Causeway lass, Portrush - Fri 3rd June

[polmac]

People: me and 9 others from work

Duration: 10am to 4pm

Tide:

Weather: wonderfull!

Bait: mackeral and lures

Rigs: lures

Results: cod, gurnard, whiting, mackeral and a smooth hound

Report:
First boat trip of the year for us and myself and we headed out again with the causeway lass. with a scorcer of a day on the way and ovely calm weather we thought that we would be onto a great day of fishing.
oh how were were wrong. truth be told it was very poor throughout with very little fish turning up all day. at one point we had gone half an hour with not one person getting so much as a bite.
i ended up catching 13 fish over the day which was the most, sadly that didnt win any prizes between us as we decided on the biggest fish as the winner which was won by robert who caught a cracking fish. a nice way to end the day up as ive never seen a fish like that.

[polmac]

some pics from the day

[PaddyB]

Sad to see so many small codling boxed, but that tub gurnard in the box looks like a brute(for the area)

[polmac]

i know what you mean about the cod but all these guys are complete novices so they were over the moon to catch them and take them home to eat

[saving private brian]

them fish are borderline and theres a haddock in there i think

[nicefish]

i know what you mean about the cod but all these guys are complete novices so they were over the moon to catch them and take them home to eat

Did they not supply life jackets?

[brianbru]

Nice to get out in weather like that lads well done. The smooth hound Looks like a spurdog!!!


Brian

[BigPhil]

nice day to be out.

novices or not many of those fish are too small to eat and novices should have been informed to return fish of that size, if not by those who were experienced, then by the skipper.

[Al and Jordan]

at least you got the weather for it man. we were out in red bay last sunday and it was pretty poor. weather and fishing . i take it you chartered the boat for yourselves? been watching richards website and still waiting to see any dates go up for individual places to be advertised yet

[dbrock]

well done on getting the lads interested in fishing, in fairness between 8 lads very little fish in that box, no harm done hope you have them all hooked

[Drew]

Hard luck on the slow session, Your Smoothy is a Spurdog alright... What I will say is, though I don't agree with the taking of undersized fish, I believe that when it comes to attracting more to our sport charters with novice friends and workmates are a sure way to increase interest, and therefore taking a couple home each to show the Wife/Girlfriend/Mum probably isn't the worst idea. Education takes time, but the more anglers who eventually make it to a competant level, the greater the voice we have as a sport.

[Stephen8wood]

Hard luck on the slow session, Your Smoothy is a Spurdog alright... What I will say is, though I don't agree with the taking of undersized fish, I believe that when it comes to attracting more to our sport charters with novice friends and workmates are a sure way to increase interest, and therefore taking a couple home each to show the Wife/Girlfriend/Mum probably isn't the worst idea. Education takes time, but the more anglers who eventually make it to a competant level, the greater the voice we have as a sport.

Agreed. When I started out I took tiny things home with me. I remember trying to fillet a 3 inch whiting once. It takes time to get the idea. Looked like a great day out all the same.

[polmac]

Hard luck on the slow session, Your Smoothy is a Spurdog alright... What I will say is, though I don't agree with the taking of undersized fish, I believe that when it comes to attracting more to our sport charters with novice friends and workmates are a sure way to increase interest, and therefore taking a couple home each to show the Wife/Girlfriend/Mum probably isn't the worst idea. Education takes time, but the more anglers who eventually make it to a competant level, the greater the voice we have as a sport.

agreed drew, all bar 2 of the group have fished before and the rest were over the moon at getting a fish to show off at home to their families. its a good day out for them.

i personally took nothing home and threw most back in like the other angler on the trip

[birdseye]

Nice to see some fish.Not to many counters
What did you think of the new boat??

[polmac]

Nice to see some fish.Not to many counters
What did you think of the new boat??

its a great job, alot bigger and it can def shift when he opens the engines up!

will def be back again in august hopefully for another day out

[lugworm]

looked like a swell day bud...........jus want to make a fair point on the undersized fish, personally jus like yourself i wouldnt take undersized fish out but i would make the acception for some novices, for the simple reason that there are 1000's upon 1000's of fish of all different species killed in trawling nets, that dont mean to catch them, but they do and all those dead fish are jus dumped back into the ocean........

for example as seen on hughs fish fight.........jus one trawler in the uk was trawling for bass and the majority of the trawl that was cot were cod, and every single cod in that net was dumped back into the water and there was a BIG BIG number of them trown back DEAD, and this is an EVERYDAY OCCURANCE...................

So my point being is that ide rather see a couple of codling go back with the novices than to be thrown back dead!!!!!!!!
i think i have a fair point being entitled to my own opinion!!!!!!!!!!!

i also know that the whole point of throwing them back is so they can grow and spawn to build up the stocks..........but i dont think by slating one novice angler for a few undersized cod is going to make the difference.................its the bigger picture we need to look at!!!!!!!!!!!!

[birdseye]

Good boat can fair shift Throws a lot of spray on a rough sea.
Might not suit a lot of anglers,not a lot of shelter or seating when
going at speed. Hope to get out again on a calm one. .
Reserved judgement.

[jbhartin]

looked like a swell day bud...........jus want to make a fair point on the undersized fish, personally jus like yourself i wouldnt take undersized fish out but i would make the acception for some novices, for the simple reason that there are 1000's upon 1000's of fish of all different species killed in trawling nets, that dont mean to catch them, but they do and all those dead fish are jus dumped back into the ocean........

for example as seen on hughs fish fight.........jus one trawler in the uk was trawling for Bass and the majority of the trawl that was cot were cod, and every single cod in that net was dumped back into the water and there was a BIG BIG number of them trown back DEAD, and this is an EVERYDAY OCCURANCE...................

So my point being is that ide rather see a couple of codling go back with the novices than to be thrown back dead!!!!!!!!
i think i have a fair point being entitled to my own opinion!!!!!!!!!!!

i also know that the whole point of throwing them back is so they can grow and spawn to build up the stocks..........but i dont think by slating one novice angler for a few undersized cod is going to make the difference.................its the bigger picture we need to look at!!!!!!!!!!!!

I totally agree with you " Lugworm " at least the lads were going to eat those fish - " well I hope they did " and they will be twice as wise the next time they go out as am sure Polmac will give them the correct advice and put the small stuff back ..

[S Mc Allister]

Its similar From Garron Point to Red Bay the fishing in the boat is relatively poor, though the odd good cod is showing up though the biggest this year was caught on 12th July at %lb, a novice I had out caught it. Catching a lot of small haddock and whiting but good to see the haddock it has been the first in 4 years. Also starting to catch a few gurnard both grey and red. No tubs yet. Fishing overall poor enough barr the odd cod. Very few mackeral also.

People should stop giving out about people keeping small fish every novice wants to keep their first fish and eat it, and as somebody already pointed out there are unreal amounts killed everyday from all sorts of other things like commercial fishing etc. so a novice keeping a few fish will do no harm. And as already pointed out once they try a time or two to fillet them they'll throw them back.

Tight lines and lets hope to an improvement in the next month