Geoff

wow what a day - non stop action from the first drop to the last........
Forecast weather window for the weekend had northerly 15mph on Saturday - northerly is off the land so 15mph is just about do-able.  Small tides so expectations were low.
Met at Tims boat for 7am to get out before sunrise - no messing about trying to find bait- straight to the 5nm mark with frozen baits in case the wind strengthened. Target - Whiting on the small gear- rays on the big stuff. 

dropped the hook, wind and tide not quite aligned but was ok bit bumpy an swinging a bit - dropped the small rigs first while the boat settled and was straight into the fish - literally as soon as the lead touched down. 
We had so much action on the small rods it was hours before we put the big ones out - Pout, Bream, Whiting, scad, dogfish. I have never put back so many decent bream - we must have had over 20 to the boat - all decent size. Some of the pout were bigguns too - great non stop fun!



eventually we tired of that and had we already had 2 decent bream and 3 big whiting for the table - so we put out the big baits only to find the Pout, whiting and bream hitting them too - Tim had a big Bream on a 6.0 hook and mackerel fillet!! - these fish were ravenous, either stripping the mackerel baits or hooking themselves!
I put down a mackerel head hoping the bait would last long enough for something bigger and I was rewarded with a big angry double figure Bull Huss.

I also managed a Scallop on the big rod - must have taken a fancy to my muppet...... 🤣 perfect for a starter!

 
On the way home we were escorted by a pod of Dolphins - always amazing to see. 

 
Bream and Scallop for tea,

with the whiting done in chunks for sunday lunch fish wrap!!

 
a pretty special day afloat to kick start the year - I was knackered though - combination of cold and all day action on a constantly moving boat really tired me out - I must be out of practice! 😜
Lets hope this is a good sign for the year ahead!

it is in hand all ready

i will be taking it to the garage before youse. i will do a road check first, ie braking ect then feule then to fawley garage. i dont think it would pass a mot for it youse led additive in the feule, plus many aditional rules .
frankley at this age a reguler check up would be addviseable

Belated new year greetings one and all. 

taxed the van today and i donot nead a mot now.

Ok til it means " I need you to fill my boat up so I can use it"

Picked the wrong day to shuck mussels, pigging freezing! They better catch some decent fish!

Finally a very short window in the weather allowed a few hours out on boxing day.
Had the in laws down for xmas and managed to get a pass for boxing day. Didn't get up early doors as didn't want to curtail any festivities - so it was down the boat for 11am armed with turkey sandwiches and a flask of coffee
Phil had a new rod and reel for his birthday back in Sept that he still hadn't christened so that was the plan - get phil a fish - any fish - he now has a very nice 8-12lb Ugly stick GX2 paired with a Penn Rival 15LW. for the inshore lighter stuff (his 30lb Penn Squadron is like a broomstick)
Plan was to drift Portlands entrances and inshore reefs with baited feathers and chuck some squid jigs over in case they were still about. 
target mackerel, Gurnards, Pollock, whiting
Rigged up Phils new rod with brand new feathers - for the best possible luck. 

 
Headed out into what was pretty much flat calm. 
was treated to flat seas and fantastic cloud patterns


but sadly not many fish and no squid. Even tried baited feathers to no avail.
Phil did manage 2 mackerel and therefore christened the rod. so that part was a sucess

 
Come 3.30pm we were losing light and headed back to the harbour - not the best fishing, but we were just glad to be out, and good to give the boat a good run
got to the pub just before dark

 
not sure when the next weather window will be - Easter maybe........

Thanks Pete, and a happy Christmas to you  and all our other forum members and readers. Geoff.🙂

Merry Xmas everyone, and may you all have a safe and prosperous new year and all your pot noodles be tasty

Thanks Pete, and a happy Christmas to you  and all our other forum members and readers. Geoff.🙂

Thanks Pete, and a happy Christmas to you  and all our other forum members and readers. Geoff.🙂

Thanks Pete, and a happy Christmas to you  and all our other forum members and readers. Geoff.🙂

geff
happy xmas mate, have a grate xmas to you and all the famerly

great report mate 

A short weather window on a big tide, so it had to be worth a go.
Launched in the dark at 07:00 with brother in law as crew. Went out to 4 different wrecks between 10 and 15 miles out and there was nobody at home, not even a Pout !
However, we did mange to lose 6 sets of gear between us, I lost 3 slow jigs, and James lost 3 sets of running booms. The sea was a tad lumpy past 10 miles, but still doable.
As we had to be back on the slip for 12:30 to catch the tide, I decided to head inshore for the last hour, at our usual bait mark near the Orestone.
On the way back in I noticed 5 boats fishing an inshore wreck (the coal boat) at 5 miles out, which is unusual, so I guessed either a) all the other wrecks were netted, or b) the fish were showing inshore.
Once on the inside of the Orestone we decided on Maccy rigs, looking for decent Mack or Whiting. The sounder was full of activity, mostly on the bottom, so we dropped the rigs. Straight away I was into a fish that was definitely not a Mack or a whiting, it was, however, a 50cm Bass. This is pretty much the way it continued for the next hour with Bass, Pollock, and Channel Mackerel. I tried small slow jigs, and also 115mm Redgills, but the only thing that would catch was the 3 string tinsel Hokkai's. I assume the Mack, Bass, and Pollock were chasing some sort of white bait, but using the livescope I couldn't identify what they were chasing.
We ended up with 12 Bass from 48 - 52cm (we kept 4), 9 Pollock of about 3 - 5 lb, and I lost count of the Mackerel, but some were very large.
After this episode I have started tying my own feathers (Tinsels) as the 'ready mades' are unreliable, we lost a good half a dozen decent fish to bad dropper knots, and snood breakage.
Sorry, but no pics this time. My GoPro has bitten the dust (they are notoriously unreliable, but give good footage), and I will replace it with a DJI Osmo Action 4, but they are like rocking horse poo at the moment, so I invested in a cheaper Wolfang GA460, and need a couple of sessions to get the hang of how to operate it efficiently. I got some footage, but it was just us going uptide on a wreck for another drift.
So, almost 45Nm, but it came good in the end. The sea was flat inshore so I fished until the last minutes then gave it beans to get back (40kts).
I am hoping to get out over the Christmas, weather permitting, and make a trip the the Skerries for some winter Turbot as there are less Plaice around to steal the baits.
Hope you all have a good Christmas.
 
 
 
 

I’ve got the dog, she gets violent if she thinks someone will steal her ball 

I’m not expecting much (anything) for Christmas…. I’m always a nightmare to buy for (apparently) so I just tell people not to bother 🤣
If I need gear I wheel and deal until I can afford it… 

Here you go then...
 

Been busy doing maintenance on mine and the boats my daughter skippers, as well as doing a bit of commercial abalone dive boat skippering.
The rod and line fishing has been excellent over the past few months, if anything to good which has made me a bit bored with it. Trying to get motivated to turn my sights on the marlin season now but I just feel I’ve been there and done that to much.  
 
I took my youngest daughter and her partner out who managed 3 marlin species in a day. He also manged to catch and release over 40 coral trout to 80cm in one session from my boat on my annual northern trip. The tropical fishing was simply incredible thanks to being able to download satellite images into my GPS showing every detail of shallow coral reef systems. Northern bluefin tuna were in schools which could almost be guaranteed in sight from any location we fished, which also had various large trevally species following under. 
 
The beaches are currently thick with Aus salmon in the 3-6kg size with packs of whaler sharks getting among them. I am planning chasing a few mako solo but again feel a bit lacking in enthusiasm, however I will fill the boat with fuel this morning so I can at least head out to try and grab a few lobsters for Xmas dinner.
Oh yes, it’s been bloody hot here too, 37’c when polishing one of the boats ( three in total ).

There are several large schools of salmon in this shot, the salmon which are off the right of the screen had some decent sized sharks I estimate in the 150kg + size.  I had to use my wife’s polarised glasses over the front of my phone camera to help see these salmon. Aus salmon are not related to normal salmon, these are a far more powerful tough fighting fish. The fact they are more powerful makes their flesh strong and meaty to eat and less desirable.



 

Well, until today I haven’t been out at sea since the middle of August. The weather (mainly) and work (occasionally) had conspired to keep me landlocked with no chance of pestering, let alone catching, any fish.
At long last everything went to plan and I got out of Littlehampton on this mornings flooding tide.
By 8.45am I was four miles off in 16m of water with the pick down on some mixed ground.
Unfortunately no specimen fish took a liking to my lovely squid and lug baits though I did manage 15 nice (over 1.5lb) whiting a 4lb pollack and some straps. 
Most importantly the boat,engine and trailer all worked perfectly and I was able to enjoy a much needed day at sea.
Hopefully we will get a spell of settled weather soon so I can get out and play again.
 

Due to work and weather I haven’t been out, until today, since the middle of August.

I know the answer to that one, they forgot their rods so had to go back and get them.  They'll be back later

Anyone been out? 
 
my season is now done until spring 😞 Boat be out the water in new year to start the next round of maintenance, repairs and new toys to add. Hopefully back at early April for the pollack 🙂 
Powerboat instruction this weekend so still on the water but this time I’m on someone else’s RIB so I’m praying that the weather holds as I won’t have a warm cabin to hide in 🤣