13.2.11 -First decent pollack of the year.....

[cathalger]

Two of us fished a rock mark in NE Antrim today for about an hour around high water, on the way home from a boat repair near Ballintoy, hence the face like Ive done a Tony Montana in Scarface, no performance enhancing substances were actually used during this fishing trip. Its white gelcoat dust.

The 1st four casts produced 4 takes, landed 3 and lost a substantial fish in the kelp, but didnt leave the spinner in the fish. The following 20 or so casts produced one small coley.

Better one was 3lb exactly, it had a semi digested 15 spine stickleback sticking out of its throat, only identifiable by the tail.

The other two were nearly the pound and a quarter, small fish for that mark but welcome in February.

[saving private brian]

thats top class for this time of year well done.thats an old reel cathal

[FisherKing]

Thats a fine pollock for this time of year well done

[tight lines]

great catch fine pollock for this time of year they look very well feed and in great condition well done

[zud25]

Well done on the pollocks

[Drew]

Good to meet you Cathal, Cracking Session!

[FISHYFINGERS]

EXCELLENT CATCH ON A LURE THIS TIME OF YEAR.

[declan65]

Well done, those pollock are in nice condition

[JimC]

Nice fishing. Could be an interesting mark to try an Illex Nitro or a Hart Leech

[Drew]

Lot of boys tend to Jellyworm up that direction, think a couple of site members have been smashed up by some seriously tidy fish in that area

[fishy1987]

beautiful fish beautiful cant wait to get one!fairplay

[nicefish]

Cracking fish and photos, How old is the reel your using?

[cathalger]

Cracking fish and photos, How old is the reel your using?

Hi nicefish, kinda thought someone might ask that, I bought that wee mitchell as a kid in August 1986, its been serviced once by Mitchell approx 15 years ago, still going. Thats when things were made to last, not like todays s***. I paid £15 for it new.

Thanks for all the comments.

[mac attack]

Some lovely fish there, great session, well done

[cathalger]

Thanks for comments, Yes Brian its old but its going strong, about time I regreased its insides to keep it working.

Drew good to meet you last night, we'll get a longer chat another time. Yeah big pollack can be hooked up there but theyre hard to land as they dive for the kelp jungle. I have quite a few around the 4lb succesfully landed but plenty of fish bigger than that have got away. How did you get on last night??

JimC, like the look of those lures, pollack killers those, I should start to use that kinda thing more, spinners are good but theyre expensive, I lost 3 spinners yesterday so thats about a tenner gone. Particularly like the look of the drop shot rig, that should work well with a 1oz bomb on the tail end, thanks for that.

Cheers nicefish(reel was bought almost 25 years ago) fishy 1987, declan65, FISHYFINGERS, zud25, FisherKing, mac attack.

tightlines, yes its a fat fish, probably full of spawn, I didnt gut it, its in the freezer intact.

[Der Baron]

Nice fish Cathal, good to see something decent starting to show!

[cathalger]

Nice fish Cathal, good to see something decent starting to show!

Cheers Paul. Yeah was close to a brace of those good fish, It was just a short blast of good fishing and if I had been able to get that particular spinner out of the 3lber and didnt have to change over to a different type (which wouldnt sink fast enough) I think I'd have hit another couple atleast.

A taste of whats to come!

[JOHN1]

nice fishing well done
you wouldnt beleive i only binned one of them mitchells a few weeks back was in good condition only it was handleless, very strange with the anti clockwise rotation you dont see that too often

[cathalger]

nice fishing well done
you wouldnt beleive i only binned one of them mitchells a few weeks back was in good condition only it was handleless, very strange with the anti clockwise rotation you dont see that too often

John please dont tell me you binned a working Mitchell 410A? Youd still get a handle for that somewhere, I have a handle here on a similar model black reel, but I need to put it on the blue one cos as you can see its taped up to stop it turning the wrong way. There has to be other handles knocking around, thousands of those reels were in use in the 80's and 90's before Shimanos replaced them.

Dont know what you mean re the anti clockwise rotation?

[JOHN1]

John please dont tell me you binned a working Mitchell 410A? Dont know what you mean re the anti clockwise rotation?

yep i binned it

what i mean is on most fixed spools when you turn the handle the reel will rotate to the left,
with that mitchell when you turn the handle the reel rotates to the right going anticlockwise