Date: 02-02-2018
Time of day: Evening - night
Location: Seaton
Mark: Left hand side of beach
Low Tide: 00:49(0.41m) 13:16(0.43m)
High Tide: 07:53(4.65m) 20:21(4.33m)
Time fished from: 18:30
Time fished to: 01:20
Weather: Bright moon hidden by cloud cover. Very little wind. A few spots of rain around midnight.
Sea: Fairly clear with a small swell and waves, but increasing in height as the tide fell.
Method: Ledger (homemade pulley rig) | Ledger (homemade 2 hook flapper) | Ledger (running ledger)
Bait: Whole frozen loligo squid, frozen large sandeel | frozen lugworm, frozen squid pieces | half frozen bluey, whole frozen loligo squid, frozen large sandeel
Caught (weight): 2 Dogfish (2lbs 0oz, Guessed), 1 Bull Huss (0lbs 6oz, guessed), 1 Dogfish (2lbs 8oz, guessed), 1 Small-eyed Ray (1lbs 0oz, guessed), 1 Bull Huss (11lbs 15oz, Weighed)| 4 Pouting (0lbs 2oz, guessed) 1 Whiting (0lbs 2oz, guessed)
The Session: I set up not far from the last parking space at the left hand side of the Esplanade. The first rod I baited with a whole squid and cast it as far as I could, which I estimated to be 70 yards. Then I followed with the rod I was going for smaller fish with and cast it around 40 yards. Just 20 minutes passed before the squid was taken by a dogfish and that was shortly followed by a pouting on the lugworm.
I had more bites, especially on the lugworm but they were too quick and short to strike at, in between them I set up another rod and baited it with half a bluey I had which was unused on previous sessions. I cast this rod around 50 yards to my left and left the rod with the ratchet off in a sand spike I'd made from some plastic tubing. I also grabbed a handful of old unused bait and threw it in the sea, hoping it might help attract something. About 15 minutes later I decided to check the squid bait and as I reeled in I felt something on the end, presumed it to be weed, but it turned out to be a very small Bull Huss. The fish wasn't even hooked, as I found when I took hold of the line and gently pulled the bait out of its mouth, with the hook buried inside the bait. The fish was so small it was unable to eject the bait once it took it.
20 more minutes passed which was filled by a series of pulls on the flapper rig. Some fish I felt briefly before coming off and of those a couple felt a nice sie but I was unable to bring anything else in. As I glanced at the rod baited with squid I saw it pull down a few times, briefly fell still before moving again. It was a typical Dogfish bite and so I struck quickly to try and avoid it swallowing the hook. When this fish came to the shore I immediately noticed this fish was longer than any I'd caught before, not really much wider, just a long fish. It was hooked nicely in the upper jaw and was easy to unhook. I put it back and turned again to the flapper rig rod, the tip was still giving small shakes until the bait was gone or I decided to strike and mostly miss the fish. I wondered if it was going to be like my sessions in Ilfracombe where the fish, if I could ever hook one, would turn out to be a nice sized Whiting, and as if to answer my thought one cast produced a very small whiting. A while later a cast produced another small Pouting.
There were more bites on the flapper rig over the next hour but nothing I could hook and lan. Having nothing more on the squid I eventually decided to set up another pulley rig and scale down the hook and try sandeel. I also used a heavier lead weight and cast it about 10 yards or more further out. The bait wasn't out long before I got a bite, two in fact and I bumped them both. Dogfish, I thought. I hit the next bite quickly as the rod tip bent down, not far, but hard and as I reeled in this fish I was sure was a dogfish I looked in the surf for its body before spotting just two glinting eyes of a Small-Eyed Ray. Maybe the bites I had been missing on squid were also Ray? I was hopeful of more of them but couldn't hook the next two bites, neither could I hook any more of the bites on the flapper rod. I checked the rod I baited with bluey to find just the bone left, so I put the other half on and cast it again. I thought that maybe this rod was keeping the crabs away from my other two, so was happy to just leave it out there.
It was around 22:45 now and the tide had been going out for a couple of hours. While trying to time a strike on the flapper rod I noticed two quick pulls on the pulley rod. It did the same again and I just decided to strike. I felt a good fish on the end though it didn't fight very hard, so I was confused when the surf helped me to pull what I first thought to be a very big dogfish. It was about 30 yards down the slope and so I couldn't see properly, I slowly edged down and as I recognised it was much bigger than I first thought I went to pull it away from the water and saw the hook just in the tip of its upper lip, and then it pulled free. I just managed to shuffle the rest of the way down and lift the fish up before another wave came to take the fish away. I estimated the fish to weigh around 9lb and when the digital scales kept showing 11-12 on the screen I double checked with some dial scales which read 12lb 2oz, my biggest fish to date. I've knocked an few ounces off the weight I've recorded for the weight of the sling. I think some of the weight was due to the fish having a very full stomach.
Another hour passed of missed bites on both rods and me eventually running out of lugworm, Some I was getting before I even had time to walk back to my beach rest and put the rod down. Still very quick bites though, all I managed was landing a Pouting on a piece of squid and then the next hour more of the same but managing another dogfish on sandeel and a pouting on squid again. The bluey on the third rod gone again, I put on a pulley rig and tried double sandeel for a bit, had one bite and missed it. The sandeels were crushed. I should have caught a lot more during this session but after catching my biggest fish to date I wasn't bothered at all at my low bite/landing ratio. I learned from this session to not write off these months that other anglers tell me can be the worst of the year.
Tackle used (price) [ time since first used ]:
Set up 1:
Rod: Daiwa seahunter Z 13ft 2 piece MFS (£42.99) [ > 0 years 2 months ]
Reel: Daiwa Crosscast S 5000 Fixed spool (£48.99) [ > 2 years 11 months ]
Line: Maxima Chameleon 20lb (£17.99) 600m
Hooks: Unbranded Baitholder 4/0 (£3.99) 50
Shockleader: Gardner Slinky 60lb (£6.99) 100M
Hooklength: Ultima Memorex 40lb (£5.95) 50m
Hooks: Sakuma Manta 2/0 (£5.78) 30 11-6-2017
Hooklength: Sunset Amnesia 40lb (£4.50) 100m
Set up 2:
Rod: Daiwa Crosscast 13ft 3 piece Fixed Spool (£60.00) [ > 0 years 3 months ]
Reel: Shakespeare Agility Surf 70FD Fixed Spool (£39.99) [ > 3 years 9 months ]
Line: Maxima Hi-Viz 20lb (£15.42) 550m
Hooks: Sakuma Stinger 2 (£15.00) 100
Shockleader: Gardner Slinky 60lb (£6.99) 100M
Hooklength: Maxima Clear 15lb (£4.00) 100m
Set up 3:
Rod: Daiwa Seahunter X 14ft 3 piece Fixed spool (£64.07)
Reel: Leeda Quicksilver Fixed Spool (£19.95)
Line: Daiwa Sensor 50lb (£6.99) 230m
Hooks: Sakuma Circle Extra 6/0 (£7.29) 10
Hooklength: Gardner Slinky 100lb (£7.95) 100m
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