Catch Report - Ilfracombe - 7th September 2019 (4)

Date From: 07/09/2019 20:00:00

Date To: 08/09/2019 01:50:00

Time of day: Evening - night

Location: Ilfracombe

Mark: The pier

Low Tide:

Moon Phase:

Weather: Cloudy with some sunshine and wind from behind.

Sunrise/Sunset:

Sea: Fairly murky and choppy with a swell of around 3 feet.

Method: Ledger (homemade up and over rig) | Ledger (running ledger) | float

Bait: Whole frozen double medium sandeel | half mackerel | frozen mackerel strips

Caught:

The Session:

I went for a ledgering session at my local pier. I was going to try four methods but was hoping to find out if any ray were still around in particular.

Once I arrived I set up on the upper pier and quickly discovered that I hadn't brought enough tackle to set up 4 rods so I set up one distance ledger and cast it around 70 yards each time, then the float rod and finally a conger rod for close in work.

There were a few other anglers and shortly after I arrived they all were pushed off the lowe pier by the incoming tide and we were all on the top, with the Oldenburg ferry moored near us.

It quickly became apparent that it was going to be a fairly quiet night as the float never produced a fish for over 2 hours. One of the other anglers hooked a rather large Conger Eel but lost it while someone was attempting to get a drop-net down to it. I later learnd from them that they had been fishing here for the week and had caught and seen a few cod from the pier.

After I had caught the Pollock I had a bite on the distance ledger rod but missed it. It was a gentle bite which could have been a crab but when the bait came back it was crushed so I believe it was a fish. After recasting, I waited about 15 minutes before the rod tip twicthed and then bent down very slightly before settling back and moving gently with the swell. I kept a close watch though and there were a couple of moments where the movement of the tip suggested a fish had the bait and after what felt like 5 minutes the tip bent down once and then again and I jumped up to feel a fish on the end when I lifted the rod.

It felt like a hard fighting dogfish but as it managed to keep down deep right to the edge I was hoping it was a Ray and when it finally siurface my hope was realised as a small spotted ray showed itself and gave one last attempt to swim down before I was able to lift it out from the lower pier which was just becoming flooded with water. It only weighed 2lb but it didn't matter to me.

I rebaited and recast and settled down, expecting another biteless hour. I had two more pollock on the float within half an hour though but after that the only sign of fish being around was the state of my sandeel each time I reeled in. I saw no bites register on my rod tip though. The half mackerel was almost untouched too, showing just some signs of being eaten by crabs. There were two occasions when the rod tip moved too much for a crab to be taking the bait and I held the rod to feel something pulling the tip occasionally, but each time I struck I felt nothing at all.

I gave it until around high tide before packing up, leaving one other angler on the pier. Although it was a quiet session for me the Ray I caught and seeing the Conger Eel being hooked was good to see for the venue.

Tackle used (price) [ time since first used ]: