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Set off from Amble at 4am after dragging my sorry a**e out of bed, actually kipped on the living room floor so as not to wake everyone when I left. Turned left at the harbour mouth and headed up to Marden rocks just south of Boulmer Haven. The wind quickly came up, there again it had never really died down overnight.
Fishing was sporadic, lots of coalies in fact thousands of the little buggers. My mate was fishing with shiny lures and I was using hockies with large prawns. The coalies were taking his lures in preference to mine. Sometime around 8am we started catching the odd cod but the coalies kept coming, they went for my hockies eventually but seemed unwilling to tackle the prawns. I had surmised that after the recent winds the cod would start to come back inshore and I was hoping today was the day and the ground just south of Boulmer would produce the fishing it has done recently but it seemed we were to early. So we had about 3 smallish cod just over size. By now it was approaching high water, I decided to move closer to the rocks. I was actually expecting even more coalies from there from previous experience. I moved in and I guess about a third of a mile off the rocks I stopped. Soon as we hit bottom cod, cod and more cod. I had a doubler, the first for a long time, two 3-4lbers and my mate one, then straight back down for more. At last reasonable size up to 5lb. Although I had a net I decided to be clever and lift my biggest cod over the size, of course I lost it at the last second.
The wind was blowing hard and pushing us straight back out, we lost the cod and in our haste we hadn't noted the mark. So we moved back in but I don't think we hit the right spot again but it could have simply been a shoal moving through. We continued to pick up reasonable fish and I finished up with 10 good keepers and we threw many many small cod back. Also had a pollack and only one Mackerel, we also kept a good sized coalie.
The cod must be moving into the rocky areas at high water seeking food they were all filled with small crabs or possibly lobsters, anyway they were small orange crunchy things with claws in their stomachs.
Since we never catch big coalies I guess when they reach a reasonable size they head off for pastures new, I'm wondering if this is the time, they seem to massing for an exodus. Coming in I spoke to some people fishing on Pan Bush just off the harbour mouth, they were also plagued by coalies but had picked up a reasonable cod also.
There seems to be plenty of fish about and this weekend might see them return in very good numbers close in. The large prawns from Morrison seem to do the trick, I think all the cod went for the prawn, they stay on the hook and can be stored in the freezer. I recommend them as good bait.
Fishing was sporadic, lots of coalies in fact thousands of the little buggers. My mate was fishing with shiny lures and I was using hockies with large prawns. The coalies were taking his lures in preference to mine. Sometime around 8am we started catching the odd cod but the coalies kept coming, they went for my hockies eventually but seemed unwilling to tackle the prawns. I had surmised that after the recent winds the cod would start to come back inshore and I was hoping today was the day and the ground just south of Boulmer would produce the fishing it has done recently but it seemed we were to early. So we had about 3 smallish cod just over size. By now it was approaching high water, I decided to move closer to the rocks. I was actually expecting even more coalies from there from previous experience. I moved in and I guess about a third of a mile off the rocks I stopped. Soon as we hit bottom cod, cod and more cod. I had a doubler, the first for a long time, two 3-4lbers and my mate one, then straight back down for more. At last reasonable size up to 5lb. Although I had a net I decided to be clever and lift my biggest cod over the size, of course I lost it at the last second.
The wind was blowing hard and pushing us straight back out, we lost the cod and in our haste we hadn't noted the mark. So we moved back in but I don't think we hit the right spot again but it could have simply been a shoal moving through. We continued to pick up reasonable fish and I finished up with 10 good keepers and we threw many many small cod back. Also had a pollack and only one Mackerel, we also kept a good sized coalie.
The cod must be moving into the rocky areas at high water seeking food they were all filled with small crabs or possibly lobsters, anyway they were small orange crunchy things with claws in their stomachs.
Since we never catch big coalies I guess when they reach a reasonable size they head off for pastures new, I'm wondering if this is the time, they seem to massing for an exodus. Coming in I spoke to some people fishing on Pan Bush just off the harbour mouth, they were also plagued by coalies but had picked up a reasonable cod also.
There seems to be plenty of fish about and this weekend might see them return in very good numbers close in. The large prawns from Morrison seem to do the trick, I think all the cod went for the prawn, they stay on the hook and can be stored in the freezer. I recommend them as good bait.
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