Co Antrim rock mark 15 Dec 10.

[cathalger]

John- 2pm to 9pm
Me- 6pm to 11pm.

Tide high at 6.30pm.

Baits, freshly dug black lug, squid.

Conditions, calm, mild, damp.

Report;
I joined John at 6pm, he'd already had a few small codling, nothing major, a couple at 1.25lb and a couple of doggies. On my first 3 casts I got dogfish. Bites were steady, mostly from dogs, a few other nibles from hook cleaners for me but John had 2 more nice wee codling before leavin at 9pm due to having to go to work in Bfast at midnight.

I ended up catching 7 dogs and nothing else. Couldnt manage a codling at all, fishin the same baits as John but not gettin the distance he was.

We had a number of edible crab each throughout the session. Of more interest than the anglin was the squat lobster in the rockpool nearby, discovered with a look with the headlamp. Saw 2 butterfish, prawns, blennies and hermit crab also.

The small sea scorpion was caught in a rockpool on Monday evening, it was only 7cm long.

[Drew]

Nice session lads... Colours on the Lobster are class!

[polmac]

great pics lads, well done

[Surfrod]

Quality photographs
Well done

[Al and Jordan]

great pics cathal . the squat lobster is class looking man. are you out at the weekend?

[fishermannum1]

nice session there guys, nice pic's

[saving private brian]

nice report and pics there cathal.love the lobster 1.when ye r fishing off the rock mark wat kinda rigs r ye using

[cathalger]

nice report and pics there cathal.love the lobster 1.when ye r fishing off the rock mark wat kinda rigs r ye using

Brian, I was using a shop bought trace with 2 snoods, one coming off the trace at the top of the trace about 2' from the weight( 5oz gripper) and another snood coming off the trace close to the lead. Size 2/0 aberdeens on each trace baited with big fat black lug tipped off with small strips of squid (Johns bait of choice and he has a lot of experience, he's in his 50's now and done a lot of fishin).

He fishes nothing fancy, making up his traces with 3 way swivels and last night fishing 3/0 bait holder hooks. 5oz gripper on the end. 18" snoods. He generally punches his bait out a good bit further that me, using a beefier 12 rod than my v light one, and he has about 25' of 30lb b.s. shock leader on too, something I must do too.

I have noticed a couple of times (inc last night) when he has hit codling, I have had a good thump or 2 only for the fish to then leave the bait alone and not come back? I dont see him doing anything special, he just lifts the rod when he sees a bite and if he feels another decent pull he strikes it. We were standing right beside each other last night and I got doggie after doggie- he didnt but he did get codling.

Ive caught an odd codling off that mark but he seems to be able to get a run of them, last Sat night when I was up the coast failing to catch a bass he had 5 codling there at 3lb, 2lb x3 and a 1lber+ an almost 2lb flounder!

Any suggestions on terminal set up would be very much appreciated,

Cheers

[cathalger]

Thanks everyone for the responses, yeah the snaps of those wee squat lobster turned out good. Thats the first time I saw them in that particular pool, but then again I usually only be lookin into it in the daylight and they are possibly hiding away in the day time.

[tight lines]

no shame in geting dogs thay have saved us all from the blank well done

[FISHYFINGERS]

SOME VERY INTERESTING LOOKING SEA LIFE THERE. GOOD PICS.

[gfkelly1969]

well done nice session,I love the photos of the Lobster,great colour on them

[the-ghost]

nice one, never seen a squat before. that areas hiving wi dogs at the minute, pain in the arse when trying to target other species

[lampard]

nice picture

[dave316]

i used to buy squat lobsters from larne market years ago. they were dirt cheap as nobody wanted them, but were beautiful to eat. never see them for sale these days though as no doubt they get exported

[chuckaroo]

last time i was in scotland i went to a seafood market on the west coast. you could buy a 'pint' of squat lobsters (a plastic pint glass full, maybe 50+ of them in there), which i did. i took me aaages to sit and crack them open one at a time. tastey, but nearly gave up!!

[corbyeire]

didnt know we had squat lobsters in our waters!

[liam78]

well there you get them in shipswrecks they come out at night time picture look like there were taking underwater

[cathalger]

Cheers for responses everyone, never tried eating them myself, to be honest the majority of the ones I have seen are so tiny I couldnt justify gathering them and boiling them up for the morsel of meat within, Have seen a lot of prawn, and have considered taking some of those, they are gettin a bye ball these days from the salmon anglers that used to gather them for bait (myself inc. on a few occasions) cos prawning for salmon seems to banned just about everywhere.

Corbyeire, I hadnt seen them round here myself until a big storm in April washed them up dead on the shore, among other stuff. Never thought I'd get shots of them so handy as the other night, I was thinkin of goin out with a local lobster man who gets them in his creels, just to get decent photos of them.

Ive looked those pools before and never seen squats, are they a new arrival in these waters I wonder, like the trigger fish or is it maybe that Ive just never looked in the depths of winter? Another thing I never saw evidence of round here until that storm in April was the 'hairy crab'. They were washed up dead too, since first seeing them in the spring Ive caught live ones on foul hooked bits of seaweed while out in the boat and found bits of them on the shore.

I have a notion that new species are colonising these waters, or are becoming much more abundant. If they were there in numbers before how did I never see them or bits of dead ones on the shore?

Has anyone else noticed sealife in recent years they werent previously familiar with?

[chuckaroo]

Cathal i reckon the more time someone spends looking at these things the more things they will discover; its only with a growing interest, and more time spent observing, that someone will discover 'new' species that they havent seen before.
(surely the trigger fish has been coming up with the gulf stream for many many years, maybe we just werent aware of it)

i myself have stumbled across squat lobsters before from years back - from around our shores and from out in boats. you can find out a lot from the internet on all marine species - their distribution, their life cycles, and so on. a lot of research has been undertaken but of course theres still lots to learn, and probably new phenomenon to discover. circumstances, populations of certain species, availability of food, fecundity, conditions, environments etc etc, change all the time. plenty more things out there to discover and learn about!!

books, aquariums, internet,.. allll good



the squat lobsters i was eating on the west coast of scotland were big enough that once de-shelled the meat was about the size of a small prawn. i dont know, about an inch long.