Sundays Competition Catch

[overdraft]

Overdarfts day started with a nice surprise when we approached the fuel station at corralls to be greeted by a brand new floating pontoon to berth on while fueling up,

 

The fishing was'nt bad either, after deciding to head towards Southbourne we managed to get some good consisted drifts in, which resulted in ,7plaice , biggest going to Charlie of 1lb 9oz, 1 red mullet to me 1lb 4oz. 1 nice bass, 4 bream, and 4 mackeral, (a CHICKEN STIR FRY!!! but no pudding!!!cheap chef!!) so all in all not a bad day afloat, hope everyone had good day.

 

Kim

[Adam F]

BW and Dawn Raider started whilst it was dark this morning and launched from Weymouth at 6.30am.

 

The wind was much more than we expected and the slate grey skies made me think that a lumpy bumpy day was in store - but once at anchor it didnt seen too bad.

 

My mark produced from the off - target species as well - Blondes, Undulates and Spotted rays all came to the net within the first 2 hours - in total we had 4 on BW (making 8 rays in total for the two boats) best on BW went 12lb 14oz Undulate to Gordon who also had a 3lb 12oz Spotted. My best was a 10lb 8oz Undulate - all lovely fish.

 

The tope then arrived, and dispite not being target fish provided Gordon and I some electric sport for well over an hour - four fish on at once - screaming takes - searing runs - two tope on the deck and playing another......we had about 20 fish between us best going 20lb.

 

The tide then swang to ebb and dispite trying a few other marks they didnt produce so we called it a day at 3pm and headed home.

 

Nice to do something different - but the big blonde still eludes me!!

 

AF

[JIMBOB]

As Adam said 4 rays per boat, I was out with Mark B as crew And He had quite a few tope All relesed with the T-Bar , At the water,Best fish estimated at 18lb and a Blonde ray of 10lb 8oz.

I had a few tope only to about 12lb but 3 rays to make a ray hatrick!,of 3 different species, a 10lb 8 oz blonde ray ,a 13lb 8oz undulate and a 3lb 4oz spotted

So a fair go it, But I could of done with the undulate's I caught Tuesday!

 

James

[Paul D]

Had a great day out on Phaeton. No record breaking rays for me though.

However, caught the first ray of the day a small undulate of around 2 lb ( my first ever undulate ).

 

We then moved to another mark and fishing was slow. Duncan had a nice Undulate. Paul J had a bass. Duncan had a tope and I then caught a Blonde Ray of around 5 lb which seemed much bigger as it had the trace around its tail. Still my first blonde ray as well.

 

Mucho impressed with Phaeton - want one please

 

Many thanks to Duncan for the trip out.

[alun j.]

Day out on Maverick with Martin [ what an impressive skipper]!

 

Not only does he take you his best marks [ very quickly] but then lets you catch most of the fish !!

 

After pulling up a few mackerel for bait.........bumped out to the SW.Banks in a fresher than expected N. to NE. breeze [ 3 increasing to 4 and later 5 ??]

 

Arriving at slack water , I hooked into a fish first drop, using light tackle. A 10 - 15 minute tussle heaved up a pb. Blonde, that just squeezed into Martin's net. The acrobatic ballet of digital weighing at sea followed [ with me trying to hold his arms still]........... Taking that minimum 'steady weight' principle........ Martin called it at 24 1/4 lb. before we slipped it back.

 

As tide started to flow , Martin responded with dogfish, as I upped the weight of lead on the trace......... but all was quiet apart from unhit bites.

 

My turn next just before a move was called for......... and I was in to a ' beast' that I could hardly budge in that tide. Lack of experience caused me to 'up the welly' as my arm was tiring; instead of asking to buoy - off the anchor, and pull it up on the drift ................. I pulled harder ...... until the inevitable...... and line parted !!! ****** A good fish I'm sure.......... and I was well impressed with the muscle in my solid C rods.

 

Following moves inshore and out of tide and wind were fruitless and comp. time elapsed.

 

We finished off drifting the Swash........... I was not expecting.........on the basis of past experience........... but Martin did it again !! ......... some fine feisty plaice for supper tomorrow! and a gurnard

 

Thanks again Martin ........... I enjoyed my day on your super boat and your relaxed good company........... esp. with another pb. to add.

 

Alun.

[Maverick Martin]

As Alun said after a prompt start from him with a lovely Blonde ray first drop things went decidedly down hill. A shame about the second Ray that hung in the tide but 17lb trace line just isn't up to handling those grinding pads on big Rays in those tides.

 

It was definately Aluns day as all I could manage was dogs, mackerel and a lonely plaice after our competition time was up Never mind it was good to be out on the water with good company.

 

Martin

[alun j.]

Martin,

 

I agree in general.......... but it wasn't 'grinding pads' ..... line parted at swivel knot.

 

Too much welly........ with impatience......break at weakest point.......... where expected as I was using 20 lb braid.

 

When I upped the trace later......... and got hooked up in the bottom........ it was the braid that broke then.

 

The solution would have been the buoyed-off anchor....... as we quickly concurred on !!

 

Alun.

[Sinbad]

Was also out on Sinbad with friend Dave P.

What was a frantic start turned out more leisurely, as the 'other competion' being run at Parkstone Yacht Club didnt officially start until after a hearty breakfast (Bacon , eggs, black pudding fried bread etc etc etc) was consumed !

 

We fished at the pier for tons of mackerel - mostly small sized (ideal live bait) but no jumbos. then a few spots on the patch.

 

Best fish was a 5 lb Undulate ray, my first ever, what beautiful rays these are !

Then some dogfish, and a few more, and then drifted the branksome shore line for a few flatties, but got masses of tiny bream , landed a small bass, and took a decent bream home for tea.

 

All in all a very enjoyable day, the future looks good, with all those tiny bream arround.

 

Paul

 

[JIMBOB]

Supa blonde ray Alun/martin what a fish and good to see it returned.

Il be out there this week trying to catch her

 

James

 

[Maverick Martin]

Alun

 

Agree that buoying of the anchor would have been useful and depending on how far down the fish had taken the hook would probably got the ray up . Also noted that your line parted at the swivel but I still think that 17lb trace line is not up to fishing for large rays. Assuming knots were secure heavier trace line wouldnt have parted at the swivel or anywhere else. Main line of 20lb unless it is damaged is niegh on impossible to break with a rod, but will part when pulled for a break but not when using the rod normally.

[Adam F]

Admittedly we didnt get the chance to test it out on such a fine Ray as Alun's but we were armed with 30-50lb class rods, 30lb braided mainline and 150lb traces to Varivas barbless 7/0 hooks.

 

We were in 110' with a fair tide and 1-1.5lb of lead - Im sure we would have needed this gear of we hooked anything near 20lb - the heavy traceline was to safeguard against Tope - which Im glad we did! The heavy line didnt seem to put off the rays and made sure we saftely landed and returned these magnificent fish.

 

Thats it for me now until Oct! next trip will proably be for cod!!

[duncan]

Martin - I think these 17lb traces must be a Christchurch thing as I had to have some words about them on Phaeton too!

 

There still seems to be a thing about using traces lighter than the main line to 'save' gear/mainline or whatever but the fact is that if you main line does part it's going to be at the knot to the swivel or leader if you use one for new line, and somewhere in that area for an older line which will proabable have developed a weak point near the boom area. My preference remains to use 6 inches of 20-30lb wire to the hook and the balance of the trace in 80lb hard nylon despite using 20lb mainline.

 

If nothing else this does give you the confidence to hang on in there knowing that you have a true breaking point at about 18lb on that braid/swivel knot (if done well!)

 

Really sorry to hear about the lost fish; not sure how buoying the anchor would have helped other than to initially change the angle of the pull on the ray to release it - couldn't you have let out another 50 m anchor line to achieve this? Bit easier than buoying it off etc. Suspect you would still have had a similar problem even drifting as the fish is simply using the speed of the water (which hasn't changed).

[great white]

Some nice fish recorded well done

 

Our Day was a bit slower

 

using the new timings we thought we would try to get the two slack periods in, which we did.

But I had not seen the amount of wind that we had, in any of the forecasts that I checked.

During the slack periods the fishing was difficult to say the least.

 

we had 2 congers 2 tope Dogs pout lots of macs etc

 

But the only Ray was a decent fish that came in the middle of the tide run, it surfaced a long way behind the boat and dived again about 30 yards behind the boat.

I could not gain anything on it for a while so eventually had to tighten the drag a bit and give it more muscle. Bad idea made 10 metres then line parted. [30lb braid]

Dans 24lb tope had been around the lines earlier so it may have been weakened.

 

Unless it was an undulate it would not have won , but it would have been good to get our only ray onboard.

 

Nice to get so many boats out there trying.

 

Charlie

[Maverick Martin]

Duncan

 

not sure how buoying the anchor would have helped other than to initially change the angle of the pull on the ray to release it -

If we had buoyed the anchor we would have been drifting at the sameish speed as the tide it would therefore have been fighting the fish more directly with less influence of the tide. If we had let out another 50m of anchor line it would have taken no time at all for the tide to have run away with the fish, we would then have been back to square one

 

Never mind he (the fish) or she is still our there waiting to be caught. Would whoever catches it please return the trace to Alun

 

Martin

[duncan]

Sorry Martin I think we are at cross purposes! Couldn't agree more that once the fish is of the bottom drifting with the current makes the subsequent 'battle' a completely different game. I thought the problem Alun had was shifting it in the first place from what had been said - in which case starting to drift will enable you to put more pull on the fish than most can do with their arms (about 25lb?) but will be like snagging the bottom on a drift. With 20lb main line Alun could already exert the maximum pressure (and more) that the gear warranted in this case.

 

Anyhow here's a happy man and his first blonde (he claims!)

 

[Maverick Martin]

Duncan

 

Ah I see your point, the fish was already off the bottom and kiting off in the tide

 

Martin

[duncan]

in which case you were a very mean skip not to buoy off your anchor and give the man a fighting chance to land the monster................

 

having said that I will admit that it wouldn't have been easy on Phaeton - cutting the line is easy enough but securely attaching the buoy would have been in a bit of a palava as would re rigging it all in that tide in due course!

 

we have had a number of fish around 25lb from the area in the last 4 years but there are obviously some even bigger ones around!

[Paul J]

raises the question

 

are we ready to buoy off the anchor in an emergency ? eg:man overboard

 

Paul J

[great white]

I would have and probably should have done that on Sunday

 

The main reason why I didn't was getting the boys to rapidly reel in the other five lines. all with 1 1/2 lb leads on.

 

my boat is rigged for an easy system of letting the anchor go.

On the very end of the anchor warp is a buoy that will not fit through the alderney ring.

I just undo the rope from the side cleat and let all the warp pay out, when it reaches the buoy just chuck it overboard and you are drifting.

 

Charlie

[duncan]

Charlie that makes mine positively complex - easier to do than the explanation sounds but remember the balance of the rode has to pass through the little hole next to the windlass..........

1. pull a few metres of rode through the deck and then attach to cleat leaving lots of slack beyond windlass

2. attach fender to slack away from windlass but under rails etc (obviously!)

3. release bitter end and pull remaining rode on deck through hole - it might jam if you leave it to be pulled out after releasing the tied off rode and you wouldn't have any easy way of taking the pressure off the jam (untill the tide changed!)

4. press down anchor button to take pressure of tied off rode, release the whole lot and watch it disapear

 

about 3 minutes I reckon.

 

For a man OB it would be knife in the winter (and get a diver to recover) or wave nicely in the summer and call a downtide boat to hook him out.....

[Paul D]

For a man OB it would be knife in the winter (and get a diver to recover)

Duncan,

 

I hope you are talking about the rope as opposed to the MOB

 

on a serious note - I can now see a reason NOT to keep the end of my anchor rope tied to the cleat permanently as this makes it harder to ditch in an emergency.