COD ACCUMULATIVE TOTAL = 14
Heads up. If any of you have any weddings, christenings or funerals coming up, where you really want perfect weather, with zero wind, drop me a line. I will arrange a 100 hour engine service on BIF1, and Neptune will sort the rest. As that is where I was at yesterday. Not wanting to lose the whole day, in the evening I took a friend and her 11 year old son, on mission squid. Perfect squid conditions meant that we found them as well. Only three for an hours looking, but numbers will build daily. Squid season is open!! And on the shingle also. If any of you are depressed at another evening with the TV, find some steeply shelving shingle and cast a squid jig around.
Todays first sailing and it was my very great pleasure to welcome back Max, Siri and Mitch, and new to BIF1 Dominic. Siri is a bit of a superstar at the moment. Every now and then, you acknowledge someone who also was a marine creature in a previous incarnation. Siri is most definitely one. As myself, he prefers watching water to youtube videos when it comes to fish. You can learn far more from the quarry itself, than any "expert" can fill you up with. Even small bass display behaviours that they carry on through their lives. I got some great footage recently of a tiny bass protecting some food source it had discovered. I digress... Siri only went and did what I have been dreaming about. Two days ago he had a bonito close to the Marina, from his own boat. Amazing. Simply amazing. Oh, and bluefin sightings are coming in daily. Almost certainly what I saw breach at distance last week. One sighting was 10 meters off the nudist beach at 1800 last night. But few saw it. Busy watching their phones. Maybe watching fishing videos on youtube...
Fishing was ok. Topwaters are now the go to method for first sailing. Bass very happy suddenly to strike from the top. An hour later, with the rising sun, less happy, but still taking sub's. And for the last hour, it took deeper water and shads to get a result. 15 bass, mostly table plus (max kill) and a bonus coddie for Mitch.
Second sailing, and with me were Duncan, Paul, Mark and John. The bright sun continued its relentless demise of the fishing. With uber clear seas, it isnt just the edges that suffer. Anything less than 30 feet is likely affected. I tried to do a traditional early flood routine, but it turned into a proper hunt, where the only reliable fishing I could find was on one tiny patch of rough. Even a look into fifty plus feet didnt really come up with much. But from that one tiny patch, we landed ten bass, and Marc also had a bonus cod. Five killed. Cuttles a bit of a pain. 2 killed.
Final sailing, and regulars James and Dicky were joined by new to BIF1 but not to fishing, Richard, with his partner, and very new to fishing, Micheal with an a. Michaela. Wow. The older I get, the more I need the prompts to remember who was on board. Happily, Michaela was a listener, and was fishing nicely literally after ten minutes. Amazing. And I think being a focused beginner really helped, as she ended up I think top rod with three, perhaps four, of the eight bass landed. I had set a target of ten, as by now it was heat, sun was still bright, with promised haze appearing but then kept evaporating. No coddies on this one, but James did get a nice ballan wrasse, and other species were gurnard, bream, pouting and mackerel.
FOOTNOTE - Ive been thinking more on the trebles v singles debate. Earlier in the year I was lost, as the bass seemed to be bouncing off them. But then it turned out, the bass simply were not interested in large topwater lures, even when smashing pin fry off the surface. Now there are sardines as well as herring and sprat around, all quite large, and bass are very happy to rise up with them. So, when a bass takes a spook properly, it hooks up. Simple. What doesnt happen, which does with trebles, is if a bass nudges a lure, it doesnt get hooked up on the outside of the body. Some may say that is a loss. But I prefer to trick my bass to eat wholeheartedly my plastic, as I believe that is the art of lure fishing. Not simply numbers. So, I am very happy to recommend cox and rawle 3/0 inline barbless singles to replace trebles on the Heddon one knocker spook. Just keep a healthy bend in the rod, and all will be fine.
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