Deora De - Cork Harbour - 24/06/06

[phanover]

I hired the "Deora De" a 35' Offshore 105 charter boat skippered by Jim Linehan for our 4th annual work outing. While the boat itself is a newcomer to Cork Harbour for 2006, Jim has been involved in the Cork boat angling scene for many years and I remembered him from when he crewed on previous work outings we had with Cork Harbour Boats.

The boat picked up the 10 of us from the pier at Monkstown at 10am as arranged. Conditions didn't look too bad for fishing with a bit of cloud and the wind predicted at F3 to F2. We had a slight change of routine from previous trips, in that we didn't stop in the harbour for Mackerel as other charter boats had reported on the radio that they were scarce. Instead we
proceeded to an area known as "The Spits" (hope I've got that right) about 5 miles or so outside the harbour where we found two other charter boats already on station.

The conditions were a bit worse that predicted with a sea fog and visibility down to about 300 yards. It was also a bit choppy with wind gusting to F4 at times, resulting in one of the lads having a bad bout of "mal de mer" . However that didn't deter the rest of us . We were soon getting stuck into the macks and then it was straight onto the bigger stuff. Things got off to a good start when I took a 5lb Codling on small baited hookais. This was followed by other lads latching onto a good number of small 2-3lb pollack and a couple of similar sized codling. We spent the next hour or so on the drift when we hit a bit of a purple patch which saw a nine pound pollack caught, swiftly followed by 3 Ling around 5lb mark. Encouraged by this, I switched to bigger hookais (Grauvell Killers). The gamble paid off when I took a nice 9lb cod which was a PB for me!. That and the 9lb Pollack turned out to the best fish of the day.

However we weren't finished. As the sun broke though and the wind slackened off at 2 O'Clock we continued to catch a good number of smaller fish as before including a Haddock of around 3lb. I don't know how common they are around Cork, but I hadn't seen any in the 3 previous work outings.

Eventually the fishing dried up on that mark, so we headed back to just outside the mouth of the harbour for the last hour. Three or four more smallish ling were caught as well as lots of whiting in the 1-2lb range. We called it a day at five and headed back to port.

All in all a very enjoyable day out. My thanks to Jim for his advice and assistance especially to the newcomers who gave him the thumbs up.

Paul

[petekd]

Good stuff Paul, nice to get a few on deck. Sounds like a decent day out.

[dtsacs]

Paul

We are heading to Cobh this weekend for our annual weekend away, we fish Saturday & Sunday and have 2 local boats hired. We were there last year on what must have been the hottest weekend of the year, the sea was like glass both inside and outside the harbour, I don't think we will be as luckly this year.
We had plenty of Haddock last year as well as all the usual :- Cod, Ling, Conger, Pollack, Gurnard etc. etc. so we are hoping for the same this weekend (Jim how's she fishing around there at the moment).

It looks like there's 2 or 3 spots available on both Saturday's & Sunday's boats if anybody down that neck of the woods is interested (we normally fish with 8 on each boat). We get picked up from the pier across from the square in Cobh (not the Naval one) at 1000hrs and will be returning around 1700hrs both days.
Anybody interested PM me and I'll give details.

Damien

[JimC]

Howya Damien,

The forecast looks like you'll get a good enough day on Sat, Sunday could be a little dodgy. Long way off a this stage though.

The harbour is blowing hot & cold. There's a scarcity of Blonde Rays. We've had some nice plaice in the last week and there's an infestation of dabs! The harbour rock is fishing well for congers. Outside there's good enough action on the Ling Rocks. As you can see from Paul's report "The Smiths" is not too bad as well. East of Power Head is fishing well for cod and whiting. There's plenty congers showing out this way as well. Haddock have been thin on the ground this last while not in the same qtys as last year. In all the fishing not bad, you can be lucky.

1000 to 1700: Why are ye only fishing half days?

Might see ye in Cobh one of the evenings,
Jim.

[dtsacs]

Thanks Jim,

We only fish half days to make room for the drinking in the evening (it's a way of getting rid of some of the weaker people on the Sunday).

We plan to do one day on the drift outside for Cod, Pollack etc. and have an animal competition on the other day. This will all depend on the weather situation though and we might have to change to anchoring inside the harbour.
Are the Dabs of any size?, they need to be 280mm to count with us and the Plaice 300mm, (I must put my Dab traces back in my tackle box).

Feel free to call by, you won't miss us we will in the Commodore or the pub a few doors down, Friday/Saturday & Sunday nights.

Damien

[JimC]

I was fishing the bank on Sat. Two hook ledgers (1/0). Doublers of dabs most under 280 but a good few over. Got to be a pain in the end. I even had a dab take a whole squid (eventually) on a 6/0! Less plaice as you'd imagine but had them to 2.75lb (hub cap).

Enjoy!

Jim.

[RobertMcClean]

Good aul Telesport somthings never change, Bert and Robbie downing pints to bet the best of them!! best of luck Damien.

[Mohawk]

Nice report Paul!

It sounds like a very good boat and skipper you picked there, I knew slipping you that fiver would do the trick





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Jim