Thursday 16 May 2013

A smooth start to May for Jamie and Stevie

Steve Kirk myself went fishing on the 4th of May - with the low tide at 14.30pm we arrived just a the tide started to push in. Starting out with a rod a piece, we fired out a couple of crab baits at close range and sat back for the action. It wasn't long before my rod tip started to bounce and I was into my first fish of the day, a wee dogfish, nowt much to shout about but hey, it's a species I didn't have this year as yet. Next I get another bite and strike into a decent flounder, then another straight after, Steve still hasn't managed to get a bite as yet and is starting to worry that he's doing something wrong, shortly after he strikes into his first fish, a nice wee plump flounder. This continues for the next hour or so with a couple of double shots of flounders and dogfish coming in as well.

Eventually we are close to being washed off the shore and move to the higher rock ledge just round the corner, I have a trace baited and ready to go and send it out. Soon after it hits the bottom the rod gets an almighty bite and the tip goes straight down and proceeds to pull the rod from the stand, I grab it, strike and nothing! - I retrieve the trace and find the crabs to be pretty much intact and send them back out again to roughly the same location as before. Again almost instantly I get a huge bite, this time I’m ready, lift the rod and it's almost pulled from my hands, I strike and feel something hugging the bottom then moving up, I beckon to Steve that I think this could be a ray, to which her replies "I've never seen a ray from here….." 2 minutes later and I’m pulling a nice Thornback from the water… - weighed in at 5lb 1oz, photos taken it's released back to the water.

The fishing was pretty much frantic and it would have been hard to fish 2 rods here as the bites were pretty much instant upon the bait hitting the water - plus it saved us using all our crab! - Next again I get another great bite then a slack liner, lift the rod, wind in the slack and get another great pull on the line, I strike and the rod doubles over, prior to the dogs and flounders this was a welcome battle to get this fish in with it fighting back and running from left to right and back again, I'm hoping it's a decent Bass, but am equally as happy to see a nice smooth hound break the surface. Thinking this was a little early for them but I’m later proved wrong. From that pint they just seemed to switch on for Steve and myself with every bait that we put out being instantly engulfed by a smoothie - there must have been that many out there in front of us that you couldn't go wrong. I was sending the same baits out 3 and 4 times without having to change it and getting the same result each time. Instant action! 

We finished off around 9 with the smoothies turning off and the return of the dogfish again. In respect of the day, a fantastic outings fishing with stacks of fish.