Andy 1965
Well-known member
- Joined
- Oct 18, 2020
- Messages
- 370
- Reaction score
- 3,401
- Points
- 93
- Location
- North Wales
- Favourite Fishing
- Lure
After a week of high winds, and with storm Eunice on the horizon, I spotted a brief lull in the weather on Thursday night, so I seized the opportunity to head out for a quick session in the calm before the storm. My original plan was to head for Anglesey as usual, but with heavy rain due to reach the West coast by 22:00 I decided to stay closer to home, where the rain wasn’t due until after midnight. As well as staying dry for longer, another bonus of fishing close to home was a much shorter drive, meaning more fishing time 
.
I arrived at the mark to find a brisk breeze blowing from left to right along the shore, which might make fishing a little awkward to start, but any wind was forecast to ease off soon and to turn offshore, so I knew things would only get easier. Possibly due to the wind direction, the surf from earlier in the day had also eased off considerably, but I hoped that it would pick up again later as the water depth increased.
With the target being bass, I only brought a small selection of bait with me and both rods were soon set up with 3-hook flappers. These were baited mainly with frozen black lug, but I also tarted up a couple of the baits with small strips of squid, as well as fishing one hook on each rig with sandeel or plain squid. One rod was then cast short and the other to long range, in the hope that I could pinpoint exactly where the fish were feeding.
With the tide flooding quickly, I was certainly kept on the move but the fishing was quiet, so at least moving my gear every 10 minutes gave me something to do ?. The weed was also a bit problematic to start with, but that soon cleared as I was pushed further up the beach. Eventually, I found myself fishing the seaward side of a steep sandbank and I was finally able to relax a little, as I didn’t have to move camp quite so often.
Once the gulley in front of this bank had filled a bit, I dropped one of the rigs really close in, hoping to find something which might be mooching around just behind the steadily increasing waves. As it happened, it was this rig which accounted for the first bit of action of the night, when 10 minutes after casting out, I noticed a sharp rattle on the rod tip. I gave the bite a few minutes to develop, but sadly it didn’t happen and when I finally reeled in to check, I only found a worm almost pulled off the hook. Though I was still fishless, I was at least encouraged to know that there was something out there ?.
After re-baiting the rig I lobbed it back into the gulley, in the hope there might be more fish in there but I was out of luck. Soon after this I was pushed back again and I was forced to beat a hasty retreat as the tide flooded over the sandbank and into another gulley behind me, but not before I had also re-baited the other rod and cast it out to where the waves were just about still breaking over an earlier sandbank.
Once on safe, dry ground again I could pay full attention to my gear, and soon after this I had the second bite of the evening. This came to the bait fished at distance, and this time it was more than just a single rattle. With one eye on the rod, I quickly baited up another rig in readiness before I started to reel in. To begin with I was unsure if there was anything on the line, but after a few turns of the reel I finally felt some weight. It wasn’t big by any stretch of the imagination, but after a couple of minutes I finally saw a flash in the surf, and it was in fact silver ?.
After a quick picture, it was released to grow much, much bigger ? and I got back to the fishing with a sense of optimism for the rest of the session.
An hour or so later, and as the first spots of rain showed in the beam from my headlamp, I was still waiting for another bite, but despite a decent surf now crashing ashore, things had gone very quiet. This remained the case for the last hour of the flood and by the time midnight ticked by I was beginning to lose heart, but despite the rain getting heavier, I decided to give it another half an hour, just in case. The bass had obviously vanished though, perhaps to the relative shelter of deeper water before Eunice arrived, and I didn’t see any more signs of life ?.
By 1am I’d had enough, and with the blank just about beaten once again, I began the short journey home, to dry my gear out and to batten down the hatches before Eunice arrived.
.I arrived at the mark to find a brisk breeze blowing from left to right along the shore, which might make fishing a little awkward to start, but any wind was forecast to ease off soon and to turn offshore, so I knew things would only get easier. Possibly due to the wind direction, the surf from earlier in the day had also eased off considerably, but I hoped that it would pick up again later as the water depth increased.
With the target being bass, I only brought a small selection of bait with me and both rods were soon set up with 3-hook flappers. These were baited mainly with frozen black lug, but I also tarted up a couple of the baits with small strips of squid, as well as fishing one hook on each rig with sandeel or plain squid. One rod was then cast short and the other to long range, in the hope that I could pinpoint exactly where the fish were feeding.
With the tide flooding quickly, I was certainly kept on the move but the fishing was quiet, so at least moving my gear every 10 minutes gave me something to do ?. The weed was also a bit problematic to start with, but that soon cleared as I was pushed further up the beach. Eventually, I found myself fishing the seaward side of a steep sandbank and I was finally able to relax a little, as I didn’t have to move camp quite so often.
Once the gulley in front of this bank had filled a bit, I dropped one of the rigs really close in, hoping to find something which might be mooching around just behind the steadily increasing waves. As it happened, it was this rig which accounted for the first bit of action of the night, when 10 minutes after casting out, I noticed a sharp rattle on the rod tip. I gave the bite a few minutes to develop, but sadly it didn’t happen and when I finally reeled in to check, I only found a worm almost pulled off the hook. Though I was still fishless, I was at least encouraged to know that there was something out there ?.
After re-baiting the rig I lobbed it back into the gulley, in the hope there might be more fish in there but I was out of luck. Soon after this I was pushed back again and I was forced to beat a hasty retreat as the tide flooded over the sandbank and into another gulley behind me, but not before I had also re-baited the other rod and cast it out to where the waves were just about still breaking over an earlier sandbank.
Once on safe, dry ground again I could pay full attention to my gear, and soon after this I had the second bite of the evening. This came to the bait fished at distance, and this time it was more than just a single rattle. With one eye on the rod, I quickly baited up another rig in readiness before I started to reel in. To begin with I was unsure if there was anything on the line, but after a few turns of the reel I finally felt some weight. It wasn’t big by any stretch of the imagination, but after a couple of minutes I finally saw a flash in the surf, and it was in fact silver ?.
After a quick picture, it was released to grow much, much bigger ? and I got back to the fishing with a sense of optimism for the rest of the session.
An hour or so later, and as the first spots of rain showed in the beam from my headlamp, I was still waiting for another bite, but despite a decent surf now crashing ashore, things had gone very quiet. This remained the case for the last hour of the flood and by the time midnight ticked by I was beginning to lose heart, but despite the rain getting heavier, I decided to give it another half an hour, just in case. The bass had obviously vanished though, perhaps to the relative shelter of deeper water before Eunice arrived, and I didn’t see any more signs of life ?.
By 1am I’d had enough, and with the blank just about beaten once again, I began the short journey home, to dry my gear out and to batten down the hatches before Eunice arrived.
