Innehållsförteckning för Issue 613 från Sea Angler

ISSUE 613 SEPTEMBER 2022 Welcome to the September issue. Judging by your catch pictures and my own experience the record temperatures over recent weeks have coincided with a phenomenal summer of smoothhound fishing. The number of hounds being caught, and the range of your catches from across the country, make me think that the hound is becoming the backbone of UK summer angling from both the shore and afloat. My own experience is that of others; baits are unable to be honed in on by other species without a hungry hound getting there first! Not that I’m complaining; they fight hard, look stunning and are relatively easy to catch making them a popular target species for young, old, experienced and beginner alike. The warmer our sea temperatures get the more…

Last month we had a look at how we might slow down a bit and start thinking more about the fishing photos we want to take. So now let’s take that further and start dialling into composition, or the makeup of the actual photo. I hope you have been playing around a bit and not just standing there and shooting away at eye-level all the time. I also hope you have noticed how changing the angle or position at which you take a picture can really “grab” you when you scroll through your camera roll - but what about how we might use the elements in front of us to help make an interesting photograph? How do we combine the angler and all that sea and sky or rocks and…

Situated on Dorset’s western fringe, the shelving shingle of Monmouth Beach at Lyme Regis provides rough ground fishing with huge potential. From the high-water mark, it gives way to sand and then some real rough stuff from the low water mark onwards. There is a series of rocky scars stretching directly out into Chippel Bay. As the tide floods various fish species move along the edge of the rocky shelves where it drops into the gulley. SEASONAL SPECIES From mid-April onwards, Monmouth Beach is certainly worth visiting. Initially it will be dogfish, pout and rockling but the first ballan wrasse, bull huss and small-eyed rays will start to figure during May. A wide variety of species can then be expected throughout the summer and autumn. Double-figure bass and conger eels…

Stretching beyond the idyllic village of Orford, with Aldeburgh to the north, and Bawdsey to the south, is the iconic shingle spit which is Orford Island. Over the 1970s, 1980s, and even in the early 2000s, it was said to be one of the cod capitals of the UK; the quality of its winter fishing has been written about many times. However, with the demise of the southern North Sea cod shoal, the island, as its affectionally known, is still the place to go, but now its season stretches to include spring, summer and autumn, with a change in species from cod to one of good-sized hounds, rays, bass, and plenty of them. The island was formally administered by the Ministry of Defence, and has a history of secret military…

FANCY WINNING A NEW ROD AND REEL COMBO from Okuma by catching a great fish? In our catch competition, your target is to catch one over the weight given on our nominated species list. If you do, enter our contest and you automatically stand a chance of winning either our shore or boat prize. Each issue we award a superb Okuma package to the captor of the best shore fish and best boat-caught fish, both chosen on merit. Prizes are awarded at our discretion and Okuma reserves the right to send alternative prizes. Patrick Cawley, Cardiff Fish: 14lb 3oz bass Bait: Orange firetail jelly worm Venue: Onboard Sealeopard Charter off Monk Nash, Bristol Channel Date: 12/07/22 Iain Wilkinson, Isle of Man Fish: 60lb topeBait: Mackerel flapperVenue: Out of port St…

One of the most wanted species yet least caught are turbot and brill. Some English Channel ports, especially Weymouth, have a reputation for still producing fair numbers and some good-sized fish, but it’s often the case elsewhere that few anglers deliberately target these prize flatties. Therefore, charter skippers can also ignore them as a target species understandably concentrating on more popular fish. It’s all too often a case of “out of sight, out of mind”. There are though, still localised concentrations of both brill and turbot right around the UK coast. These tend to exist in inshore areas where commercial fishing is less prevalent. The Cornish coast, the sand banks that feature off the Welsh west coast, the west coast of Scotland, and especially the south and west coast of…

Well, there are a number of things that will possibly help on the day and by dotting the Is and crossing the Ts methodically you will know you are doing your best and it will inspire you with confidence. LOCATION The first and most important thing, as in several aspects of life, is location-location-location. It’s pretty obvious you wont catch anything if the fish aren’t there. It’s often hard enough catching them when they are there. So what can you do on this one? The first things to realise is that fish will follow the food and basically want a life that is as easy as possible. So where will the food be? There are classic cases like follow the birds! The birds are there feeding on the small fish…

The drop shot rig is a very effective method of presenting a lure close to the seabed and keeping it in ‘the zone’. The current of the tide will ensure the lure continues to fish while it remains stationary. An additional advantage fishing rock marks and rough ground is that the lure is not retrieved, and snagging is therefore minimised. The use of ball or column weights which clip on to the line also helps to minimise tackle losses. By adjusting the distance of the hook to the weight you vary how close to the bottom you fish. The drop shot rig can be fished with a variety of soft lures such as shads, worms and paddletails. It is an effective method for all sizes of lure including HRF and…

Stanmer Park, Brighton a long, long time ago. Terry Carroll threw a bunch of test rods on the grass. “Here’s what they sent us,” he said. “I mean, just look. They’re supposed to be a leading rod company, but this is what they come up with. Useless. They’re nice people, but they just don’t get it.” Although he didn’t say it at the time, it was crystal clear that Terry knew that the only answer was to make his own rods. And after a series of ups and downs, strained alliances and false starts that’s exactly what he did when, in around 1980, he and his wife Barbara created Zziplex rod blanks. These days we’ve grown almost immune to the hype dished out by the sea fishing world. Hardly anything…

The town welcomed four teams per nation with anglers travelling from all corners of Ireland, England, Scotland, and Wales. Tuesday 5th and Wednesday 6th July, had the following teams fishing at these locations: TUESDAY, JULY 5 ■ Seniors/U21s - Cogden Beach (Chesil Beach) ■ Juniors - Ringstead Beach ■ Ladies - Preston Beach WEDNESDAY, JULY 6 ■ Seniors/U21s - Ferry Bridge (Chesil Beach) ■ Juniors - Ringstead Beach ■ Ladies - Preston Beach Chesil Beach, where the Seniors and Under 21s competed, fished harder than Ringsted and Preston with D section at Ferry Bridge only seeing two fish landed by the in-form JP Molloy of Ireland helping them to the gold medal position. Dave Lane, the local expert on Chesil, had the best result with five fish for 175 points…

If you are new to shore angling you might well think that the most efficient if not the only way to catch wrasse is to use soft plastic lures, as in recent years so much has been written about catching wrasse using these increasingly popular and undoubtedly effective techniques. While plenty of wrasse are caught on lures I would argue that if you are specifically looking to catch large wrasse, then it’s best to leave your artificials at home and offer them something more flavoursome. I love fishing for wrasse, and my favourite way of catching wrasse is close range ledgering using bait. I like nothing more than lobbing out a whole crab and waiting for the rod tip to slam over then having to pull as hard as I…

Like all sports, sea angling has a dominance hierarchy; a group of people that have risen to the top of the sport and are widely accepted to be the best. There is a phenomenon called the Pareto distribution, or 80/20 rule, which says that 20 per cent will be more productive and successful than the other 80 per cent put together. This law or rule applies to art, music, economics, sports and most other areas of life. Since the invention of forums and social media, we now know who these people are and what they catch regularly. Most of us are not fortunate enough to be born into a situation where we have a family member who can offer us expert tutelage on how to be the best angler on…

With the exception of Lannacombe, the area under review is east facing from Start Point to East Gate and comprises eight-and-a-half miles of sand coves and free open beaches that are joined when the tide is flooding and access is denied between them. LANNACOMBE BAY It is a top-rated venue for a variety of species ranging from plaice and dab, from May on to late autumn, and codling, whiting, pouting, the occasional flounder and greater and lesser dogfish during the colder months. Facing Lannacombe Bay, of turbot fame, the beach is the best opportunity to add this iconic species to your catch CV. Winter fishing is good for all the season’s species. START POINT The walk down to the cove on its north is long but well worth the effort…

The north coast of the Gower Peninsula is flanked by the sprawling expanse of the Loughor Estuary, which flows into Carmarthen Bay. The outer part of the estuary to the west of Burry Port consists of long sandy beaches, which face across to an ever-changing system of offshore sandbanks known as the Hooper Sands. These sandbanks very effectively split the flow of water through two channels, one to the south off the coast of Gower, the second to the north at the southern end of Cefn Sidan beach. This is known as The North Channel, which we are going to look at here. SPECIES Throughout the year the Loughor Estuary produces a wide range of species for both boat and shore anglers. Shore anglers in particular have long recognised the…

The winner will be kitted out with a 7ft two-piece 20-30lb Pursuit IV rod and 6000 size fixed spool reel combo worth £124.99. The Pursuit IV rod features a sensitive blank and is finished with K-type guides while the Pursuit IV reel features a durable and corrosion resistant graphite body and powerful HT-100 drag system. Not only that, but you’ll also get your hands on a foldable PENN EVA bag worth £46.99 to keep your tackle and belongings dry, a PENN cool bag worth £28.99 to keep your bait and catch fresh and a PENN rig wallet worth £41.99 containing 12 removable wallets. Don’t miss out on this opportunity to win this high-quality boat fishing package! To be in with a chance to win, simply enter for free online at…

Depending on where in the world they are caught the cobia, Rachycentron canadum, are also known as black kingfish, black salmon, ling, lemonfish, crabeater, prodigal son, codfish and black bonito. Cobia are normally solitary, except for annual spawning aggregations when large numbers of fish congregate at reefs, wrecks, harbours, buoys, and other structural oases. They are pelagic by nature, but occasionally enter estuaries and mangroves in search of prey. Cobia are found in the warm-temperate to tropical waters of the western and eastern Atlantic Ocean and throughout the Caribbean, as well as in the Indian Ocean off the coast of India and Australia, and off the Pacific coast of Japan. Cobia have been recorded in the Mediterranean Sea, firstly off the coast of Israel in 1978 and more recently as…

Rod advice or where to buy, email: seafishing@century.uk Website: www.century.uk All things being equal, it is easy and safe for a 150g outfit to handle 25g less and 50g more lead. In old money, that’s one ounce down and two up, thus covering most fishing needs. Neither man nor kit should break into a sweat, and except with highly specialised rods there is little risk of the blank snapping even with much greater loads. Things being equal means using a casting method where pressure builds fairly slowly over a generous arc, plus using an appropriate outfit. These are key factors in all good casting, but especially relevant when we want to use one outfit to handle a broad range of weights. A thrashy style on an over-meaty rod makes it…

GARMIN LIVESCOPE XR Garmin has unveiled the latest addition to its award-winning live-scanning sonar line-up. The new LiveScope XR has an extended range for deeper and open waters. With excellent image sharpness at both close and long ranges simultaneously, LiveScope XR delivers real-time images of fish and structure up to 500ft in front of or below the boat—over 200 per cent more range than the leading competitor system. EXTENDED RANGE With an optimised design for deeper water, the LiveScope XR transducer has extended elements so anglers can see both long and close-range views in real time. Anglers can see further around and below the boat – up to 500ft in freshwater and 350ft in saltwater – and the ‘Reverse Range’ feature allows them to utilise more of the screen to…

For the better part of 30 years reviewing boats has played a big part of my monthly routine working for Sea Angler, and the various other publications to whom I have contributed. Then along came Covid and together with the obvious restrictions in travel, imports came to an abrupt halt and very few companies had the confidence to invest in the development and production of new boats. Then, finally, I received an email asking whether or not I’d be interested in reviewing a new boat? I was, and I did, and here are my thoughts… The H20 Hamble Dory can best be described as being a modern take of a timeless classic. The original ‘dories’ were the small wooden clinker built boats commercial fisherman and whalers used in conjunction with…

JULY 24: SAMF GB SUMMER LEAGUE Hessle, 20 anglers ■ Result: 1st Paul Denholm Grimsby, 28 fish, 568cm (2); 2nd Ian Nelson, Grimsby, 20 fish, 466cm (1); 3rd Tony Burman, 18 fish, 388 cm. Biggest fish was a 31cm flounder landed by Wayne Leason. Overall league winner was Tony Burman with 3 points, 2nd Paul Denholm (6 points) and joint 3rd was Karl Wiepcke and Brian McKensie with 8 points. 23-24: NORTH EAST RIVER TYNE 2-DAY River Tyne, 42 anglers Competitors from Scotland, Cumbria and Yorkshire, travelled Tyne River. This year the match stretch was moved up river of Newcastle city centre in the hope of increasing the numbers of fish landed. Where as codling would have been the target species in the lower part of the Tyne, this changed…

First off, this article is written from the perspective of a saltwater fly angler, but that’s only because the lessons I learned were learned through the necessity of that angling discipline. The fact is that as a veteran beach angler before that, I’d been missing a trick. A big one. And what I learned when I picked up the fly rod is something I wish I’d known long before. So whether you’re a ‘swffer’ or not, consider the following. If you’ve come to saltwater fly fishing from another angling discipline, particularly the beach-casting fraternity, like I did, you may be likely to make an immediate assumption that the key to success will be getting your fly way out into the deepest water possible. Makes sense; the bigger fish are further…

The year 2020 was well and truly a year of extremes. Covid kept the world in its thrall. Some sectors saw businesses go bankrupt left, right and centre while other sectors thrived like never before. The angling industry was certainly one of those! Angling retailers, online business, clubs; everybody is profiting from the circumstances. Sportfishing Netherlands, the national angling body in the Netherlands, sold tens of thousands of extra fishing permits and it has never been so busy at the waterside. At one point, partly due to the enormous demand for sea bait, Topsy Baits was not able to supply the Dutch market for a couple of weeks. Luckily there were more sources for bait and most of us could still go fishing. GATHERING INTEL However, all those anglers at…

I always find late summer a time of reflection. Being a teacher, late August and early September bring the end of the summer holidays, those long, lazy warm days start to slip into memory, and the year suddenly seems to have more months spent than are left in credit. Around this time, I like to squeeze in one final fishing session before the new term begins, spending the last sunlit pennies of my summer leisure on one of my local beaches. For this session, I decided on Pink Bay in Porthcawl as a destination, a beach so named due to the pinkish boulder and pebble bank that shelves steeply down onto the sand. Whereas other local beaches are often thronged with surfers, Pink Bay requires a walk of around 20…

Looking out through the study window as I write this, I see that the silent stillness of the evening has become tangled in a soft, steady mesh of rain, the drizzle not enough to count as a noise in itself, but perhaps as a different, slightly louder, form of silence. A hush, perhaps. To be expected. After all, it is still winter, the nights remain long and, as R.S Thomas put it, we continue to find ourselves “Lost in the world’s wood”. On it falls, as I write up the notes from my earlier session, muttering the words as they appear on the screen: whiting; pouting; dab; each one becoming flesh again as it’s uttered and re-imagined, a slightly more refined version of the instant replay I began in my…

Almost every fishing boat today, even the smallest dinghies, will have access to GPS. A valuable aid to navigation, even the most basic GPS unit will deliver you to your chosen mark and then guide you back to safety. But while GPS is an obvious asset aboard your boat, in no way should it be considered as a replacement for a compass. Likewise, many onboard GPS units today incorporate an electronic chartplotter, and these should never be considered as being a replacement for a paper chart covering the area you fish. Electronics are certainly a tremendous tool when they are working but totally useless if they break down. And, of course, invariably they choose to malfunction when you need them most, such as when you find yourself shrouded in thick…

Portishead is a typically modern marina complex that you’ll find located on the north Somerset coast, just a few miles down channel from the Severn bridges. It is perfectly located to provide convenient boat access to the productive fishing grounds of the upper Bristol Channel. You only have to drive over either of the twin Severn bridges when the tide is out to view the type of ground over which anglers fish. The entire area consists of a vast expanse of inter-tidal mudflats along with large areas of reef, in addition to numerous sizeable patches of mixed, hard and broken ground, much of which is dissected by deeper drainage channels. It might look a mess but such terrain provides a hugely rich feeding ground hosting an abundant population of shrimp,…

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Circle-hooks are an ancient design, but in recent years, when they were found to increase commercial (long-line) catches of sea fish, they have been modified and improved. They are now widely available in sizes suitable for bass angling and I’ve been using these hooks for much of my predator angling (salt and freshwater) for years now. When I first mentioned this (decades ago – time flies!) in books and articles, I had a good deal of correspondence from interested anglers regarding the pros and cons of their use. Rod and line anglers, using traditional J hooks, are able to strike bites and hook the culprits. Circle-hooks, in contrast, designed as they are for static long lines where the fish ‘hook themselves’, require no sharp strike. In fact, a gentle tightening…

● = Penn Sea League SEPTEMBER ● 10: Southern League round 9 of 12 & open, Hayling/Southbourne, 9am-2pm, pegged, measure & return, undersize fish count as 1oz, £15 match entry, £5 pools, £10 pair, team of five free, 2022 League entry £25, booking ends one hour before start, book only, Darren: 07919 073232, Mike: 07983 579596, Ian: 07736 004714 or Ant: 07775 691916. southernleagueandopens@gmail.com ● 10: Colwyn Bay Victoria Sea Anglers Summer series 4th leg, North Shore, Llandudno, 7-11pm, Darren Jones: 07595 375663 ● 10: Filey Fishing Centenary Festival, 2-6pm, heaviest fish match, weigh in by 7pm, Filey playing fields association. adriancolling66@gmail.com ● 10-11: Northern Ireland Federation of Sea Anglers, 2 day open and home nations championships. Port Salon beach and River Roe Estuary, £50 entry plus federation membership of…