Diary of Catch Reports

The aim of this blog is to give an insight into the fishing available on and around the Isle of Wight for both visiting and resident anglers alike.
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Enjoy!

Tuesday, 14 June 2011

Fort Hopping

I had invited an old school friend out today (Ian) for a muck about with the light gear. The aim was to find a few mackerel on the feathers, then look for a few bass with lures and finally finish up with an hour at anchor looking for a better bass or two.
We left the marina at 8am and were soon on our way flanked by another club member with the same idea!


We arrived at the Fort and there were mackerel everywhere....it looked like you could quite literally walk across them at some points. Ian started to bang a few out on feathers while I had a bit more fun with a fly rod! We spent an hour or so having fun with the mackerel before I suggested we had a move to try and locate a few bass. This was met with a nod of approval and we were soon under way to mark number 2. I could see birds working on the approach and from experience here I new these would be bass and not mackerel......small bass but spikeys none the less! I rigged Ian up with a bubble float and delta eel while I stuck with the fly rod. The fishing was constant with a bass a chuck, most though not much bigger than 15" but great sport on light gear all the same.




We must have had 50 or 60 fish between us during the next 2 hours along with a few more chunky mackerel. The size of the bass though weren't getting any bigger and as we only had around an hour left I suggested we had a move to find a better fish at anchor.
Anchor down in 18ft of water over a shallow bank and we were soon setting up the light rods to fish on the bottom with fresh mackerel. I had to stress that it wasn't the best time of day to be doing this (early morning or evening much better) but it was worth a crack none the less. We had 45 minutes here before heading back and in the last 5 I had a slamming bite on mackerel fillet. Grabbing the but of the rod as it tried to leave the boat it felt like a good fish in the tide run. It fort well above it's weight and I was quite surprised to see a sub 4lb fish hit the surface.


 With that it was time to head back. Plenty of fish, great weather, Ian enjoyed himself and dinner sorted....much better than a day at work!



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