Oli took a day off work and joined me for what looked like the calmest day's fishing in the whole year. And indeed it was. Barely a ripple all day, fishing in shorts and t-shirts for some of the time. Wonderful! What could be better? Well, catching fish would have been nice.
It became a frustrating day. Half the time we were waiting for the tides to pick up, and for the remaining half we were waiting for them to die down. And what little bit of enjoyable fishing in-between was spoiled by numerous seals alongside. There were news reports of Orcas in the area today, but sadly, nowhere near enough to thin out the massive seal populations that have ballooned out of all proportion over the past few years along the entire East Coast.
We started the day at Bondicarr, picking up a few mini codling and a couple of pollack of 1lb within 10 minutes, but seeing the tide fading fast we didnt linger and hurried down to Cresswell, hoping to repeat Sunday's success. On the way, we saw shoals of sandeels on the sounder, being ripped apart by terns, gannets and gulls. Positive omens we thought.
At Cresswell, there were plenty of fish to be seen on the screens, but bites were very tentative. By now, I was using a 6oz sinker only, which I swapped for a metal jig, since the tide was so slow. I had 3 codling that I measured at 47/48/50 cm, and a handful of smaller ones. Oli was doing a bit better but still so few fish. And the seals were becoming a pain by now, so we opted to go wrecking.
The drifts were a bit faster offshore, and the same clear water, down to 20 feet were promising. There were fish out there, but nothing big. My largest codling was measured at 61cm, but the rest were between 35 and 50cm. Oli had a decent pollack that sadly could not be returned alive. Otherwise, we had about 20 codling between us over the next couple of hours, but with the tide picking up we elected to try the rough ground again, but the drift was soon up to 1.5 knots, with a lot of tackle lost to snags. Oli had a colourful wrasse, but the codling were small and infrequent, so we called it a day and headed back in. Still, it was lovely to be out without being tossed about by the usual swell.
It became a frustrating day. Half the time we were waiting for the tides to pick up, and for the remaining half we were waiting for them to die down. And what little bit of enjoyable fishing in-between was spoiled by numerous seals alongside. There were news reports of Orcas in the area today, but sadly, nowhere near enough to thin out the massive seal populations that have ballooned out of all proportion over the past few years along the entire East Coast.
We started the day at Bondicarr, picking up a few mini codling and a couple of pollack of 1lb within 10 minutes, but seeing the tide fading fast we didnt linger and hurried down to Cresswell, hoping to repeat Sunday's success. On the way, we saw shoals of sandeels on the sounder, being ripped apart by terns, gannets and gulls. Positive omens we thought.
At Cresswell, there were plenty of fish to be seen on the screens, but bites were very tentative. By now, I was using a 6oz sinker only, which I swapped for a metal jig, since the tide was so slow. I had 3 codling that I measured at 47/48/50 cm, and a handful of smaller ones. Oli was doing a bit better but still so few fish. And the seals were becoming a pain by now, so we opted to go wrecking.
The drifts were a bit faster offshore, and the same clear water, down to 20 feet were promising. There were fish out there, but nothing big. My largest codling was measured at 61cm, but the rest were between 35 and 50cm. Oli had a decent pollack that sadly could not be returned alive. Otherwise, we had about 20 codling between us over the next couple of hours, but with the tide picking up we elected to try the rough ground again, but the drift was soon up to 1.5 knots, with a lot of tackle lost to snags. Oli had a colourful wrasse, but the codling were small and infrequent, so we called it a day and headed back in. Still, it was lovely to be out without being tossed about by the usual swell.
