BONITO DOWNINGS CO DONEGAL 21ST AUGUST tope on a tangled rop

[dan belfast]

:Oops: mariner sea angling club and al and jordan as guests
Weather: ok
Rigs:eveything
Results: mackerel,pollock,coalies,pouting,red tub and grey gurnard, scad and a tope
And dogs


Time for another boat trip. We have become regular vistors to downings over the years , thanks to the variety of good fishing and the excellent skipper trevor ryder. We set from port at around 9.30am and made our way out, a quick stop for mackerel and we were of to fish the adacious wreck. From previous reports of mine you can tell the fishing has been excellent but not in this case optisim was quite high though from first drop when I caught a nice ling but these were really few and far between . There was a lot of coalies about and not much else was getting a chance. Then I got a strange bite and pulled up a nice ling minus its body and tail :d :d this could of been anything but trevor said there has been a fair lot of probeagles round the wreck so you never no. Around mid afternoon the pollock fishing steadied up and the ling fishing also improved a fair bit also. Trevor the asked did we want to fish the lineburner as there was a chance of nice codling,haddock,spiecimen tub or even the chance of a dencent tope.

We started slow enough again but the fishing picked up with a lot of gurnards coming on board and lots of fair sized mackerel. All of a sudden we were greeted with a huge basking shark which trevor said had been in the area for a few weeks. A change of drift resulted in the first tope hit a huge bang bang bang on my mate alans rod but over excitement got the better of him and he struck to early after several more hits including a crackin run on als rod which again was lost to over excitement up stepped young jordan with his 12lb class rod and 20lb mono to upstage us all at first glance it looked as though he had hooked a decent big ling or something but no it was a crackin tope. He played it like a pro and gave the rest of us an exhibition on how to do it. He let it run when it wanted run and bullied it when the fish tired. Exceelent wee man well done. Anyway after a bit of a tangle trevor managed to get the tailer on and the fish was boated a lovely tope just under the 20lb mark.After a lot pics and a lot of smiles lol the fish was released to fight another day. We decided that was enough for the day and it was lines up. On way back in wee seen a lovely big sunfish also.


Verdict: the days fishing was poor enough considering the usual standard of the wreck fishing. The tope soon made up for it and a certain young man will have something to remember in the futre. Red bay in 2 weeks is our next trip so will stick up another report the. Al will post photos when there resized.

Last edited by dan belfast on Tue Aug 23, 2011 4:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

soory abou spelling

some pics

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And jordan strikes again well done young man .

nice wee pics AL

nice 1 boys!!!!!!!!!!!

great report dan. you pretty much covered everything in it man. i would love to have seen whatever the hell it was that chomped your ling over the wreck . just to give everyone an idea of scale i reckon your ling was the same size as the one i had not too far off 7lb before it got smashed!! from the pics it looks like something had the enitre fish in it's mouth and tried to chomp it from behind the head before you gave it a good pull and skinned it for 12 or so inches before it just bit through the fish something like stripping back the plastic of copper wire. if only it had have taken it a few inches higher you might have hooked the ling munching robber!!. ah but sure it would'nt be a proper days fishing without at least 1 story of the one that got away lol!!
both myself and alan had a chance for a tope too if alan had of let it run a bit longer and i had of tackled up properly my size 2 snap link swivel got bent clean out and the fish dissappeared with my hook and bait . my own fault for locking down the drag instead of letting it run when it wanted to ah well,,,, we live and learn .
but jordan was a diamond playing that tope on his light pollacking gear and getting the fish to the boat and landed . althow i gotta admitt my heart was in my mouth until trevor roped it and got it on board . it would have been a cruel twist if it had have broken free at the side of the boat!! jordan would have been in after it .
many thanks again to your club for inviting us out with you again a great bunch of lads to fish with, and the banter was mighty

And jordan strikes again well done young man .

cheers mitch, jordan was at his work yet again he's not gonna be allowed to enter the biggest fish pool any more after showing us all up again

thanks Al you and wee man always more than welcome

thanks Al you and wee man always more than welcome