Mixed Fortunes

Over the past couple of weeks the fishing has remained pretty hit or miss in the South Devon area. The weather has warmed up which has made things feel more pleasant to be out in. The catch rates haven’t warmed up a lot though. Last time I reported on how scratching techniques seemed to be working reasonably well from the beaches local to me. With no real significant sign that things were improving I have continued along this line of attack, joined once again by family members.

Following up his run of successful trips my dad was certainly up for trying to up his species count and also to try to get a nice sized flounder from the beach. Once again we stayed local to him and chose to fish the Ness Beach in Shaldon. Situated on the opposite side of the Teign Estuary to Teignmouth, Shaldon is a lovely coastal village. There are a few good spots to fish for bass and flounders along the river shoreline, particularly for bass in the raging waters of the river mouth over low water. With strong westerly winds again sweeping down the river we opted to go for the shelter of the Ness. I enjoy fishing the Ness; I caught my first bass from this beach many years ago. Fishing this beach always feels like a real adventure. Its main access point is through a smuggler’s tunnel cut straight through the sandstone cliffs.

The sounds of the wind and surf echo through the tunnel as you make your way down. You never know what you’ll find when you reach daylight at the bottom. On this day I found a very calm sea and not a breath of wind, with the cliffs behind us forming a perfect barrier to all Westerly breezes.

The calm, settled sea looked good to target flatfish from the clean ground in the middle of the beach. The ground becomes more mixed the closer you go to either end. I had an eye on the possibility of a plaice on the sandbanks further out. My dad hoped for flounder in the gulleys closer in. It was perhaps the nicest afternoon we have had all year, almost warm before the sunset. Unfortunately the crabs also felt it was a nice afternoon to be out and were on the feed hard. Nothing was safe from their hungry claws and we endured biteless hours over the top of the tide and into darkness. With that the full moon rose serenely over the sea and shone with all its intensity for the remainder of the session. A friend of ours, Gary, joined us and managed to winkle out a dogfish around dusk. I had a few runs on a large squid bait cast in close for a bass but couldn’t connect with anything. I suspect they were dogfish. Big bass are caught from this beach regularly but more often after an Easterly blow has stirred things up. Smoothounds appear later in the year. The beach does get very busy with tourists through the summer making night fishing and very early mornings the best time to fish. Dad and I suffered a blank but it was enjoyable to be out on an evening that finally felt like spring was here.

That poor result didn’t deter me from trying another beach for my next session. This time I was joined by Roy, my partner’s father. We met up in Sidmouth to fish the Jurassic Coast. With strong westerly winds forecast I picked a location on the main town beach that looked like it would offer some shelter. We both arrived a bit later than we would’ve liked due to the rugby being on the telly. We had our first baits in the water just as dusk was beginning to form a gloom around us.

Two offshore breakwaters protect this area of the beach and the town from the worst of the rough seas. They also provide shelter for many species of fish and a pathway for species to move into the shallower waters. Despite the forecast there was a complete lack of any wind and a nice feel to the air again, no chilly fingers when baiting up. Bites came as soon as the light went from the sky. With a heavy cloud cover it was a dim evening. A few waves were hitting the shore with force and the water was well coloured for some distance out. The first fish ashore was a bass of about a pound on a bait cast at distance on my rod. Roy, using his freshwater outfits, was soon into fish as well. Casting a Wessex rig beyond the breakers a good bite resulted in a small bull huss, certainly a surprise capture from the clean ground in front of us.

This was followed immediately by a slightly larger version. My baits got hit by dogfish soon after. I was pleased to see one as it was the first of the year for me, another species to add to my tally for the year. A solid strike onto Roy’s carp rod resulted in a very spirited scrap from a very chunky dogfish just before high water.

Weighing in at 2lb 5oz it was a very nice specimen from the shore at this time of year. She was safely returned just as a smaller specimen took my bait. It had been an action packed hour over the high water period. As the ebb tide began things went quiet for a while. Roy started packing up and went to refresh baits for one last cast. As he was dealing with one rod his other rod baited with sandeel and ragworms curved over alarmingly. I grabbed it to avoid losing it to the sea. A short fight followed before a shape appeared on the surface in the gloom, a ray.

It wasn’t going to break any records but it was Roy’s first ever small-eyed ray. I was delighted to see another species hit the beach and it was good to learn that they could be targeted from this section of the shore. Hopefully a sign that the corner is being turned in regards to our fishing fortunes. I stayed on another hour into the ebb for another dogfish before calling it a night myself. A much more fortunate evening than the week before and a renewed enthusiasm that things are improving locally. Roy was over the moon to see a number of different species on this session remarking that in sea fishing you really never know what you are going to catch.

Around the coast things have been quiet. A few plaice are showing from East Devon and the South Hams but not in the numbers they were last year. Mackerel and herring are being caught regularly from the deeper waters around Torbay.

I would expect more plaice to show over the coming weeks. Easterly winds are forecast which will kill things for a while. Thornback rays will be worth targeting from the shelter of the South Hams estuaries. Flounders will also be showing later in the month as they return from their offshore spawning grounds. I am hoping to try my hand at course fishing very soon and will hopefully be able to report on a new experience for me!

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LRF Profile – The Long Spined Sea Scorpion

Certain fish species are just icons for their respective scenes. The bass is the poster boy for heavy rock fishing, the carp for specimen coarse fishing and when it comes to LRF, one species is synonymous with the technique, the long spined sea scorpion.

The long spined sea scorpion, all fins and fury.

It’s easy to see why this species is so popular, it’s incredibly photogenic! Looking more like a venomous fish from the tropics, their habit of puffing up their spikes when handled makes every photo look epic. For such a small species, they are so individual and surprisingly aggressive, it’s inevitable that they capture the imagination.

In the UK we have two species of sea scorpion, the long spined and the short spined. Certain areas have more of one than the other, but the general rule is that the long spined is more common. It is also the smaller of the two, the record standing at just nine ounces, whereas the short spined grows to a significantly larger two pounds. Colour patterns of both species are extremely varied, from bright red, to purple, blue, black and dark brown, no two fish are the same. Combined with stripes and spots, these are beautiful creatures to behold.

Habitat-wise these fish prefer rocky areas with plenty of ambush sites – whether those rocks are naturally formed or artificially like harbours or sea defence walls, scorpions do not seem to be fussy. I’ve certainly found that rocks that border open sand tend to be prime feeding areas for these little predators. Though they hunt primarily through ambush, scorpion fish are surprisingly mobile. They quickly follow the tide up, whether this is swimming up the channels and gulleys in rocky areas or moving to and up the harbour wall. I once spent a day fishing the tide up on a sea defence made of boulders, the scorpions clearly moved in from the beach in only inches of water, you would get takes only at the edge of the tide. It was great evidence of the fish moving up with the rising water.

A short spined sea scorpion, notice the short spines and bulkier build. This one was caught by Jamie Sandford’s dad, Jamie kindly letting me use the pictures for comparison.

This angry looking specimen was caught in inches deep water on the rising tide.

Long spined sea scorpion have a mouth almost the width of their entire body, combined with a powerful digestive system, this is a species that can eat something almost the size of itself! As an angler this can lead to some entertaining catches, with lures and baits intended for larger species being gobbled up by this most greedy of mini-species. Their preferred food is normally prawns, shrimps, small fish and other small crustaceans and worms. This gives the LRF angler plenty of lure choice to target them, I will say though that personally, small silver or pink straw/ball tail lures and red Isome worms have been the most prolific for myself.

Probably the toughest part of targeting scorpions is catching every other fish species. Scorps’ share their habitat with all the other mini-species and singling out just them can be difficult. If you are fishing crystal clear rockpools or gulleys, then sight fishing is both exciting and effective. If you don’t have that luxury, say in deeper water like you find in harbours, then you will likely catch every other species before your target. Obviously this is the joy of LRF but if you’re on a species hunt, it’s worth being slightly more specific. A worthwhile tactic is to use slightly larger, unscented fish or prawn imitation lures, either dropshotted or on a jighead. You will catch less gobies and blennies, hopefully singling out your desired scorpion. Of course my best advice is to fish through all the species until you catch one, everyone loves variety.

With a Ballzy Worm lure in it’s mouth, this one was covered in glorious colouration.

Once caught you will quickly discover a few things: one being that although these fish have no real teeth, they have a powerful bite, easily latching on to your hook or finger! It’s not going to hurt too much, but it might bend your hook if you’re not careful in removing it. You might also be lucky to be experience the vibration they give out when threatened, it’s like a mobile phone going off in your hand. Overall you can’t help but be enamoured with the character and pompousness of this incredible little fish. As I always say, look after your catch, they are tough creatures but deserve our respect. Careful catch and release is always the way forward, you never know it might lead to catching that fish again!

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As always, thanks for reading.

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If you want to find out more info about sea fishing reels, check out www.myseareels.com

Scratching in the surf

Now certainly is the time of year when the fishing around South Devon can be particularly tough. The whiting have all but gone leaving the main targets relatively small, not easy to find and you simply have to put the hours in to get great results. This is not exactly an inspiring time for the everyday shore fisherman. The recent weather with a succession of low pressure systems causing strong winds and downpours  also does not get you feeling like heading out. There are fish to catch though if you want to enjoy a few hours on the beach as my dad and I have been doing recently.

If you have read my previous posts you will have seen that my dad has not long got into his shore fishing. For Christmas I had a 12ft rod remade up for him and ever since he has been chomping at the bit to get out and christen it. With the fishing not being too brilliant we opted not to travel far and have been hitting the beaches in the Dawlish and Teignmouth areas of the coastline. Our first sortee was to a small cove to the West of Dawlish beach. This was an area I had wanted to fish for a long time but had always been scuppered by big storms whenever I ventured down. This time, despite some high Southwest winds, the beach was decidedly fishable. The surf was stirring things up close to the shore and there was some fishy looking colour to the water.

The cove is surrounded by two small breakwaters protecting the train tracks behind. Beyond the breakers there are small broken reefs and gulleys. The place has a lot of potential for good fishing in my opinion. This first ever session saw us casting from the centre of the beach on a rising tide. I fished a large bait into the surf hoping for a nice bass and another rod further out to see what else might be about. Dad was getting to grips with casting his new, more powerful rod and was flicking small baits just beyond the breakers, at most, 40 yards. Squalls of rain and breeze came and went as the tide slowly rose. I knew fishing would be tough and the first couple of hours proved me right with no bites and barely a touch on any of the baits. Just before dusk began to settle in I noticed my dad’s pull down sharply and rise back into position, a definite bite but not the bass bite I expected to see in such conditions. Dad was keen to see if he had a fish but waited patiently to see if the bite would show again. A cup of coffee later and he could take it no more. A bend in his rod tip showed me he had something on and it wasn’t long before a nice plump flounder was sliding up the sand out of the churning waves.

Not the biggest fish but it made my dad’s day and got him a fish on his new rod. It was in great condition and duly went back strongly. Inspired, dad carried on casting just beyond the surf line saying he wanted a bigger one! Unfortunately that didn’t transpire. Darkness fell completely around us at the top of the tide, broken only by the lights of the passing trains, their rumbling muffled by the pounding waves. I struggled even after dark and had no bites at all. My dad however thoroughly enjoyed himself adding pout and shore rockling to his haul. With the tide ebbing away we became aware that there was a chill in the air and looked up to see a glorious clear sky full of stars which seemed in sharp focus that night. We called it a night a couple of hours after high water and arranged our next trip for the following week.

This time we made our way to Teignmouth to fish the main beach not too far from the mouth from the River Teign.

This is a beach I have had some really good fishing sessions from in the past. My personal best flounder came from nearby and the bass fishing can be non-stop later in the year. The river itself is one of the most famous flounder estuaries in the country. With large gusts of wind blowing straight down the estuary the beach was the obvious choice to have the breeze coming over our backs. We adopted the same tactics as the week before and fished the tide up. Once again bites were hard to come by until just before dark when dad missed what looked like a good flounder bite; my fault for telling him to lift into it too soon! Not long after the sun had disappeared behind Dartmoor did the fish come on the feed in force. I got the first bite on a small bait cast as far as I could get it (not a bad distance with the wind behind!) It looked suspiciously like a whiting but I was very pleased to find a small bar of silver skim its way through the coloured sea to my feet.

This was followed straight away by another. Then my dad’s rod start tapping away with the signs of another fat little school bass. The fish were really on the feed. I’d set dad up with some small wire booms on his rig which seems to work fantastically in the surf, the short snoods rarely tangle and the catch rate was much higher than for my plain flapping rig. He was over the moon to land a double shot of bass and a whiting, followed up with more bass. He then added a fat five-bearded rockling to his count.

He was catching two fish to one on me using his scratching rig in the surf and was overjoyed at the end of the session when he tallied up six species over his two sessions, three of them new fish for his catch list. I was happy with a few schoolies myself and I also winkled out a five-bearded rockling for my annual species tally right on the last cast of the night. Two very enjoyable trips at not the best time of year. It was awesome to see my dad really getting to grips with his fishing now. We will be out together again very soon to try to up his species tally and see what else we can get from the local surf beaches.

Elsewhere around the coast it has been a similar story of school bass and various smaller species. Interestingly a few smoothounds, small plaice and rays have started to show in the South Hams areas, hopefully a sign that it won’t be long before things improve dramatically. My good friend Mark has been out and about trying for the big predators. A few strap congers have come his way. He also caught an intriguing rarity, a topnot, on one of his conger baits.

A fish I’ve never seen in the flesh but becoming a more common capture in these days of species hunting and LRF fishing.

The coming weeks locally will see hopefully more plaice turning up around the South Hams. Small eyed, spotted and thornback rays are also viable targets as the month progresses. If the weather settles down a bit and the sea clears, mackerel will also be showing from the Torbay marks.

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Scratching in the surf

Now certainly is the time of year when the fishing around South Devon can be particularly tough. The whiting have all but gone leaving the main targets relatively small, not easy to find and you simply have to put the hours in to get great results. This is not exactly an inspiring time for the everyday shore fisherman. The recent weather with a succession of low pressure systems causing strong winds and downpours  also does not get you feeling like heading out. There are fish to catch though if you want to enjoy a few hours on the beach as my dad and I have been doing recently.

If you have read my previous posts you will have seen that my dad has not long got into his shore fishing. For Christmas I had a 12ft rod remade up for him and ever since he has been chomping at the bit to get out and christen it. With the fishing not being too brilliant we opted not to travel far and have been hitting the beaches in the Dawlish and Teignmouth areas of the coastline. Our first sortee was to a small cove to the West of Dawlish beach. This was an area I had wanted to fish for a long time but had always been scuppered by big storms whenever I ventured down. This time, despite some high Southwest winds, the beach was decidedly fishable. The surf was stirring things up close to the shore and there was some fishy looking colour to the water.

The cove is surrounded by two small breakwaters protecting the train tracks behind. Beyond the breakers there are small broken reefs and gulleys. The place has a lot of potential for good fishing in my opinion. This first ever session saw us casting from the centre of the beach on a rising tide. I fished a large bait into the surf hoping for a nice bass and another rod further out to see what else might be about. Dad was getting to grips with casting his new, more powerful rod and was flicking small baits just beyond the breakers, at most, 40 yards. Squalls of rain and breeze came and went as the tide slowly rose. I knew fishing would be tough and the first couple of hours proved me right with no bites and barely a touch on any of the baits. Just before dusk began to settle in I noticed my dad’s pull down sharply and rise back into position, a definite bite but not the bass bite I expected to see in such conditions. Dad was keen to see if he had a fish but waited patiently to see if the bite would show again. A cup of coffee later and he could take it no more. A bend in his rod tip showed me he had something on and it wasn’t long before a nice plump flounder was sliding up the sand out of the churning waves.

Not the biggest fish but it made my dad’s day and got him a fish on his new rod. It was in great condition and duly went back strongly. Inspired, dad carried on casting just beyond the surf line saying he wanted a bigger one! Unfortunately that didn’t transpire. Darkness fell completely around us at the top of the tide, broken only by the lights of the passing trains, their rumbling muffled by the pounding waves. I struggled even after dark and had no bites at all. My dad however thoroughly enjoyed himself adding pout and shore rockling to his haul. With the tide ebbing away we became aware that there was a chill in the air and looked up to see a glorious clear sky full of stars which seemed in sharp focus that night. We called it a night a couple of hours after high water and arranged our next trip for the following week.

This time we made our way to Teignmouth to fish the main beach not too far from the mouth from the River Teign.

This is a beach I have had some really good fishing sessions from in the past. My personal best flounder came from nearby and the bass fishing can be non-stop later in the year. The river itself is one of the most famous flounder estuaries in the country. With large gusts of wind blowing straight down the estuary the beach was the obvious choice to have the breeze coming over our backs. We adopted the same tactics as the week before and fished the tide up. Once again bites were hard to come by until just before dark when dad missed what looked like a good flounder bite; my fault for telling him to lift into it too soon! Not long after the sun had disappeared behind Dartmoor did the fish come on the feed in force. I got the first bite on a small bait cast as far as I could get it (not a bad distance with the wind behind!) It looked suspiciously like a whiting but I was very pleased to find a small bar of silver skim its way through the coloured sea to my feet.

This was followed straight away by another. Then my dad’s rod start tapping away with the signs of another fat little school bass. The fish were really on the feed. I’d set dad up with some small wire booms on his rig which seems to work fantastically in the surf, the short snoods rarely tangle and the catch rate was much higher than for my plain flapping rig. He was over the moon to land a double shot of bass and a whiting, followed up with more bass. He then added a fat five-bearded rockling to his count.

He was catching two fish to one on me using his scratching rig in the surf and was overjoyed at the end of the session when he tallied up six species over his two sessions, three of them new fish for his catch list. I was happy with a few schoolies myself and I also winkled out a five-bearded rockling for my annual species tally right on the last cast of the night. Two very enjoyable trips at not the best time of year. It was awesome to see my dad really getting to grips with his fishing now. We will be out together again very soon to try to up his species tally and see what else we can get from the local surf beaches.

Elsewhere around the coast it has been a similar story of school bass and various smaller species. Interestingly a few smoothounds, small plaice and rays have started to show in the South Hams areas, hopefully a sign that it won’t be long before things improve dramatically. My good friend Mark has been out and about trying for the big predators. A few strap congers have come his way. He also caught an intriguing rarity, a topnot, on one of his conger baits.

A fish I’ve never seen in the flesh but becoming a more common capture in these days of species hunting and LRF fishing.

The coming weeks locally will see hopefully more plaice turning up around the South Hams. Small eyed, spotted and thornback rays are also viable targets as the month progresses. If the weather settles down a bit and the sea clears, mackerel will also be showing from the Torbay marks.

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Chasing Winter Silver

On a blustery and damp Monday night in February, I find myself searching for silver. The ‘Tamar Tarpon’ (I unfortunately can’t take credit for that excellent nickname) aka the Atlantic herring, rumoured to be in the river in huge numbers. An LRF angling opportunity on my doorstep I’d be a fool to miss. Not one to sit bored watching television, I ready the rod and make my way to the river.

I don’t fish the Tamar often enough, it’s the river that divides Devon and Cornwall neatly almost the entirety of the border. The lower reaches and the mouth of this river are only a two minute walk from my house, yet in my own desire for wilder climbs I often ignore it. Not this night though, tonight I’m embracing my local, if not exactly picturesque, fishing marks.

Drizzle, wind and low temperatures, what else could you possibly desire?

The sun is long gone and the only illumination left is the orange glow of streetlights. The cloud is low and reflects the light pollution, almost gives the impression there’s embers burning behind it. I’m at my first mark and it’s as far removed from the more poetically beautiful coastline, only a few miles away, as you can get. North Corner Pontoon in Devonport. It’s grubby, ugly and home to many a rat, but I love it. I caught my first fish here, a tiny ballan wrasse, so I’ll always have a soft spot for it. It’s a popular mark and there are already two anglers bait fishing on the pontoon.

I’m not interested in fishing from the pontoon though, I require a casting point where light hits the water. To the right there is a large accessible ledge with a streetlight beaming onto the surface. I know this to be a fish magnet, any area with artificial light on the water at night, provides a great chance of holding fish. The wind is strong, though not consistent, so I opt for a heavier jighead than I’d ideally like. Three grams might not seem like a lot, but it falls a little too quick through the water column for my liking, but it’s the only way to get the lure out there in this wind so I persevere. I lift the rod tip constantly to slow the fall but I’m cautious not to be too erratic.

Small ‘ballzy worm’ lures bring small plucks and hits but nothing concrete. I switch over to an inch of the ever reliable Power Isome and it brings instant results. I use a slow pulsing retrieve through the artificially lit water and a fish is on. The spirited dive with no real power gives up the perpetrator immediately, a tiny pollack. Quickly I follow it up with two more. The silver fish are eluding me!

Fishing at night and quality photos do not go hand in hand, but these micro pollack deserve a little limelight, they save many a blank!

It’s very clearly obvious the herring aren’t here so I move on. I head to probably my least favourite mark in Plymouth, Mount Wise. I have no real reason not to like it, the area holds fish and regularly throws up great catches yet I can’t get on with it. It’s a very open and exposed promenade with few obvious features besides streetlights. I suppose it doesn’t help that it holds a greater selection of trolleys and baskets than your average Tesco! It’s these snags that make me thankful I’m using a cheap AGM jighead tonight, I can afford to lose two or three of these.

These cheap AGM jigheads are perfect when fishing snaggy areas, combined with a length of Power Isome you will always find fish.

There’s three fishermen bait fishing on the most prominent spot, a small pier that juts out a couple of metres to either side. To the right of me at the end there is an angler fishing LRF under the streetlamp. Unfortunately the spot I wanted to try but alas I’ll try left. I make my casts into the dark, the random gusts of wind blow me off balance. It’s not easy to keep in touch with my lure at times. This is both the frustration and joy of winter LRF, the conditions are awful but the satisfaction when you catch a fish is addictive. I keep casting, trying out different depths but, with only one stray hit to work with, it’s uninspiring stuff!

The three guys fishing on the pier have moved and I’m wasting no time in trying there. The gap between one side of the pier and the inside wall is well lit and calm. If there’s fish anywhere they must be here. I cast out and then twitch it back, keeping it about a metre under the surface. A solid hit! Then another. The hits continue without a hook up right until it’s under the rod tip. I cut down the Isome so it barely extends past the hook and recast. The hit is instant again but this time I connect. The fish feels rather strong and it’s definitely not a pollack. It is a few metres out and is dogged in it’s fight against me. Though not large enough to take line, I’m relieved when I see silver. Unfortunately though, not silver enough to be a herring. I get it on land and it’s revealed to be a sand smelt, a rather large one too.

A chunky little sand smelt, a welcome sight on chilly nights!

Sand smelt are a small species of pelagic shoaling fish. They are unusual in that they are not particularly slimy and smell rather pleasant. It can only be described as cucumber-like. The one I hold in my hands is certainly the chunkiest I’ve ever caught, though still only about five inches long. I try to contain it’s wriggling for two seconds to take a picture, not easy in the wind and drizzle. After a couple of satisfactory photos it is returned to swim again.

I really want a herring now and subsequent casts have brought me only more smelt. As lovely as they are I want a real pull on the rod, something that right now only a herring or a bass is going to provide. The LRF’er on the end looks like he’s packing up, so I figure he’s worth chatting to, perhaps he’s had more luck with the herring than I. I walk over and on the floor in a plastic bag is my answer, it’s full of herring (and a little annoyingly, an undersize pollack, but I’m not in the mood to pick a fight). The chap is leaving but says there’s plenty of herring here still, which is music to my silver deprived ears.

The streetlight beams directly onto the water here and you can occasionally see fish flashing under the surface. I put on a slightly longer piece of Isome and cast out just beyond the light. I twitch it back for immediate results. A real pull back, then another, then I strike and connect. This fish is no smelt! It’s turbo-charged and takes line handsomely then shakes the hook. This happens again twice. The fourth fish is truly on and I yank it in just so I can see it.

This photo really shows the varied colour palette in the herring. True disco balls in fish form.

The ‘Tamar Tarpon’ in all it’s iridescent glory, those silver scales reflecting blues, pinks and lilacs at me. A true disco ball of a fish. Their mouth is incredibly thin and it’s easy to see how the hook pulls out so often. Trying to take pictures of such a lively fish, whilst also trying not to shake any of it’s scales off is a test. Their beautiful large scales seem to be held on by a thread, they lose them so easy and I’m careful to minimise touching the fish. Unlike the angler before me I require no food for the pot, just the simple joy of catching such a beautiful thing. I quickly return it.

With that tarpon-like mouth and slim, streamlined build, it’s no wonder these fish fight so well.

I’m now hooking fish after fish, a lot are shaking the hook right at the end. This suits me as I’m only here for the fight. With the drag set light the herring rocket off! Some go deep and fight like a scad, others do their best impression of a garfish and leap from the water. In difficult wind and a constant drizzle, it’s a relief to find such electric sport. I milk each fight and there are many, I lose count but it’s easily over twenty in only fifteen minutes. Only mackerel can rival this species for sheer numbers, greed and outright speed!

With a massive smile on my face I head home, my lust for silver abated. As I drive home I see the flickering of televisions on curtains, I imagine the people inside, warm but numbingly watching television. I’m chilled to the bone and smell of herring, but I know who had the more memorable of nights.

If you enjoyed this post then take a look at my blog.

You can also find me on Facebook here. Feel free to contact me if you would like any advice or if you just want to talk fishing.

I’m on Instagram too, search – benbassettfishing.

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