A Dorset Quickie.

Just back in from a night down in Dorset where the conditions have been difficult of late (although there seems to be a good stamp of fish down that way with several biggies being caught.

The fishing was tough (no wind, weed etc.) but we managed 11 fish. I suspect if the conditions had been slightly different (note different & not necessarily better) we would have bagged up.

Nice haircut lad!

 

Late night schoolie.

Not much else to report (but I hope to get out & land another fish or two later this week).

Be good & tight lines!

A big girl for Mark.....

Mark just texted - a nice fish of 75cm...........looks a stonker!

Well done Mark!

Now why don't I catch fish like that? lol.

Rob did the job!

Just back in from a Dorset trip with Rob Staigis which turned out to be a blast despite the usual weather issues (this time we were blessed with the tail end of a hurricane & a months worth of rain in a day!).

On arrival conditions were actually pretty good & we sat off to Chesil where Rob managed to bag a schoolie on his second cast in England. Despite the other boys all catching a fist full of fish, I managed a spectacular blank.

 

 

 

Next day we headed off to some rock marks early where we had a few fish and a lot of fun (Rob was straight into the fish again - a very happy chappy), followed by an evening session which produced another second cast fish for Rob & Joe.

As we had caught there the previous day we headed to some rocks again & Joe managed 6 fish in a row on arrival but the fishing seemed to die off as the wind swung East.

Last day found us on Chesil with pure East wind (gusts to a savage 50+ mph with enough rain to drown a town). We did manage a couple of fish but the going was extremely tough!

 

 

All in all it was a big fun trip, although the average size could have been better (we caught probably around 60 fish between us despite the conditions) and it was fantastic to swap tips & tactics with Rob who introduced us to a couple of lures which worked very well in Dorset (perhaps not the patterns we would usually use but proved to be fish catchers for Rob).

Rob will I'm sure do a report on his blog & I will post a link when its done (Robs website can be found at www.wolfsbarsh.com)

Tight lines you bassers…………..

Dorset Silver.......

Here are just a few pics from a recent Dorset run - the conditions were borderline with strong winds making casting any distance very difficult (20 - 30 yards if you were lucky) but the water was clear so we were pretty confident..................

We started off well & the fishing kept pretty steady for an afternoon session through till dusk when we decided it was time to call it a day......

Next day turned out even better with us all taking a few fish (DFR man Richard even popped over to join us and had 4 or 5 fish in as many casts as soon as he got there).

All in all some fun fishing & am really looking forward to visiting again in September, when I will be dragging Rob Staigis from Wolfsbarsch.com over for for a few days to meet up with the guys.

Tight Lines People!

Not much to report...........

I must admit that I have been lazy about doing a report on my last trip to Dorset a few weeks ago (in my defence - the conditions were terrible & the fishing worse, so theres not too much to say)

All we caught were a few schoolies (also few & far between) despite fishing four days & walking a hell of alot of miles trying to find the fish!

A couple of pics................

A foot of swell would have been perfect

A night schoolie

 Getting smaller!

A first lighter (from the dirtiest water ever)

 I will be off for a spot of plugging again in a couple of weeks & really hope to actually catch something a bit bigger!


Tight lines guys n gals!

A spot of fun.

After a failed mission (35mph winds) in Pembrokeshire I decided a quick trip to Dorset was the way to go, so at short notice I chucked my gear in the rental car & headed down from Cardiff. On arrival a bitter cold NW wind was a blowing but we were in with the chance of a fish or two.
I arrived at lunch time and met up with Mark (any excuse to avoid work lol). After a few hours of thrashing the water for a schoolie each we decided it was time for a change of venue.

True to form, Mark clipped on a weighted sluggo (jig head) and on his first cast shouted over he was into a fish. "What sort?" I shouted over "weed fish or rock fish?" thinking he had just tripped a snag, and suddenly Marks rod arched over & the fish screamed off up current much to my suprise taking line as it did so. Being a true fishing buddy I declined Marks request of help grabbing it (well what are friends for), and after a fiesty scrap he landed the below at 63cms.

By now it was getting dark & we fished on with Mark taking another schoolie around the 3lb mark. A bit dissapointed at being beaten 3 to 1, I headed back to my hotel with the hope the morning session would be better.

The next morning I woke to find the wind had dropped with weed making the fishing very difficult (about 1 in 10 casts was coming back clean). Just as the sun broke the horizon my lure got smashed at distance and a fair bit of line was stripped from the reel on the inital run. Fish landed it measured 58cms and was a very solid fish as Marks had been the previous evening.

Somewhat happier I cast out again and was hit straight away by another which also gave a good scrap, this one went 54cms. I fished on for an hour or so, but the tide was slack & I had to leave to get back, so I missed the push of the flood which I suspect would have fished well.

We didnt catch any great numbers, but the fish we did catch were decent fighters so we were both happy & had some fun as we always do.

Hopefully I will get another trip in the the next few weeks (Dorset or Ireland both tickle my fancy), so with any luck I might catch a few more before silly season (winter) starts.

Thanks for reading!

The going got tough.

Just a quick interim report from a few days in wild & windy Dorset. As expected I arrived to raging winds (W& SW @ 25+ mph with gusts to 40mph!), almost unfishable but we managed to find a couple of sheltered spots but fish were few and far between.

Mark with a rock caught 3lber

To cut a long story (well walk) short, we really covered a lot of ground and climbed alot of cliffs to find clean water away from the winds on the tides we needed. I ended up catching 10 fish (excluding the usual bycatch), all of which were taken on surface lures, with the biggest at about 53cm (a suprisingly fat little chap).

The schoolies wanted it off the top.

Always a pleasure to catch these pretty fish.

A very fat fish at about 53cm.



I hope to be out in the next couple of days again - probably West Wales (or maybe even Ireland if air traffic control go ahead and strike in Germany, but thats another story).

Good luck to Gee, Joe & Mark who are off to Ireland tonight (they have a few days over there with tides and conditions looking good - no excuses lads lol).

Tight lines & thanks for reading!

Hard Work...........

Anticipation was high for this trip, as the fishing had been excellent before I arrived (Mark had taken almost 100 fish in 3 days to over 7lb!) - what could go wrong?

Schoolies love a Zonk.

Well the weather calmed down the day I arrived, and the sprat schools seemed to dissapear overnight so the fishing was far tougher than expected.
We found ourselves having to cover alot of ground to find a few fish - hard work indeed.

One off the top.

To cut a long story short we managed to catch fish on each session (mainly schoolies), but had to work hard for them (low light early  did produce a couple of better fish for Joe & Richard).

Joe took this beaut in the dark.

6+lb of Dorset Silver!

All in all we had alot of fun (as usual).....................................

Richrad with a 6.5lb-er

Mark says love your fish!

He loves his favorite lures too!

One rucksack per car! We had an interesting choice of transport.

Great for drying out the gear though!

A big thanks to Mark, Joe, Steve, Richard, Elliot & Carl for the fun!

See you guys soon!

The Holland blank report.

We knew the fishing was poor in Holland at the moment, but were hopeful of at least a fish or two - we were to be dissapointed.........

On arrival we checked in at our somewhat eccentric hotel and headed straight out with high hopes.

After a couple of hours we decided to head off for "breakfast" and had some great bacon and mushroom pancakes in a windmill (as one does in Holland)

Back on the water we fished a spot with a very strong current and chatted to another fisherman who confirmed that the fishing was awaful at the moment (the previous week had been fantastic and he had taken fish to 72cm!). The water did look good so we put some effort in, but nothing showed).

Next day we decided to meet with Rob Staigis who was running a bass workshop for a couple of clients while we were there (Rob had already been out on a boat - they struggled for a couple of very small schoolies).

We met up at Bass Hengelsport - a really cool shop dedicated to lure fishing for bass (they have a massive selection of softs - every colour and type you can imagine). The owner (aptly names Bas), really knows his local stuff & showed us some underwater video of large numbers of bass holding on local structure which was interesting). Bass Hengelsport is well worth a visit if you are in the area.

Off we went again - cast after cast produced nothing (we fished well on into the evening)

That evening we decided that we would leave early the next day and cut the trip short (sometimes you just know when you have been beaten).
We did have alot of fun (as soon as the boys got back to the UK they went straight out and Mark managed a couple of fish - typical!)...........

Stop Press......
Just received a message from Mark - hes out this morning.......10 fish to 76cm! (what a difference a day & 400 miles can make lol). Not jealous at all (cough cough).

A half day on Chesil.

After a bit of confusion as to conditions & meeting up with Steve (sorry about that Steve), I ended up popping down to Dorset for a half day yesterday. Mark was guiding for Dave and I caught up with them for a brief Chesil session.
True to form the perfect morning conditions changed on my arrival & the wind turned which pretty much killed the swell we so badly needed.Dave has only recently taken up lure fishing, so needless to say he was happy catching a few fish despite the going being tough,

A happy Dave with his first Chesil Bass.

The X-Rap in Ayu was the lure Dave was catching on (bait fish were abundant but the bigger bass didnt show up as we had hoped).

Greedy bait fish.

I managed a couple too.

Its was also great to see how close the bass will come in to get an easy meal - the fish in the above picture was caught in water that just covered its back (bold fish indeed!!).

Walking Chesil can break a man!

With the conditions looking average for the next day I decided to make the long haul back (I had intended to stay overnight if the fishing was really good).

I hope to get another trip out (possibly to the Gower) in the next few days in the search for a bigger fish or two........

Tight lines!