Open Shore Sweepstake 26th October

A PB Bass for Martin

Torn boots, broken rods, lost reel handles, big fuel bills whilst wandering along beaches at night in the rain....

A couple of knee replacements might be needed in the near future but after a handful of decent fish in the last month he eventually got there - 71cm.

Two species desperados do whatever it takes

Daz and I headed down to Cairnryan with his 8ft inflatable yesterday and fished inside the old coal pier. I knew there were a few species here, but we weren't expecting to end up with seventeen different ones in five hours, and not a single LSD.

Baits were wee bits of ragworm or fresh mussel on size 4 sabikis fished on light spinning rods with a 1oz weight. Ferries passed us in and out four times with nothing other than a very light swell for a couple of minutes each time. As we fished either side of HW, the pier probably absorbed most of the wash.

Species caught;
1 Rock goby
2 Ballan Wrasse
3 Corkwing wrasse
4 Goldsinny wrasse
5 Rock Cook wrasse
6 Cod
7 Haddock
8 Pollack
9 Coalfish
10 Mackerel
11 Herring
12 LSSS
13 SSSS
14 Dab
15 Pouting
16 Poor Cod
17 Whiting

Daz was only short of a cuckoo for the wrasse grand slam, but 5hrs is a long time without stretching your legs Later in the afternoon, the water was thick with tiny herring and small sandeels. These were being chased by palm sized coalies and mackerel. The mackerel we filletted were stuffed with herring.

Port Logan for Stu and Gordon

With the Arbroath charter being cancelled, I was at a loose end when Stuart called on Friday night to see if I had any alternative arrangements?

Our cunning plan was to visit Port Logan where Stu's target species would be a plaice for the 2013 species hunt. The forecast had been very changeable with three forecasters providing three different wind directions and speeds. We arrived at logan to find Team Robertson already there with At Last and Cassandra getting ready to launch.

With a fair size of swell in the morning, we were pretty much coast hugging up and down to a few different marks. Stuart got not one plaice but two. My hunt for a red gurnard proved less fruitful and it's still on my target list.

Without really trying - we ended up with twelve species on the day; Cod, Whiting, Pollack, Haddock, LSD, SS Sea Scorpion, Ballan Wrasse, Tub Gurnard, Grey Gurnard, Mackerel, Dab and Plaice.

 

A striped bruser

Stewart put a couple of slow Loch Ken trips behind him and had some great sport with Pike and Perch.

This is a Crayfish crunching fatty!