Weather: Heavy rain Friday, clear and dry Sat & Sun odd shower Monday
Bait: Peeler, Squid, Sandeel, Mackerel, Lug, Maddies & Rag
Rigs: various
Results: Dogs, Smooth Hounds, Dabs, Flounder, Plaice, Codling, Whiting, Silver eel, Poor Cod, Five Bearded Rockling
Report:
Friday 28th 22:30-06:30
Chris had never caught a Smooth Hound before so I said I’d take him over to Wexford to get him one. We'd arranged to meet up with eric and co on Friday so after the ritual Fillet Steak and Stout we hit the beach. It was good to see a few familiar faces on the beach with eric, TonyFella, dfella, bigsod, dbrock, roger, cretekos all set up. Fishing was slow enough with a couple of smuts showing for Denis and Shane, with a few dogs knocking about too... Tony lost a cracking hound in the surf with both Chris and myself losing hounds too… Chris's dropped hound hit so hard he knocked the reel out of gear and his 7ht Mag was clicking like a rachet... When Chris finally caught up with it he was 60 yards down the beach and into a snag the fish was still pulling back but the mainline frayed on the snag and the fish was lost. I could only manage a solitary dog
while Chris had a good few fish (must’ve been the special wriggly worms he was using) can't remember the breakdown but a good few dogs a 5 bearded rockling dabs and flounder I think made up the catch. Back to base it was nice to get out of the rain having been rained on for 10hrs straight…. We’d a drop of the hard stuff and some food, think it was about 08:45 when we finally hit the hay.Saturday 29th 20:30-05:30
After an all too brief sleep we unloaded the car took everything out and to dry off and serviced our reels…. Then we headed off to pick up more bait and a few bits and pieces…. Dave and Joe in Courtown Tackle had told us Ger Doran had been in and was wondering where we were fishing as he was up for a session. So a quick call to Ger while we were on the move and after mulling over a few different venues we settled on good Smut mark that I’d heard had a few showing on it. We met Ger while we were busy stuffing our gullets with Subs and then set off for the mark….. on the way Chris spotted a Fried Chicken spot so being not a bit hungry we stopped just out of sheer gluttony and got a box full of stuff each which worked in our favour in the end as we stayed out all night in the end…. We arrived at the mark Ger was just unloading his car when he saw us scoffing again and just shook his head laughing…. First cast Ger had a nice Smut on 4½lbs that got Chris’ attention Ger was soon into a 2nd of 5½lbs… Chris was up next with his first ever Smut job done and the pressure was off I was delighted for him and we could relax a bit and enjoy the fishing. Ger had one more Smut before he finished up while I had blank saved by a silver eel the biggest one I’ve caught to date strong jaws on him too we were getting wrapped up in grassy weed but thankfully it passed after about an hour … Ger kindly left us with some Rag he’d dug thanks again much obliged Ger. Chris finished up with 6 Smuts a doggie and a new found addiction!!
Sunday 30th 20:00-04:00
After another short sleep 3hrs to be exact we got our gear together washed the reels and set off to try a mark that would give us a good mixed bag and a chance of smuts I had a few nice smuts here last year too…. We had the busiest session of the trip so far we set out to target flats with one rod while fishing the other for smuts and whatever else might be at range…. We had plenty of good sized dabs, flounders, whiting and dogs Chris had 29cm codling while I got a smut of 4lbs 13ozs…..I think I must have pushed Chris to the limit as he came over sat down and was chatting away next thing I could hear a strange sound…. Fast asleep snoring so seizing the opportunity I took a photo to share with you all these young fellas have no stamina lol …. I thought we’d get a few good smuts here but might be a couple of weeks early for this mark still…. Back to base for food and a beer then we’d a good 6hrs sleep to look forward to and boy was it needed.
Monday 31st 18:00-22:30
We had a few more bits that we had to pick up off Joe and Dave so back into courtown we picked up a pack of lug each and said we’d squeeze in one last session before we left and try and get a few species for Chris’ species hunt… we set up and first cast Chris had a dab and plaice double that set the tone for the evening with fish coming every cast I think we’d only two casts that didn’t produce fish. Again plenty of good sized dabs flounders lots of dogs and whiting made up the bulk of fish landed with Chris getting another one for his list a poor cod…. We packed up and got on the road back to Galway at about midnight…. Long weekend with a good few hours put in but I was glad Chris got to sample some smut fishing and pick up a couple of bonus species too….
Tuesday 1st 19:30-03:00
Thought I’d just add this in here tried for Tope again last night headed off to meet Mike to spin for fresh bait they were hard got then JAKES met up with us later we fished until the dawn light was starting to appear with no runs unfortunately….. clock watching now in anticipation of getting home to catch up on some much needed Zzzzz’ss
dont blame you falling asleep - the last time I was over there with Conor I nearly done the same thing.
