Guess what was Hooked at Hartlepool Today....

[Tat]

I think they were about 9-10 mls off.

[davem2005]

Why wait till next year I was taking the boat to Luce bay this weekend ...but this has got me thinking

I dont know if any of you heard on the radio news tonight of \"blue sharks\" being sited of the beaches of Hartlepool, as reported by local fishermen. What next :P

Tat if you have the gear I have the boat

Dave

[Doc]

On Saturday we were about 3 to 4 miles off, we\'ve had them within 300m of the LW mark and Topey\'s had them from the shore. Last time Dave went they headed out a bit further and still got plenty, and by all accounts Rich Ward got one at 20 miles off when they got the porgie, whether thats 20 miles off or 20 miles from Whitby is anyones guess, but when I used to fish up at whitby in the mid to late 80\'s there was a couple of photo\'s in the tackle shop of 2 tope caught off a wreck quite a way off, although Tut Utterley used to target them occasionally down towards Robin Hoods bay and in Tuts Garden.

Personally I wouldn\'t get too wrapped up in distance offshore as a deterministic factor, ground type is likely to be as important, although as the season progresses I suspect that the tope will tend to move further off. Water temperature has been a major factor in their arrival and it is likely that they will move away as temperature begins to drop off. Off our neck of the woods (Bridlington Bay area) the sea temperature may peak in October, having taken 5 or 6 months to reach the peak, however, the decrease is rapid taking just a couple of months to fall back way below 10 degrees. Prey availability is another deciding factor, where are the mainstay of their diet, inshore or offshore?

The back end of the season is possibly not the best time to be searching them out unless your prepared to concentrate and spend many fruitless days looking for them, although this will apply to early or peak season, its just that numbers are likely to be greater which increases your chances of a hook up or two or three or.........

Anyway good luck, they are well worth it

[Charlton]

Well Phill, if you fish Luce Bay, (of course the NE will never be as good as this) at the top you can catch tope in very shallow water and actually at times see them picking your bait up. The you can fish the scars in 100 foot plus of water and catch plenty tope. Would suspect that would not happen over here though, but there again nobody has actually treid so you never know. Personally to start with I would fish in 50 to 150 foot of awter, smooth bottom with a few bumps in it. Channels are good to, but dont know of many around here. The dumps at Hartlepool are similar ground to one i fished when down at Anglesey.

[davem2005]

I would certainly expect to blank, particularly at this time of year, but if no one tries it we will never know.

But if anyone fancies giving it a go I am up for it next week subject to weather and the mrs letting me out to play

Dave

[Tat]

As I said previously only the skipper of Famous showed any interest and he went out on his day off to fish for blues off Hartlepool.I dunno where,or which way he went but he must of known something,cos charter skippers would\'nt waste their time on a wild goose chase.
It\'over a year since I was on that boat mind so he might have packed it in,but mebbe not.

[Tat]

By the way davem what day you on about next w/e.I\'m the same as you if the FPO and work permit I\'d like to give it a go.

[davem2005]

I am fishing Luce bay fri sat and sunday the whitby festival weds so it would have to be thurs fri or sat, obviously subject to weather but I dont mind arranging something at the last minute...in fact I always leave things to the last minute!

I certainly dont mind blanking and it has to be better than the full house of weavers I caught on feathers last monday

Dave

[PhilT]

Unfortunately I\'m working this weekend, then away for three weeekends after so it looks like I won\'t be trying this year. Best of luck to anyone who does, and I\'ll expect to hear of your success on NESA!

[Edited on 5/9/2005 by PhilT]

[Doc]

If you decide to have a go, here are some factors we\'ve found generally work in our favour, but as with all fishing not always.

Tide size can be a deciding factor; generally lower middle sized tides can fish better (based on Bridlington 5.1 to 5.5m) that means next week the more suitable tides would be on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, although they are falling and not building.

Look for an area with some relief on the seabed that may hold a channel/gully close by, some thing the fish can run along. Quite often an area of rock/boulder that abuts a sandy seabed will have a scour. Look for areas on a chart that have banks (not necessarily sand banks but areas where the seabed is elavated), these will have gullies or channels alongside. One of our main areas is heavily potted which indicates rough ground, the trick is to position the boat in such areas, but making sure that you are far enough away from pots and markers so not to get the fish caught up when they run.

Change your baits regularly, they get ravaged by crabs and other fish, and as a consequence can be useless after a very short time.

We generally use the head or tail section, and strike immediately the fish hits the bait, this has resulted in an almost 90% strike rate, don\'t let them run, as you increase the chance of deep hooked fish. However, if you fish with a larger bait (full mackerel), you\'ll need to let them have more time to manoevre the bait in their mouths before striking. This year the fish on occasion only seem to want a live full mackerel, and we\'ve had to resort to leaving them awhile before setting the hook. Try putting a number of rods out baited with different sized baits (head and tail sections, and full live/dead mackerel), see which they prefer. Again give yourself plenty of options, what works on the west coast doesn\'t necessarily work here.

As a general rule we don\'t put out a chum trail, as it doesn\'t seem to make much difference, but as you try a new mark it might not be a bad thing to try and chum.

Fresh bait is a must, mackerel is without doubt top, but we\'ve had them on eel section (again fresh live eel is a must), we\'ve tried lamprey, dab, flounder, whiting without any greater degree of success, mackerel really is the key, which is strange because I\'m not convinced that they actively feed on mackerel normally. One thing I don\'t think we have tried is Launce, live launce may well be a killer bait, and something I expect that tope will feed upon naturally. However, I would only be inclined to try live launce once I\'d identified a mark that definitely held tope.

Whatever tactics you choose it\'ll be trial and error to whatever suits the area, but they are there... somewhere... and it won\'t be long before you find them.

Good luck

Just a few shots of what to expect..... god I hope this works!!!!!!



and another!!!



and finally one for shaggy!!!!



[Edited on 5/9/2005 by Doc]

[Edited on 5/9/2005 by Doc]

[Tat]

Doc have you tried circle hooks to see if they give you a better hook u?p.If you have do you rate them?

[Doc]

We\'ve tried them and given up on them, waste of time, Dave might have a word to say on them but I can\'t remember getting a single fish on them in 4 years of persisiting with them.

[Tat]

Cheers doc,looks like it\'s 6/0 straight shanks(long,long straight shanks)

[Charlton]

Doc, just one Q, do you use a nylon rubbing lenght. Two reasons for using this, obvioulsy first to prevent a tope wrapping up in the line and snapping off if just using light main line direct to wire/nylon trace.
Second which has come about with the advent of braid. Nylon rubbing lenght, preferably sofy nylon does very little if any damge to a tope, although when wrapped up it does mark the tope. In my opinion if a tope wraps up in braid, with it being very much thinner and stronger that it will cut the tope. As i have always used nylon rubbing lenghts i only suspect this happens after seeing braid cut a topes fin, not badly, after landing when it was thrashing about before i could get the towel on. Anybody had a tope wrapped up in braid and landed it. What was the damage.

[Doc]

Alan, we use a length of 100lb Dynon as a rubbing leader, I can\'t ever remember losing a tope after it wrapped itself up in the leader, nor have we ever had one damaged by the braid cutting into its skin, this is based on at least 5 years using this system off east Yorks. Dave might remember an instance, but I can\'t.