Tigger II, Cork Harbour 02/06/2009

People: me and William

Duration: 18.30 - 23.30

Tide: LW 20.30

Weather: warm, flat clam

Bait: fresh mack

Rigs: flowing traces, conger rigs, feathers, hokkais, sabikkis.....

Results: mackerel, pollack, doggies, poorcod, pouting, whiting and a plaice

Report: Been itching to get out with all this good weather over the weekend and got an opportunity last night. It was a mixed day for me with some good fishing, but bad boating .
Headed out in the harbour to beautiful conditions. Took a mack drop just out beyond Roches point and was rewarded with my first mackerel of the season. They were sporadic, coming in ones and two, but we got enough for bait without too much hassle.
By this time there was a little bit of water sloshing around, at first I though my drain hole was blocked, but turns out the water was coming in this way (via a missing screw in my keel band as it later turned out). Bailed it out, blocked up the drain hole and continued.
Headed out to some rough ground for conger. Lots of small bites on our big baits, William landed a small almost bronze coloured poorcod on a 6/0. Stuck down a smaller rig and pulled in some small pouting and poorcod which are much easier to tell apart when you have them both together. Had another rod out for garfish, at least one of which was skipping around the boat at distance, but to no avail.
Some doggies then put in an appearance with one a drop for a while.

After a little more bailing, we headed back in. On the way, my engine started revving, but no propulsion. Knocking down the revs gave us propulsion, so not sure what happened, maybe a shear pin starting to go or some gearing slipping? I had passed between two well spaced out buoys at the time, so I suppose it is possible we caught a rope or net or something, but no evidence of it.

Anyway after holding our breath, we were still able to move albeit slowly, so we headed back in to the harbour and found a massive breaking shoal of mackerel just off Roche's point, so we got some fresh macks for food purposes.

With perhaps overplaced confidence in the engine (had oars and it was flat calm so wasn't overly worried), we the drifted the bank picking up a half decent plaice on my first drop and then a succession of small whiting.

Did a small bit of trolling for pollack as we waited for the tide to fill enough for landing, and then limped home in the dark where we were visited by an inquisitive rib (not sure who, might have been the coastguard??) who wondered what we were doing out with no lights (battery not charged) and motoring so slowly. A quick scan of the boat with their torch showed we weren't up to anything illegal and after making sure we knew our way home they headed off again.

Got back to the slip without further incident only to have my winch strap break as I was winding in the boat, luckily it was close to the front of the trailer, so didn't lose the boat back off it.

Anyway, fishing back up to usual harbour standards, weather beautiful and other than wet feet made it back ok. Bit of boat maintenance required before my next trip out though

You where lucky with a day of good fishing but bad luck with the boat, trust me I no how tou feel as am still waiting for my gearbox prob from last trip and sitting here when eveeryone else is out is doing my fecking head in

Glad I missed that Scottie..... Ah well, alls well that ends well and all that. Let me know if you need a hand playing with the engine. Kicking myself for leaving the Hog in Donegal after the weekend but I just couldnt face towing it back down after the weekends shenanigans.

Cheers lads, and Pete thinking Thursday evening for bit of tinkering, want to fix a roller on the trailer too, so could do with a hand getting the boat off..... - we can use my new garage!

No worries, Thursday suits me. Might be looking for a dig out setting up that trailer for the Orkney myself too....

Nice report Lee,

Just fill the screw hole with some silkaflex before putting the new scre in. This should seal it up nicely. Might need a dab or two at the edge of the keel band as well

Do you an extra battery? Let me know, asn I'll make sure one finds it's way to you. The Solar trickle charge from Maplin might be worth a go as well. I think they were selling them off for €20 quid not so long ago.

Kev

Cheers Kev,

I actually have a few 'small' gel batteries for the fish finder which I can run the lights off as well, and a bigger one which Pete gave me which I think he got from you (wouldn't say no to another though )?? Just hadn't any charged up, at least I had batteries for my radio and gps.
The solar trickle charger is a great idea, has crossed my mind before, just never got around to it. Also keep meaning to rig up a charging circuit off the engine, again never got around to it.....
Anyway, no excuse now to put things off, what with a lackey to do my bidding all lined up for Thursday

So bilge pump fitting, battery fitting and charging, hole repairing, trailer repairing - busy evening in store.

Nice to get your hands on a lackey for a day. Wouldn't mind that myself.

I'll pop another battery aside for you, usual charge Although that one I gave you should be able to run everything for a day, especially if connect up the engine charge and the solar unit. The solar units comes with croc clips so could be connected to any battery. Very handy for during the week. What type of engine do you have? Does it have an output?

Kev

Hi Kev , 4 stroke yamaha 15HP 2001. I am just asssuming it has a power out. Was going to rig it up on my old 2 stroke Johnson engine, got as far as getting the oscilliscope on it to check what it was giving out etc, but did no more.
I am only running the fishfinder usually on the battery anyway, so even my small ones last the day, although I'll run more off it when I fit in the big battery, been sitting waiting to go in since last year.

Just had a quick look. I think you have at least a 100W alternator, which should do the job for charging a single battery with a light load. Just check that there is a red black coming off an alternator. If there are a couple of green wires then you will need to fit a rectifier. The 2 green wires are AC.

Kev