People: petekd, phanover and me
Duration: 08:30 -19:30
Tide: LW about 10.30ish
Weather: calm, not warm, not cold
Bait: crab, razor, mackerel, rag
Rigs: ray rigs, shamrock animal rigs, small flowing traces, 3 hook flappers etc etc, spinners
Results: dabs, dogs, huss, congers, ballan wrasse, pollack, grey gurnard and mackerel
Report: Thought the captain would make a report, but he hasn't, so I will....
Father's day species hunt extravaganza for us. Our plan was to go and bag a few more species that we hadn't got this year yet, namely blonde ray, gilt head, golden grey mullet, corkwing and thornie (various combinations of those required by those onboard).
Hit the bank early on and anchored up for the blondes all baiting up with squid. Very quiet. Pete fishing two rods got a dog and some dabs fairly quick. Soon we were joined by various other SAI boats and members, -Jim, Martin, Donal and maybe some others?-who were opting to fish on the drift. With a bit of craic exhanged we carried on fishing at anchor as the others drifted up and down past us. With no sign of any blondes we were fishing for dabs, Pete and Paul getting a fair few and me getting nothing :oops:
With the tide starting to turn we headed off to another mark to try and pick up a plaice. We managed a few more dabs (fish of the day really) and I think Paul picked up a gurnard. All these taken on rag or mack or combinations of both. I managed my first few fish of the day here - only took me two hours to get one!!
With an eye to the more exotic species on our lists we headed off to another mark to try for the gilt heads and golden greys. Another boat was there before us with no luck, we stuck it out for about half an hour before deciding there wasn't much on there either, conditions not looking good for it. With our lack of species and success starting to worry us we thought we'd hit the old faithful of harbour rock and pick up a few. On the way we decided to hit a huss mark that Paul knew of as I'd never caught a huss before. With his expert guidance, Pete's manouvering and my anchor dropping skills we hit the jackpot almost straight away with 8 huss to the boat in about 5 minutes. Paul bringing a double shot in after about a minute. I had a couple in quick succession, Pete had a few.
Great stuff, pretty hectic. Paul got the lions share with his stern position. Seemed to be a certain colour the huss found attractive as well which was noted by all onboard for future reference.....
Whilst this was going on and after it had quietened down, we were spinning for pollack, of which we had a good number, and trying for a sea trout that had jumped up near us - which we didn't see again.
There were a few missed bites on the baited rods. Then I was into a double shot of a conger and a dogfish.
Great mark! I had fished it loads of times spinning in the past little realising what lay beneath.
Satisified with our haul there, we headed off to harbour rock in search of some wrasse, cod and some more congers.
Anchored up, Paul opting for big crab baits for cod, me with rag for some wrasse, Pete with one rod out for congers I think and another for wrasse.
We were straight into some decent ballans. Same story as with the huss, got a fair few in quick succession, quietened down with the odd one after that, Paul swapping over to wrasse gear just in time to get one before the rush was over. I persevered hoping for a corkwing, but what I got was another conger. Not what I was expecting on a size four hook with a third of a rag on it :lol: especially when Pete's bait was only a few feet away. Great fun getting that to the boat, had to play it up gently the 30 feet or so to the boat. Got it up beside the boat for a look, was going to unhook it when it neatly straightened the hook and slunk off back to the depths.
Drifted the rock for a little while to see what else we could pick up, but quite slow with the odd ballan and pollack showing up.
Headed off to yet another mark to see could we get ourselves a thornie. Our luck had returned to normal, with nothing doing. We then returned to where we started and drifted with flowing traces trying to pick up some plaice, but all we managed were more dabs, with singles and doubles coming on every drop.
Paul, very obligingly, went on mackerel duty and made sure we had enough for a feed when we went home.
Quite an enjoyable day, didn't get everything on the wish list, but after my slow start I turned out quite well. Time flew by, can't believe we were fishing for 11 hours or so. Thanks to Paul and Pete for a good day out, plus I can still look forward to those other species another day....
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