More specimen rays, Donegal Bay, 9th, 10th September, 2014

[johnwest]

People:Just me

Duration:7hrs and 10hrs

Tide:all stages.

Weather:Excellent, warm, sunny, slight to no breeze.

Bait: Feathers, mackerel, scad, sliding boom trace, 2 boom pater noster, baited muppets, shads.

Rigs:

Results:2 specimen rays, 3 varieties of rays, 14 species in all.

Report:
Continuing good weather prompted another couple of days afloat.
Day 1. On the way to a reliable mackerel mark, the sounder showed a solid ball hugging the bottom, this turned out to be a mixed shoal of mackerel and scad, the latter adding to this year’s species list. A few drops at the mackerel mark topped up the bait supply though this time the mackerel had to compete with pollack which were coming in strings of 5 on most drops. So with bait sorted I headed for the ray mark which produced a specimen painted ray on my last trip. First fish was a 9lb painted ray followed by a 4lb thornback. Next up was another painted ray which weighed in at 10lb 2oz, another specimen. This one had the tail of a mackerel skeleton which I had thrown in earlier showing at the back of its mouth; the value of groundbaiting? Another thornback at 8lb 12oz which took a strip of scad proved to be the last action on this particular mark so I headed for a mixed ground area; this was infested with pollack around the 2.5lb size though a couple of smallish pouting did manage to steal the bait. By now the wind had died completely and the almost non-existent drift probably didn’t help.

Day 2. I stocked up on bait at the usual spot and this time I got my first mini-macks of the year. With enough decent mackerel in the bait box I decided to try a new mark today which was a bit further to travel but proved to be well worth the effort. 10 mins into the first drift produced a 9lb painted ray, a good start, and the next fish was a 10lb 4oz painted ray, another specimen. The rest of the afternoon produced a tally of 9 thornbacks from 2.5lbs to 6.5lbs and 6 spotted rays from 2lb 8oz up to 3lb 14oz, a new p.b. for me. I have never caught that many spotteds before; in fact I exceeded my previous lifetime total of 5! The mark also produced 4 dabs, a few dogfish and late on, a nice turbot so this new mark will be visited again. I then moved to the deeper water mixed ground mark to finish off the day. This threw up a mixture of small fish including pouting, poorcod, ballan wrasse, whiting, cuckoo wrasse and pollack but sadly still no ling for supper (should have kept the turbot!). I did hook one decent fish but after a few shakes of the head and dives to the bottom, it threw the hook. However with another couple of specimens, a p.b. and a good variety of species it wasn’t a bad trip.

[johnwest]

Just a few more photos;

[Sweetwrasse]

Couple of great days out there JW

[chuckaroo]

2 fine days afloat there JW. thats a crackin array of rays (ive said that before ), some monsters there too! beauties, great stuff
and a lovely turbot amongst a pile of other fish happy days
great pics, appreciated

what about s.strand soon enough..?

[johnwest]

Well done. Stunning fish. Thats what its all about thanks for sharing