Shannon estuary-5th august

[bigkev]

Weather sw 3,4,5, then 6
High water 3pm
Drizzle at first to beautiful sunshine and a very warm wind
Ran out in light drizzle to beal bar
The estuary is now heaving with mackerel from tiny(4 inches, no joke) up to 3/4 lb. Bait is now simply a matter of 3 or 4 drops.Mackerel can even be caught while tope fishing at anchor. Easy

However, after the outstanding tope session of two weeks ago, where we couldnt stop catching(and I believed it to be due to superior boat positioning, angling technique and general super angler status) we really struggled
Being brought back down to earth, we failed to get a single tope run, regardless of the marks tried and state of tide
Interestingly, its the second time this summer we have failed to catch in a proper session. Again, as with the last session in June that was fishless(tope anyway), it coincided with a very small tide. The shannon fishes poorly in very small tides apparently

The day finished with us taking macks, doggies, a plague of whiting to 1/2lb and two double figure huss of 11 and 14lb
Must look up specimen size for huss

Poor fishing, but nice to be on the water

Kev

[coaster]

well Kev,
greater spotted dogfish

record =23 lbs 13 ozs
specimen= 16 lbs