Steve S

There is a lot of a sea breeze around currently which is often not on the forecasts. Early morning to midday is your best bet.

I used to fish the Kennet for barbel too when I worked in Reading, that was my thing for many years. Fished also over the RDAC waters including the sections you mentioned and the section the Red Spinners have. For shear quality it was the Backstream for me (used for matches on weekends), so many doubles. Had to be a bit careful down there mind in the evening, had my car done over there once and often didn't feel too safe. I caught a 'golden' barbel down there once, it was about 8lb, was very light in colour and had a red/yellow tail. My friend and I developed a special bait which we mixed up overselves, it was brilliant, we would go an a stretch and throw in a few pounds of it at likely spots and then fish it a few days later, once they were on it, they stayed on it you could catch them in the middle of the day and in the winter, it was hard to keep quiet what we were using, I would have a some luncheon meat on show to try and put people off but sometimes they would just hang around so I stopped fishing and talked or used meat while waiting for them to move off. There's photo's of all my catches including the golden barbel. Sad to hear the Kennet is not what it was. Glad you are have a great time on the Wye Rob, it's a beautiful river along that part and I loved my barbel fishing. I just don't have the time to do it and sea fish as well and to be honest I was ready for a new challenge and sea fishing certainly is that.

No real big stuff on our trip best of it was: Terry: 10lb 9oz Pollock Alun: 10lb 2oz Pollock and 5lb Cod Stuie: 15oz Red Gurnard, 7lb 3oz Pollock Steve: 3lb 8oz Ballan Wrasse, 7lb 3oz Cod. We also had scad, whiting, bass, poor cod, pout, mackerel and a brittle star all on lures!

A problem with sea start is the range they cover, up to 3 mile offshore, ok for very local boating but not for much else.

Tigerfish: Alun, Terry, Stuie, Steve

You make an interesting point Mike. These 'super' anchors like the Rocna, can really dig in a soft bed fantastically well according to their ratings however they can be hard to get out again I have been told, I would not want to use one on the various ground we anchor in, they are expensive!

I would always err on the heavy side with anchors, most places you put the hook in are fine then go to one spot and the anchor drags, a bigger anchor helps plus a good length of chain 1.5 x boat length is a good guide. Then loads of rode, when the anchor doesn't want to hold 5 x depth is often needed particularly when there are a few waves around creating some snatch. Your setup sounds fine except I would want a longer rode, there are a lot of 30m marks round here so that would mean 150m. I think up to a 10kg anchor is quite managable on the Alderney ring, any heavier and it gets very hard work to lift over the side with the chain, for me anyway. On my 10m boat I use 15kg anchor, 16m of 8mm chain, 200m of rode. Very happy with that setup except would like another 60m of rode for some mid channel anchoring spots. I use a windlass with an Alderney ring as a backup. The idea of an anchoring guide sounds good. Fisherman's requirements for anchoring round here are far from typical with our depth of water and speed of tides. Non boat anglers have no clue what is needed for anchoring in 30m of water in 2 knots of tide.

I'll have it Dave. Steve

Thanks Dave There are a lot of proposed MCZs in our area which would affect our local fishing, well worth a study.

Well done Adam, worth guesting on Tigerfish!

Tough day fishing on the Shambles, just 5 Turbot caught and 1 plaice Results Adam: Turbot 3lb 12oz (3 others smaller) Steve: Plaice: 10oz (1 small turbot) Alun: no flatties On the bright side, there were a fair few mackerel to be had there.

Tigerfish, Steve, Alun and Adam! Sunday

Congratulations Steve, great fish, and I thought there were only small ones round here!

Sorry to hear you are not getting out on her often enough Nigel and feel you need to sell her. I sure you will get plenty of takers it's a fine boat.

I would not go for a MF 805, I had one for a few years. Good bits Cabin area is fine Sun deck on the roof can be great also good for diving off The main or Volvo engines are very solid and give little trouble. Not so good bits Quite noisy underway as engine is under cabin A wet boat lots of water over the front which can affect visability (I tend to take my boat out in most weathers so may not affect you) Rear deck space is quite small but ok for 2 to fish The fuel tank was not big enough for me I always seemed to be thinking about filling up. I got about 1.8l to 1nm out of it. Getting to the anchor locker in poor weather was somewhat risky. Need to take care in a steep following sea as the stern can try to catch up the bow... Need to be on and off the throttle to manage it. A bow thruster helps greatly with close quarters handling. Can't comment on a Rodman.

On a narrow point I think the flattie fishing has got worse in recent years (some guys have been going much longer than me) whether this is cyclic or fishing pressure I'm not sure. Turbot have been showing up all over the place near us recently and some good ones, maybe something has changed, has fishing pressure reduced in Poole bay, I hope it has but I'd be surprised if it actually has. I think Terry put it very well, it's the whole Alderney experience. With the fishing not so good there on the banks currently I'm not inclined to go more than once in the year particularly as we have found the best of the fishing for flatties is normally early season but if we hear the fishing has picked up I'm up for going over again.

Thanks for invite Alun, twas a good fishing day on the water with plenty of action , though it felt like Winter at times! Didn't anyone else actually fish the Bream comp of Saturday?

I bought a new smaller inflatable dinghy for Alderney toing and froing that I can carry on board rather than on the bathing platform. An Excel Volante 180, it was delivered today by none other than Tom Bettle! who now lives near me. Anyway Tom asked me to pass on his regards to everyone at the club; we had a quite a chat, he was saying he is really missing the fishing, from what I understand this new business venture is taking all his time currently. Tom is now running www.tbmaritime.com

Tigerfish - All change, after some quick replanning we are going Sunday 6th to Tuesday the 8th now with Alun and Terry on board! The forecast for this weekend and a couple of days after is too good to pass up and the following weekend does not look very good (but could change) so we are going for it.

Nice three Alun. Bit of turn round from last year when your 5lb bream got done by a spurdog!

TBH I've never had any trouble getting good fuel prices from Mainbrace whether someone has called in advance or not.

Well I'm sure the boat will handle it just fine, probably wouldn't get a lot of fishing done which is the whole point of going....

Silver Spray has gone over so I was told (very surprised given the forecast), Last Laugh cancelled. So we may get info from their facebook page

I have a big bag of 'tubes' in the freezer, done it for years, it works. For quick use afterwards soak in hot water.

So are we having a bass comp this year?