lots of little fish why no big fish? donegal 31.12.10

[last cast lad]

People:me

Duration:1.00-3.00pm

Tide:dropping

Weather:calm

Bait: mackeral

Rigs:conger rigs, shrimp feathers

Results(/b): lots of coalfish




Report: Started out this morning for my last session of 2010 and packed up to go pike fishing, after about an hours drive arrived at my chosen lake where I had alredy decided I was going to catch and land a double figure pike , unfortunately there developed one small hitch in my masterplan, the lake was still frozen . So turned tail and headed home and on route hatched a plan to catch a double figure conger from a rock mark where they had eluded me all year. Called home and swapped my gear and headed on to what is my favourite back up mark, usually pretty dependable, (at least in the summer anyway) This mark I know has to hold good conger, high cliffs, deep water strewn with boulders and a deep bed of kelp After the 20min hike to the mark I put out 2 conger baits, one whole makeral flapper and one mack head with the rest chopped up and threw in to develop loads of scent Since conger fishing can at times be slow I had the forsight to bring along a spinning rod to help pass time. Kept getting a lot of hits on the lures but not connecting so I clipped on a set of shrimp feathers to see what was down there and began pulling in the coalfish, bigger than I had imagined, all 25-35cm, not sure why they wern't being hooked on the lures. no monsters but a string full were good sport on the spinning rod, and all coalfish(no pollack ) in1hr 15min I pulled in 72 coalies a nice surprise for the end of dec. Glad the were all coalies, wouldn't have been able to keep count if I'd had a few different species
Sadly though absolutely no interest in my conger baits, however I'm still convinced that there has to be conger there
Happy new year to all, have fun and stay safe.

[roger de dodger]

coalies have quite small mouths and even when i,m boat fishing i find the smaller hooks work better for them ,size 6 sabikis in pink always do the job ,great bit of sport for you even if they wernt double figure

[saving private brian]

no big fish about lol.gone deeper hunting.that pic might cause a row thou

[paul skelly]

no big fish about lol.gone deeper hunting.that pic might cause a row thou

why man he said he was fishing feathers are you not allowed to catch more than one fish these days?

good fishin lad nice to get a few on the last day of the year

[The Austrian]

proper Donegal catch, well done!

[last cast lad]

no big fish about lol.gone deeper hunting.that pic might cause a row thou

I'm not sure exactly what is causing you offence but, Not to worry I'm not what one of the mackeral bashers that seem to take up residence on all of our piers and accesible rock marks each summer. As I said in the report I was there conger fishing and started throwing about lures to help pass time, I then changed to small feathers to discover what it was that I kept getting knocks from. All fish were carefully unhooked and returned alive and all fish did in fact swim away. That photo is of 1 string full of coalies set down to pose for a photo before being returned.

[plumster]

nice fishing L.C.L some haul of fish

no big fish about lol.gone deeper hunting.that pic might cause a row thou

I'm not sure exactly what is causing you offence but, Not to worry I'm not what one of the mackeral bashers that seem to take up residence on all of our piers and accesible rock marks each summer. As I said in the report I was there conger fishing and started throwing about lures to help pass time, I then changed to small feathers to discover what it was that I kept getting knocks from. All fish were carefully unhooked and returned alive and all fish did in fact swim away. That photo is of 1 string full of coalies set down to pose for a photo before being returned.

hes not offended he's just trying to be funny but i think thats past it sell by date

[tight lines]

a very nice to end the year well done

[FisherKing]

Some catch well done lcl

[Bryan1]

well done on the fishing iv'e found donegal dosent fish to well during the winter months. the golf stream keeps the water to warm for the colder water fish codling etc.

[Al and Jordan]

those coalies can be great fun on the light spinning gear alastair they might not look like much on their own, but a full string of them zipping off in different directions can be great craic
happy new year man and all the best for 2011

[tomgrey]

Fair play for the determination. Keep it up

[polaris]

nice to get full strings ov them,good bit ov fun,,,,well done

[Sweetwrasse]

Nice fishing man, they may be small but they're great craic on the lighter gear Hard luck on the congers.