Well, Ive heard it many times and said the same myself on occasions but the phrase "you don't get better than that" hase been cancelled for previous trips and re-instated for todays.
It was just wall to wall fishing or should that be drift to drift
Although everyone is pre-ocupied today with the weather and floods and football matches being called off and Satellite TV signals being lost etc. etc. if you had been with us today you would have seen a completely different story. If, that is, you'd been out on the sea before 5.00am.
We were greeted at 5.00 with a beautiful sky, a flat sea, no wind, the sun coming up and the expectations of a great days fishing ..... (and boy it was).
Of late we've been visiting more distant places about the 12 to 15 mile marks in search of bigger fish but in recent weeks these seem to have dropped off in their offerings and the medium distance wrecks about 5-6 mile have started to show.
Today we had a hunch (and a whisper in the ear) that a wreck we fished last week was beginning to hot up so our first port of call was at number XXX in the GPS.
We got there about 5.15am ish to find we were not first ..... , but then again the boats there already were the ones tipping us the whisper
From the off it was just fish after fish, at first it was coley and whiting but then as the sun rose it became Cod with Cod with Codling.
I can't remember the number of (wait for it) .... double headers , triple headers and quadruple headers I seen today from the boats over this wreck (or close to it , not necessarily over it).
We took (by accident) 3 mackerel and kept for bait, but never needed it, Tony took some squid but again never needed it, everything today was either pirk, hokaii, or shad ....... unbaited.
Myself I stuck solely to shads, Tony tried some pirking but in the main also stuck to shads.
It was the most awesome fishing trip to date (and I`ve said that a few times but this tops them all) every minute your lure was at the bottom it was being attacked by whiting, mackerel, coley or cod it was 100% bite detection all day.
I think we should re-name this particular wreck St Marys 2 as it was like fishing at St Marys there was so many boats around today ...... but all good craic between us (many NESA members on these boats I'm sure so I look forward to the replies)
At one point we shouted over to bert on Shady asking how he was doing and how many he had , the reply of "about up to our knees" was probably fair for the day ........
We came, we fished, we caught and we went home just about sums up the day, at 9.45am we decided (bearing in mind the amount of cleaning and filleting we were about to take on) to give it until 10.00am then call it a day and make our way back, there's only so much fishing a body can stand also of course there was that forcast of rain to follow which so far had held off and kept us dry in the sun. There were even signs of fishermen bearing all and taking in the tan.
A new species for myself today a Scad or Horse Mackerel, first I've had of these a strange very boney exterior fish with some pretty fearsome armour in way of spikes ... see the picture.
On the way back as Tony did his crew duties of cleaning the catch it did start to rain and by the time we got to Royal Quays it was chucking it down ..... but believe me it did not deter our smiles ..........
Today we had a substantial catch and we returned a substantial amount, probably as many as we kept .... boy, it was awesome ....... I wonder how long this will last ?
Statistics especially from a skippers point of view were brilliant.
1 wreck visited.
20 miles covered (of which 25% were on the drift, so fuel free)
This is a good one ....... ONE weight lost
approx 4 lures (shads) bitten to death past the point of use
Catch ..... Substantial (although all under 8lb)
Apologies if the report seems a bit long winded but there was just so much going on today ....
as ever , a few pics of the day .... (even these I've had to try and limit as there are so many )
Forget the Rain, this was the view at 4.45am from the marina fuel pontoon.......
As ever the sunrise ... (see it didn't rain all day )
Tony with a shad caught codling
and a one for myself ...
and a better one ...
Tonys Triple Header ....
The Scad ... a new species to me ...... (well armoured. almost a knights suit)
Busy time with many boats in the run ... great stuff !
Tony but this time a simple double header
Just to top it off .... a couple of boxes of fillets for us .....
Simply Awesome .........
cheers
Norman
It was just wall to wall fishing or should that be drift to drift
Although everyone is pre-ocupied today with the weather and floods and football matches being called off and Satellite TV signals being lost etc. etc. if you had been with us today you would have seen a completely different story. If, that is, you'd been out on the sea before 5.00am.
We were greeted at 5.00 with a beautiful sky, a flat sea, no wind, the sun coming up and the expectations of a great days fishing ..... (and boy it was).
Of late we've been visiting more distant places about the 12 to 15 mile marks in search of bigger fish but in recent weeks these seem to have dropped off in their offerings and the medium distance wrecks about 5-6 mile have started to show.
Today we had a hunch (and a whisper in the ear) that a wreck we fished last week was beginning to hot up so our first port of call was at number XXX in the GPS.
We got there about 5.15am ish to find we were not first ..... , but then again the boats there already were the ones tipping us the whisper
From the off it was just fish after fish, at first it was coley and whiting but then as the sun rose it became Cod with Cod with Codling.
I can't remember the number of (wait for it) .... double headers , triple headers and quadruple headers I seen today from the boats over this wreck (or close to it , not necessarily over it).
We took (by accident) 3 mackerel and kept for bait, but never needed it, Tony took some squid but again never needed it, everything today was either pirk, hokaii, or shad ....... unbaited.
Myself I stuck solely to shads, Tony tried some pirking but in the main also stuck to shads.
It was the most awesome fishing trip to date (and I`ve said that a few times but this tops them all) every minute your lure was at the bottom it was being attacked by whiting, mackerel, coley or cod it was 100% bite detection all day.
I think we should re-name this particular wreck St Marys 2 as it was like fishing at St Marys there was so many boats around today ...... but all good craic between us (many NESA members on these boats I'm sure so I look forward to the replies)
At one point we shouted over to bert on Shady asking how he was doing and how many he had , the reply of "about up to our knees" was probably fair for the day ........
We came, we fished, we caught and we went home just about sums up the day, at 9.45am we decided (bearing in mind the amount of cleaning and filleting we were about to take on) to give it until 10.00am then call it a day and make our way back, there's only so much fishing a body can stand also of course there was that forcast of rain to follow which so far had held off and kept us dry in the sun. There were even signs of fishermen bearing all and taking in the tan.
A new species for myself today a Scad or Horse Mackerel, first I've had of these a strange very boney exterior fish with some pretty fearsome armour in way of spikes ... see the picture.
On the way back as Tony did his crew duties of cleaning the catch it did start to rain and by the time we got to Royal Quays it was chucking it down ..... but believe me it did not deter our smiles ..........
Today we had a substantial catch and we returned a substantial amount, probably as many as we kept .... boy, it was awesome ....... I wonder how long this will last ?
Statistics especially from a skippers point of view were brilliant.
1 wreck visited.
20 miles covered (of which 25% were on the drift, so fuel free)
This is a good one ....... ONE weight lost
approx 4 lures (shads) bitten to death past the point of use
Catch ..... Substantial (although all under 8lb)
Apologies if the report seems a bit long winded but there was just so much going on today ....
as ever , a few pics of the day .... (even these I've had to try and limit as there are so many )
Forget the Rain, this was the view at 4.45am from the marina fuel pontoon.......
As ever the sunrise ... (see it didn't rain all day )
Tony with a shad caught codling
and a one for myself ...
and a better one ...
Tonys Triple Header ....
The Scad ... a new species to me ...... (well armoured. almost a knights suit)
Busy time with many boats in the run ... great stuff !
Tony but this time a simple double header
Just to top it off .... a couple of boxes of fillets for us .....
Simply Awesome .........
cheers
Norman
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