RogB

Great stuff - are they earlier than usual? Might have to see if any have shown up in Torquay this weekend

Phone in a waterproof pouch and get a smart watch linked to it...

Fishing has been slow for us in July but we did manage to catch Teignmouth airshow while fishing. This was our longest day out of about 8hrs and the first time we had ever anchored since doing our Powerboat-level-2 training. Only a couple of gurnards this trip and not much else since either kayaking inshore or fair bit further out in th boat. This is also my first video - at least the plane is impressive even of the cinematography leaves a bit to be desired🤔 PS soz no gratuitous food shots

Glad you found some. "Thin on the ground" is an understatement! I was beginning to think it was just me.. 9hrs afloat July for the Teignmouth airshow, 2 of us fishing quite inshore out of the wind for 2 gurnards. Last weekend 4hrs out on the kayaks for 6 on sat, 3 hrs on the boat out a mile or two for 1 scad (from the sewer buoy "reef" 🤮) on sunday over HW. Even the mackerel boat followed us 3 times, as if we knew best😂 Shore fishing the Ness beach was much more productive for a few evenings but that soon dried up. Anyway the ones we did have were good sized. Keep up the reports, I was inspired by your short videos and managed to shoot the typhoon at the airshow from the back of our tub but need to work out how to YouTube it. Cheers, Roger

Hoping to get out on the morning high water, do a spot of fishing and then drop anchor to watch Teignmouth airshow on saturday from the water. Going to be a bit windy for us but we hope to sit in the lee of the cliffs. Riverside boatyard are renewing the pontoon (its been lifted out) so launching and delivering the car driver will be extra comedy and double stacked on the slip - a slip we have trouble hitting as the boat loves spinning around in the wind. Will be a long day for us as well, 9-10hrs, might have to think about how much fuel we need as we still have no clear idea of consumption - previous trips of a few hrs have cost all of £15 each time - but thats about 10L of E5 and we only have a 25L tank. Think we might need to invest in a reserve tank.....

Nice report and photos. I admire your dedication but lovely looking sea so I can see why you made the effort!

Thanks for posting and making the effort on editing a video - does look a bit choppy!

Chaps I spoke to at the weekend seemed to think it was illegal at night, and a quick check online supports that https://www.spearfishing.co.uk/faqs/legal/ unless something changed when we left the EU - but that seems unlikely.

OK - thanks everybody. It very much sounds like a worthwhile policy to take out if you are in the area they operate in. The engine is still under warranty so gets a main dealer service and us owners are pretty good at problem solving and fixing things - but just don't yet have the experience on the water with boats, and our craft is a little small to be hauling a full toolbox around (we do have a basic kit). In previous years while beach fishing i've watched the RNLI tow numerous boats back to Teignmouth on bank holiday weekends in May as people hit the water for the first time of the season and conk out for some reason. We should definately pick up some extra anchor rope as we only have 30m currently. One thing I would like to do is have some better engine diagnostics as a rev counter and warning lights aren't likely to flag anything until its too late. Probably start a new thread on that topic later. Cheers Roger

Does anybody on here use Seastart outside of the solent? It seems a reasonable option for newbies for a bit of peace of mind and apparently covers the south Devon coast including Teignmouth. Although our little boat is only a couple of years old and should be reliable I am not sure if anything did go wrong we would be able to fix anything more complicated than a loose battery connection, and I think the chances of collecting debris around the prop or water intakes pretty high round our way. The 3 mile limit would be reasonable for us.

More blanks for me accross the late May bank holiday. Bass very sparse and have only seen a few small ones caught locally. No mackeral from the beaches at HT either😪 Should get the boat back in the boatyard next week so I can take my blanking to a new level!

Thanks both, I will take a look at your posts Andy. I've read much of this site and pretty much all of Ian's posts as its all good info for me. We will probably see if we can get out with Matt at some point. I'm off to Croyde for the weekend, pretending to surf, but will pack a rod and some lures. Hope you manage to get out Ian if you decide to go - I look forward to another catch report to glean info from!

Fishing from a boat is still a bit of a novelty for me, but watching youtube people slow pitch jigging and reading reports here and elsewhere it look like good fun. I only lure fish and we won't be going miles out on our little boat but I thought I would scratch together a budget set up for light SPJ up to 20m. Only lure fishing means I only have small fixed spool reels and I dont want to invest in a multiplier as I have no idea about them whatsoever. So finding a SPJ rod rung for this had been holding me back but one surfaced on the Veals website https://www.veals.co.uk/product/rapture-deep-fall-slow-pitch-spinning-100gm/. It looks OK for a fraction of the price of the more heavy duty tools. I have some multicolour j-Braid on order. I also bought a few jigs, and some smaller casting and or pitching jigs which arrived today from Joker who are local to me and I am hoping work on the local fish! I think they look pretty good. I did email the guy that sells them asking for advice on which ones for more inshore areas but never got a response 😒 so did a bit of guessing on colours 😕. Anyway I don't suppose we will hit the water until June, but when we do I will update the thread if they work or not, and whether a fixed spool reel just generated wind knots! Might throw the casting ones about a bit before that though. Anybody else try SPJ in shallower water? Cheers Roger

Almost - I belive the minimum size is 42cm, but 45cm is safer if you tape measure is a bit wrinkled, or missing the first inch! https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/bass-industry-guidance-2023/bass-fishing-guidance-2023

I thought after catching my first bass of the year a few weeks ago that things would have livened up by now, but 4 blank sessions for me on the trot in Shaldon over lows, Ness Beach over high. Luckily I broke my run of bad luck over lunchtime low today, with 3 bass, biggest 46cm. Season has started for me proper.

Nice lump of a bass, congratulations.

Well I think i have had 3 in various sizes bought at different times - generally used from the beach and kayak, not dunked nor splashed and I don't drop them in the sand. Rinsed fairly regularly but not every time. The 4000 sized one with a T shaped handle also has the handle knob bearing very stiff. My mate has two and both anti-reverse died on his, and he rinses his everytime. We do use them a couple of times a week on average over summer though.

Exages were OK (they are discontinued now) - but the chrome on the bail arm goes flaky and cuts your braid and the anti-reverse packs in after a year or two. Stradics are good but a bit pricey. I have an Ultegra which is very good for the money and I use on the kayak - its the cheapest Shimano with a one peice bail arm. the C3000 sized one is almost 50% off at £81 https://www.anglingdirect.co.uk/shimano-ultegra-fc-reel?queryID=a0d87eb623648f030e58ef2cb228c0b9&objectID=95061&indexName=live_ad_uk_products. I would get that sub £100 but it might be a bit light / small for your heavy rod or a Daiwa Ninja (but they have lots of different models and i can never remeber which one is the good one!).

Nice going! Thanks for sharing.

I don't think our experience, short days and only launching and retrival around high water from riverside would leave us many opportunities for winter fishing. Probably a good opportunity for boat tinkering - proper transducer mount, some lights and get ready for next summer season. Can always run the kayaks out if the weather is good as launching and retrieval is a bit less tide dependent. Glad to hear you had some fish, we hit the pier in Torquay and managed a couple of squid after successfully parking the boat.

Well our summer season was shortened by some health conditions, mate getting married wrecking two possible weekends of fishing with a stag weekend and then the actual event and finally the terrible autumn weather. We finished off the winch system and it worked well. Cuddy off the Pilot 4 and it fitted smoothly up the drive and into the garage. Now overwintering in the dry with the other toys..... Love it when a plan actually works Cheers Roger

Theres an app simply called "Tides" on Android by a chap called David Easton which is good as it includes a storm surge correction and also tabs that give wave heights and directions. No weather but the waves are useful and predict a few days in advance I use the actual tide height to enter a tidal offset on my Garmin Quickdraw contours so they have some resemblance to reality in tidal waters (near shore for me)

Excellent stuff. I have only once taken a cuttle for eating - as revenge as it headshotted me while I tried to net it from my kayak. Luckily I had my sunglasses on otherwise I would have had ink in my eyes but my nice bright high vis hat (so the throbbers on jetski's don't run me over) and yellow kayak were never the same again. I don't think it was an accidental shot either....🤯

Sounds like a nice day out and some fish as well. Good to hear some squid around might give it a go from Princess pier soon. Cheers

Sounds and looks like a fun day out, glad you made it back to post the photos and report!