Andy 1965
Well-known member
- Joined
- Oct 18, 2020
- Messages
- 402
- Reaction score
- 3,648
- Points
- 93
- Location
- North Wales
- Favourite Fishing
- Lure
After the poor fishing of recent weeks, it took some doing to motivate myself to head out again last night, but apart from some rain earlier in the evening, the forecast wasn’t too bad, so I decided to throw caution to the force 4 winds and to give it a go.
Once more the session was to be a local one due to lockdown, so I wasn’t expecting much but I hoped that a move to a different spot would throw up some different fish. I arrived at my chosen spot about 2 hours after low water to find only a small surf running, this wasn’t ideal and the water was also gin clear, perfect conditions for lures but not so good for dirty bait
, at least with it being overcast there wasn’t any light from the full moon.
In a now familiar routine, I rigged 1 rod up with a 2 hook flapper, baited with a lug and squid cocktail and a sandeel, while the second rod was rigged with a pennel pulley dropper and baited with a tail section of bluey, I then sat back to wait. After a couple of moves to stay ahead of the flooding tide, I decided to reel in and check the baits but it didn’t bode well to find them completely untouched
.
The night had barely begun though and I had hours of fishing ahead of me, so I tried again and half an hour later I was just watching the rod tips when completely without warning, one of them started bouncing
. Before I could get to it, the rod tip straightened suddenly and the line dropped slack and my first thought was that a schoolie had snaffled my bait. Lifting the rod from the tripod I walked towards the water’s edge, while simultaneously reeling in the slack, and eventually I regained contact with my gear. Surprisingly though, there didn’t seem to be any extra weight on the line and it looked like I’d missed it! 
I was gutted to miss what could have been my only decent hit of the night, but there was nothing for it other than to reel in and bait up again. Cursing my luck I reeled in steadily, but as the line reached the surf tables I was shocked to see it head abruptly off to the left, there was something on my line after all and as I lifted it out of the water it went completely bonkers 
. Not the bass I first thought but a surprise sea trout! 
After weeks of catching just the occasional whiting and rockling, this was the last thing I expected, but it was very welcome nonetheless
. After posing for a few souvenir snaps, it swam off strongly into the clear water and I immediately got back to the fishing with a renewed sense of optimism for the rest of the night.
Of course this was the kiss of death for the fishing, and for the next couple of hours the baits continued to come back as nicely presented as they were when I cast them out. After an hour of this I decided the large baits in particular were a complete waste of time, so the pulley dropper was switched for a second flapper, but still there was nothing doing. I kept trying though and eventually I spotted the tiniest of rattles on one of the rods. I watched intently, hoping that it would develop into something better, but it wasn’t to be and 5 minutes later I reeled in to re-bait. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I could feel a small bit of extra weight on the line and sure enough, my second fish of the night soon emerged from the surf, a greedy little 5-bearded rockling which had somehow managed to hook itself on the exposed point of the 1/0
.
After this I was forced to accept that there wasn’t anything bigger than rockling about, so reasoning that catching small stuff was better than catching nothing at all, I decided to scale down my gear again. One of the flappers was now switched for a boom rig, armed with size 8s and baited with tiny pieces of lug and sandeel, and this did the trick. On the very next cast I was pleasantly surprised to catch species number 4 for 2021 and my second new one of the evening, a mini flounder.
They all count though I told myself
.
Small hooks and baits were definitely the way to go and next up was a double header, another slightly bigger flounder on one hook and rockling number 2 of the session on the other hook.
It looked like I was on a roll now, but sadly I was mistaken and as high water approached, the fishing died off again and even the tiny baits were left untouched
.
My original plan was to give it until midnight, and with the weather having settled by now I saw no reason to change that. For the remainder of the session I switched to boom rigs on both rods, in an attempt to add a few more bits and pieces to my bag, but apart from 1 more rockling on the last cast of the night
high water and the first hour or so of the ebb passed without any further excitement.
So with no sign of an end to lockdown just yet, I’ve got at least another 3 weeks of local fishing to look forward to, but at least I know that as well as the smaller stuff, there is also a remote chance of a bonus catch
.
Once more the session was to be a local one due to lockdown, so I wasn’t expecting much but I hoped that a move to a different spot would throw up some different fish. I arrived at my chosen spot about 2 hours after low water to find only a small surf running, this wasn’t ideal and the water was also gin clear, perfect conditions for lures but not so good for dirty bait
, at least with it being overcast there wasn’t any light from the full moon.In a now familiar routine, I rigged 1 rod up with a 2 hook flapper, baited with a lug and squid cocktail and a sandeel, while the second rod was rigged with a pennel pulley dropper and baited with a tail section of bluey, I then sat back to wait. After a couple of moves to stay ahead of the flooding tide, I decided to reel in and check the baits but it didn’t bode well to find them completely untouched
.The night had barely begun though and I had hours of fishing ahead of me, so I tried again and half an hour later I was just watching the rod tips when completely without warning, one of them started bouncing
. Before I could get to it, the rod tip straightened suddenly and the line dropped slack and my first thought was that a schoolie had snaffled my bait. Lifting the rod from the tripod I walked towards the water’s edge, while simultaneously reeling in the slack, and eventually I regained contact with my gear. Surprisingly though, there didn’t seem to be any extra weight on the line and it looked like I’d missed it! I was gutted to miss what could have been my only decent hit of the night, but there was nothing for it other than to reel in and bait up again. Cursing my luck I reeled in steadily, but as the line reached the surf tables I was shocked to see it head abruptly off to the left, there was something on my line after all and as I lifted it out of the water it went completely bonkers . Not the bass I first thought but a surprise sea trout! After weeks of catching just the occasional whiting and rockling, this was the last thing I expected, but it was very welcome nonetheless
. After posing for a few souvenir snaps, it swam off strongly into the clear water and I immediately got back to the fishing with a renewed sense of optimism for the rest of the night.Of course this was the kiss of death for the fishing, and for the next couple of hours the baits continued to come back as nicely presented as they were when I cast them out. After an hour of this I decided the large baits in particular were a complete waste of time, so the pulley dropper was switched for a second flapper, but still there was nothing doing. I kept trying though and eventually I spotted the tiniest of rattles on one of the rods. I watched intently, hoping that it would develop into something better, but it wasn’t to be and 5 minutes later I reeled in to re-bait. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I could feel a small bit of extra weight on the line and sure enough, my second fish of the night soon emerged from the surf, a greedy little 5-bearded rockling which had somehow managed to hook itself on the exposed point of the 1/0
.After this I was forced to accept that there wasn’t anything bigger than rockling about, so reasoning that catching small stuff was better than catching nothing at all, I decided to scale down my gear again. One of the flappers was now switched for a boom rig, armed with size 8s and baited with tiny pieces of lug and sandeel, and this did the trick. On the very next cast I was pleasantly surprised to catch species number 4 for 2021 and my second new one of the evening, a mini flounder.
They all count though I told myself
.Small hooks and baits were definitely the way to go and next up was a double header, another slightly bigger flounder on one hook and rockling number 2 of the session on the other hook.
It looked like I was on a roll now, but sadly I was mistaken and as high water approached, the fishing died off again and even the tiny baits were left untouched
.My original plan was to give it until midnight, and with the weather having settled by now I saw no reason to change that. For the remainder of the session I switched to boom rigs on both rods, in an attempt to add a few more bits and pieces to my bag, but apart from 1 more rockling on the last cast of the night
high water and the first hour or so of the ebb passed without any further excitement.
So with no sign of an end to lockdown just yet, I’ve got at least another 3 weeks of local fishing to look forward to, but at least I know that as well as the smaller stuff, there is also a remote chance of a bonus catch
.
.
