stevetheangler

OK, been on holiday to Newquay, Cornwall for the week of Monday 1st to Monday 8th May and had a couple of dabbles in the sea…

First of the two sessions was crablining in Newquay Harbour (South Wall, Inner Harbour) with Liz for our traditional Crabline Champion Competition whenever we are on the coast on Wednesday 3rd (or maybe Thurs 4th?). Usual crablines with bacon in the mesh bait bags on an incoming tide but after an hour in quite a cool breeze (but actually sheltered by the harbour walls, REALLY breezy outside those confines) neither of us so much as even sighted a crab which is not only unusual but actually an unknown situation for us over all the years we’ve done it – and we’ve been to far more unlikely-to-catch places! However, I did have a few small fish interested in my bait bag – a couple of 2”-4” black fish that looked like blenny, and one slightly larger mottled brown one that looked very wrasse-like from high above them…

… however, the picture above does show the blenny as mottled brown but they do turn black when in breeding so maybe both fish types were blennies…? I did add a hook to my bait bag with a small strip of bacon in an attempt to catch one but as my only hook was a 1/0, and even though the fish were attacking it, the hook was far too big for them to take… Anyway, after our hour, fishing boats started to return to harbour and took up all the available spaces to fish from … so off we went to the pub with an honourable draw recorded…

The second session was in the sea itself on Sunday May 7th fishing on Towan Head – however, selection of fishing area was not good given (a) it was calm, hot, sunny (b) next to the car park, (c) next to a launch pad for paddleboards, canoes, etc and (d) on high rocks with deep water below which meant that undisciplined kids (whose parents were sat over the way but said/did nothing to correct the kid’s behaviour) were jumping in about 10 yards from the floats and then climbing out between Liz and I who were sat only 10 feet apart. Needless to say we had not a bite or nibble in the 3 hours of our fishing up to high tide. General area (cliffs, rocks with large sandy areas) was good and if there then would fish there again albeit not in the exact location we chose this trip. Anyway, we didn’t take the beachcasters this trip, just basically the pike rods and floats and floatfished with sprat fillets sourced from the leftover pike baits of the past season and with raw king prawns… so we had to fish a calmer area due to the tackle limitations… next time we’d take the proper sea gear – beachcasters, 4oz-6oz breakaway leads, etc.

So, now looking forward to my next session with anticipation – Friday 12th May, a session on a local 19 acre reservoir which I’ve never fished in my life before, but which has a good head of fish including bream into double figures. I bought the season tickets (plural as you can only fish one rod per ticket, and so I’ve got two so I can use two rods – I’ve actually a 3-rod EA licence but the controlling club have a 2-rod limit on their waters) just before leaving on holiday in readiness and the past couple of days I’ve sorted my tackle and now only my bait to sort… the new club also has another 3 waters too that look good – a 16 acre lake and two smaller pools of 1.5-2.0 acres which I look forward to savouring too in the near future…