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Walking down onto the pontoon at Amble marina on Saturday morning gave a hint as to what was going on at sea. The marina was full of small herring, and while it is perfectly normal for the herring to appear around now, it was a surprise when we got out of the piers to find the sea completely empty of seabirds. The previous weekend had seen hundreds of puffins, terns, guillemots and gannets around in the bay, all feasting on sandeels, or mackerel that in turn were preying on the sandeels. Clearly, the exodus of sandeel to deeper water had occurred some time during the week, and this made fishing much harder for us.
Perhaps it was also that the tides were big, and we do generally find mid-tides to be more productive. Anyway, the result was a much quieter session than the previous couple of weeks. We went north, and to be fair, picked up some decent codling at Seaton Point, but it was early doors, and rather than keep them, they went back in the expectation that we would get more later on in the day. As it turned out, the fish did not play ball. We pushed on to Craster, but the reef fishes better in the flood tide, and there wasn't a lot going on apart from a few coalies and a couple of small codling. We could see them on the fishfinder, and a lot of them too, but it was hard to provoke a response. We changed lures, varying the colours and size, and even had some frozen prawns to tempt them, but it was slow. I even dropped some sabikis down, knowing they will catch anything and everything, but found the best method was not to move them as you would normally do, but to let them lie on the bottom and use the fast drift to get the sabikis to drift past their mouths.
We pushed on further to Newton, where things were patchy. The usual marks produced little, but on almost featureless ground we stumbled upon a lot of codling, all sizes, from 8oz upwards. I picked up my one and only mackerel of the day too. While at Newton, around the red can, we saw a paddleboarder make his way out to us from Beadnall, no mean feat in itself, though without a lifevest a little foolhardy, but then he surprised us both by producing a fishing rod, and was actually started to catch! Whoever you are, we salute you, but would encourage a little more safety gear.
We had a few more codling and some large coalies, and I got a ballan wrasse too, but it was around half the number of fish compared to recent weeks. Nothing of any size to photograph either. At least it was calm, if wet at times.
Perhaps it was also that the tides were big, and we do generally find mid-tides to be more productive. Anyway, the result was a much quieter session than the previous couple of weeks. We went north, and to be fair, picked up some decent codling at Seaton Point, but it was early doors, and rather than keep them, they went back in the expectation that we would get more later on in the day. As it turned out, the fish did not play ball. We pushed on to Craster, but the reef fishes better in the flood tide, and there wasn't a lot going on apart from a few coalies and a couple of small codling. We could see them on the fishfinder, and a lot of them too, but it was hard to provoke a response. We changed lures, varying the colours and size, and even had some frozen prawns to tempt them, but it was slow. I even dropped some sabikis down, knowing they will catch anything and everything, but found the best method was not to move them as you would normally do, but to let them lie on the bottom and use the fast drift to get the sabikis to drift past their mouths.
We pushed on further to Newton, where things were patchy. The usual marks produced little, but on almost featureless ground we stumbled upon a lot of codling, all sizes, from 8oz upwards. I picked up my one and only mackerel of the day too. While at Newton, around the red can, we saw a paddleboarder make his way out to us from Beadnall, no mean feat in itself, though without a lifevest a little foolhardy, but then he surprised us both by producing a fishing rod, and was actually started to catch! Whoever you are, we salute you, but would encourage a little more safety gear.
We had a few more codling and some large coalies, and I got a ballan wrasse too, but it was around half the number of fish compared to recent weeks. Nothing of any size to photograph either. At least it was calm, if wet at times.
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