Plaice Fishing, various marks south coast

They're all over the Plaice

Various marks along the south coast

Gin clear and calm, range fishing a must

Looking back at this years blog, it's been a pretty quiet year fishing wise, a lot of unremarkable sessions, mostly due to ....... bad luck?......bad fishing?......did I upset the fishing god? nah...well maybe the first two. but I definitely have not upset the fishing god, he doesn't exist you see. there have been a few reasons, some I've touched on before, but the honest truth is I've been exploring the Sussex coast line rather than my familiar Kent coast, feeling a bit like a rambling traveller discovering each beach and mark for the first time, then just watching, listening, and learning as I go. Yes it's been a slow start, and I know I will have loads more to learn and discover over the coming years hopefully. The stand out sessions this year have all been reacting quickly to situations and changing tactics to target the fish in front of me, rather than well researched, planned and executed sessions, but that was about to change! The weather's been calm and settled, with clear and sunny sky's, the water is gin clear, and whilst the rest of the fishing community is firmly getting excited about the impending Cod season, for myself and maybe other South East lads, we haven't seen Cod in a fair few years now, and without the Cod bug, I have been setting my sights on another target, the Plaice! especially after the hard work and effort I put in earlier on in the year into finding marks, perfecting rigs, and baits, it was always on my radar to retry and get that one big fish.

The tried and tested Plaice rig

This blog is over 5 sessions during September, and involves 4 venues. The plan was simple, to catch a lovely big fat autumn Plaice!. My rigs through trail and error ended up being very traditional, and for the good reason because they work. 2 hook flappers, nice and simple and very tangle and hassle free, clipped down to provide stream lined baits and rig for distance casting as distance is key on several of my marks, bling was 5 or 7 small 5mm green and black beads between a stop rubber and a sequin. The snods were 16 inches of 12lb fluorocarbon, which was light and long enough to provide lots of free movement and provide some stealth to wary fish as fluorocarbon is a lot harder for the fish to see underwater. bait was only ever going to be Black Lugworm tipped with Squid. Hooks were small match wire size 4 offset Aberdeens, again, light and small, Plaice are experts at sucking worms off hooks, and I wanted them hooks in the fishes mouth, plus the venues I was fishing are quite likely to throw up the odd large Sole at extreme range even in day and clear water, and that is something else I would love!!!

Wait a little longer and catch his friend

My first 2 sessions were quiet successful to be fair, Target fish achieved but only one each session, and only a small plaice each time, and they did serve a purpose, 1.) proved the plaice were back in, and 2.) proved something wasn't quiet right with my rigs. I seemed to miss a fair few bites and dropped a fair few fish on the retrieve, always hard to prove, but I'm convinced I was loosing fish, It wasn't until after a more successful 3rd session where I had 4 plaice that, due to fishing on soft sand at range, often for long periods waiting for bites, the  grip lead was getting buried, and took a fair amount of pulling and tugging to free it up, it eventually popped out quite violently, it was this moment that I think was pulling the hook from the fishes mouth, or at worst tore a hole which then allowed the fish to wriggle off the hook during the retrieve. To over come the the lead digging in problem, I decide to use plain leads, which solved the problem notably! on the 4th session, I landed a fish every bite, 7 fish in total up to 33cm and I didn't loose any on the way in, although working the 2 rods with plain leads at range in a big building spring tide was proving harder work at times. Another thing was, a little bait elastic around the end of the work to stop the Plaice sucking it off the hook, and when I saw an initial bite, I let about 1m of line off the spool, and waited 4/5 minutes just to give the fish some slack to play with the bait, and waited even longer in the hope of a double shot, which worked more than enough times!!

New PB Plaice at 48cm

Hazelnut and bazil crust on Plaice

This was to be my last plaice session, as I'm about to go away on holiday with it's own fishing adventures, but I knew where the fish were, I had the range, the rigs and the tactics, I would be fishing the flood tide from dawn to lunch time, the only thing I couldn't get was fresh Black Lugworm!!! I did ponder at cancelling the trip, but I had some very good quality Frozen Black Lug and I kept thinking that maybe if so many Plaice about that they wouldn't be fussy, so I opted to go. I cast out with a off the ground cast at full wallop and with a stiff off shore wind, I'm sure the 5oz lead sailed well over 100meters, one of the furthest fishing casts I think I have ever done, abet wind assisted, well the first few hours were quiet, not a bite, I didn't mind because just as I predicted they would turn up as the tide began to move. And they did!, it was non stop action for 2 hours! felt like I was mostly baiting up!! elasticating small frozen Black Lugworms onto a size 4 hook is fiddly at best, but necessary!  I had landed 13 Plaice so far in total, and then bang it happened, I slid onto the beach what I thought was another double shot, but turned out to be the Plaice I was after! a whopping 48cm weighing 2lb 12oz!! the plan had wonderfully all come together for a change!,even on the last cast I pulled in a chunky 41cm Plaice! my tally for the day was 15 Plaice. from 26cm to 35cm, and the biggest 2 fish over 40cm. Finally my planning come together, and ended with a session i wont forget in hurry. But now its time for them Cod?.........lol nope, not yet, if the water is clear, when I get back off holiday I'll be hunting the mini Krakens (squid)

Bass Fishing, Hastings

Smaller and Lighter for Bigger and Better

Hastings, Sussex, UK.

It's a funny time of year right now, the days notably shorter, a chill in the mornings and the tree leaves beginning to turn red, autumn is setting in, the summer species are still around, and the winter ones are just arriving, at best, recent sessions have had me landing up to 8 different species on very busy nights, and at worst, desolate nights staring at a motionless rod tip till boredom sets in. If I'm honest, I'm getting a little impatient, waiting for the South Westerly winds come and stir the gin clear water into a angry muddy soup for the Cod, well that is hoping they get past the fishing fleets as they been on the missing list a few years now, the signs are good already, but right now it's a little early. 

little rod for a little lad on a perfect day!

My attention on this trip wasn't primarily with fishing, although in hind sight it perhaps should of been. I was on a family day out on the coast, enjoying maybe the last of the nice weather. We ate out, had a train trip, threw stones, played penny slot machines and walked miles, done art work and entered drawing competitions, still waiting to hear if my boy won lol, and yes he drew fishes!!!! I did take a set up with, a travel spinning rod, a replacement for my recently snapped and much loved Sea Bass Special, another Snowbee, this time a Rapter model in the same 10 - 50 gram paired with my Shimano Stradic 5000 loaded with 20lb Power Pro braid, one of my favourite set ups period! but I took this set up for my 2.5 year old boy to catch his first fish, I had about 10 rag worm left over from a previous session and set up with a 2 hook clipped down flapper with 12lb flouro snods for the clear water and size 4 hooks, perfect I though for mackerel, gar fish, plaice, bass or sole, well a 2 years old attention span lasted less than the 10 worms!!! it was high water, the sea was gin clear and with swimmers and god knows what else, made catching a fish very unlikely, unless a shoal of Mackerel came through, they didn't, there were at least 10 others trying with feathers. We left after a hour to enjoy our day.

when going light!

We had a fantastic time, which left us back at the car 5 hours later for low water, and whoa!!! what a difference!! the tide was a fairly big one and revealed more of the beach than I'd seen in a very long time,  the rolling surf was crashing hard and with the stiff south westerly wind the water was stirred up, and had a lot of colour to it! with a setting sun, it was screaming fish. I set up again, and cast out with 2 of the remaining 4 Ragworm I had left, and immediately was having bites, I had helped my little boy reel in a few times, whilst he screaming "fishes!" only to find no fish on the end, he lasted 20mins till the wife took him and his little brother to the car to get out the ever increasing wind, it had been a long day for him. I had just kindly been given some freshly dug Lugworm by the last of the day fishermen on the beach, and the wife gave me the go ahead for a few last casts. I baited up with 2 of the Lugworm and cast it as far as I could with a 2oz pyramid lead on the light rod, the wind was howling now and the bow in the line was massive as it slowly dragged the lead and rig back toward the shore.

size 4 Owner SSW hook doing the biz!

Then there it was, a big double knock and massive slack liner, I reeled in fast to connect with the lead, and gently struck, and BANG!, the rod buckled over into a 90 degree bend and the drag screamed, this initial run must of been about 20 meters, by now I positioned my self precariously on the end of the groin, the fish kited from the right where I was fishing and went down tide to my left, the battle was crazy, the fish was in such shallow water I could see its back breaking the surface, the light rod and reel were superb, the drag smooth as hell, and easily kept a constant pressure on the fish, and the rod kept a nice tight line to the fish as it shock, bounced and swooshed about in the heavy shallow surf. This fight took about 8 minutes! but eventually I slipped the fish on to the beach! YES!!!! it's massive!! NO!!!! but it's on the wrong side of the groin!!, it was about a 14' drop down and I would of had to leave my rod and hope the tide didn't wash the fish back out to sea whilst I run 80 meters up the beach around the groin and back down the other side! I didn't! a moment of madness, saw me pull the fish back into the water by the hook, and I preceded to play it again for maybe for another 2 or 3 minutes, but I managed even with heavy crashing waves to tease it back around the concrete groin, past metal steels and plates covered in old line and rigs, and up the other side onto the beach where I was fishing from. So much could of gone wrong!!! but it didn't!! and just as the fish was slid onto the beach with 12lb line and the tiny hook, it pulled out, but I just calmly jumped into the water and grabbed the fish!!!

a near perfect bar of silver , pure admiration!

put your left foot in, dam that's a big Bass

What a fantastic battle with a beautiful specimen on light gear, a tiny hook and light snod!! where are my scales and tape when I need them!! who cares really, I estimate this fish at around 8lb, what I will remember is the fight, my heart was pounding most the fight as I saw the fish very early on in the fight and I knew it was a good fish. my heart was still pounding as pictures were quickly taken, I didn't think twice about releasing the fish which was quiet difficult in the very shallow surf, wearing my best trainers I took the plunge and walked out about 10 meters into the surf and released the fish. In my haste I managed to delete the picture one of the bystanders from the ever growing crowd took on my phone, leading to me exchanging phone numbers with a stranger just so they could send me the picture on whats app that they actually took for themselves. luckily its not a bad picture! and a big thank you to them!! for the picture, a big thank you to the wife, for the last casts xox , and a big thank you to the lads who passed on the Lugworm. Today was my day!!! my only regret as I stood there with a pounding heart and wet feet, was my little boy missed it all, what I would of loved more in the world, would be giving him that memory, him helping land the fish and being in the picture with his daddy with such a special fish! dam game on! I'm gonna have to do it all again now!! such a shame lol

Thornback Ray Fishing Hythe

Sunshiney Rays

Hythe

Fishing has for myself has been a bit and miss lately, well a lot more miss if I'm honest, I've blanked more than I care to say. Probaly because I've been mostly going fishing at very short notice and under prepared rather than carefully planned tactical operations, due to a new arrival to the family, life is very hectic. It doesn't bother me much, as I enjoy fishing even if I do blank, but it doesn't make for a good blog. Anyways on with the hunt, we are having one hell of a hot spell here in the UK, it's been on average 28 degrees Celsius and sunny for 4 maybe 5 weeks in a row now, the best summer I can remember in a very long time!!! With the summer well and truly set in, the Hounds have arrived, although I should by all rights be targeting them, I've found myself happier getting out the light rods and targeting Sole, unfortunately a rock solid Sole venue for myself has totally been changed by a single winter storm, and on top of that, the council is doing heavy sea defence works on the beach as a result, which is no doubt putting off the more sensitive fish from coming close to shore i.e. Sole!.

So I've been trying different venues in a attempt to find my self some more Sole marks, with varied success, I've found a few Sole already, and but they have made me work very hard for them and I'm missing the reliability my old venue had. This trip was one such venture, to an old Sole nemesis as such, Hythe was the first venue where I caught Sole, and from memory 3 of the biggest I've ever had!!! but since that dream day, I haven't had any such luck, in fact I've only managed 1 Sole there since, but Hythe was a tactical decision this time, it ticked all the boxes. High tide was 1.30am and the timing was right for me to do a 2 up and 2 down, I only had 10 frozen Lugworm, not the ideal bait or condition for Sole, but it was the best I could muster with my baby brain planning, 10 weren't going to go far, so I intended to fish a second rod to target a 2nd species, so a took 6 Peeler Crabs and a Bluey, and Hythe offered a good chance of other species such as Bass, Rays and Hounds.

I arrived just after dusk, with no plan where to fish, I found the beach fairly busy, but after a 100 yard walk, found myself a nice spacious gap, which got even bigger when the guys left and right packed up whilst I was setting up. I used my normal Wessex rig with size 4 hooks, a plain 4oz lead, but rather than use my normal bass rods, I took the yuki Q7 which still is a delicate rod with good bite indication, but it offered real range if I needed it, baited with 1/3 of black lug, I cast it out to where I believed the gutter to be, and immediately the rod tore off!! ripping it from the stand and out my hand as I was still settling the rod down!!, I was in!! bang bang the rod tip went and a second burst from the fish stripped another load of line off the reel with a whizz of the drag, and bang, it came off! ouch, small hooks!!!, probably a sizeable Bass, but set me up with excitement for the session. For my second rod I used a Tronix Cobra GT, a standard pulley rig with a 3/0 short shank Owner SSW hook!! super sharp and grabby hooks can totally recommend!!. I baited it up with a large chunk of Bluey, and sent it as far as I could.

The Sole rod didn't do a lot from now on, and probably because I didn't give it the attention it deserved, yes it accounted for a few Whiting and a couple of Pouting, but I missed most of the bites and was left out bait less most the time!! this was due to the fact the Cobra Rod every 20 mins was getting pulled over or slack lined with a Ray!!! every cast resulted in a Ray, I managed a Ray every 30mins from when I started to when I run out of Bluey!!! that's the second time this has happened to me!!! running out of Bluey!! same venue as well, but unlike last time, I did have just enough to last till dawn with one rod, even the last cast was baited up with the head elasticated onto the the spine and ribs of the Bluey, which are normally thrown away but still accounted for one last Ray! I landed 8 in total, and lost what I believed to be a big one to a snag. they were all release unharmed and the single 3/0 was easily removed with forceps. weights were from 2lb 12oz to the biggest at 7lb 2oz with most around the 4lb/5lb, and they were all girls, not a set of clasps in sight! As sessions go, this was one of the best I've had for a long time, no monsters or PB's, but no weed, no wind, nice and warm and little tide run made for a lovely unexpected successful session, landing more Rays than I normally catch in a year, mostly because I normally catch a few Rays before getting distracted with other species, but it would have been rude not to catch them this time, as they were obviously in front of me, and in numbers.

Plaice Fishing, aboard Peganina

Grunting around the Plaice

Aboard Peganina skippered by Ant Hills

Peganina leaving Rye Harbour

It was about as calm as it gets, and sunny all day, conditions were so good that even after my last disastrous trip out to sea where I was sick for 8 hours solid ground baiting with the lining of my stomach and totally unable to fish, I was surprisingly eager to get back out afloat and find my sea legs. the plan was to drift for Plaice, having caught quite a few Plaice already off the beach, I was susceptible to target other fish, and I kept thinking maybe a bonus Turbot could be on the cards, so I bought 1 large fresh mackerel for bait and converted a few Pike spoons into 6' long flowing rigs made from florocarbon, with a single size 3/0 hook and the spoon about 2' from the hook. My Plaice rig was a conventional spreader boom with a few different snods with different colour beads with clips to attach to the spreader boom, making it easy to pre bait other snods and chop and change to suit what colour beads are working.

New PB Plaice at 43cm 1lb 10oz

It was to be a short 4 hour trip with 6 of us on the boat, I fished 2 x 12lb class rods, 1 with the Plaice spreader rig baited with fresh Lugworm and tipped with a slither of squid, and one with the 6' long running leger with spoon baited with 4" strip of Mackerel belly just nipped onto the bend of the hook. 8oz plain leads were just right for keeping the rigs on the bottom whilst we started the first drift. I slowly lowered the rig to the bottom in a controlled way as to not tangle the rig, once on the bottom, I let out about 20 meters on line and engaged the reel and set the drag, Whilst I was baiting up and dropping the Turbot rig, I noticed the Plaice rod nodding away. I let off some more line and kept the line slack for a minute, then I reeled in slowly, as the line tightened I lifted the rod gently and knew I was on immediately, A solid start to the session, a new PB Plaice at 43cm and weighing 1lb 10oz!

New PB Tub Gurnard at 2lb 8oz

After a promising start, the rest of the drift was fruitless, the 2nd drift was very quiet up until the point the Skipper had turned the engine on ready to move, and asked us all to reel in, but 2 of the guys on the boat reeled in a nice sized plaice and a Tub Gurnard, so quickly thinking, the skipper advised us to carry on fishing, bites were coming all over the boat, my mackerel bait on the spoon was attracting the Gurnards where I had 1 after another in quick succession, a new species for myself a Grey Gurnard at 1lb 4oz and 3 Tub Gurnards with a new PB at 2lb 8oz, I've only caught a couple of Tub Gurnards before and definitely not of this stamp, they are absolutely stunning fish!! and make a unique grunting sound!! All then went quiet, we set up for the last drift, I was rather hoping for another Plaice, but that never happened, a few of the other guys caught and even a Thornback Ray showed his face, but all I could mange was a solitary Dab, but that didn't matter I had had a fantastic time, 2 new PB's and a new species, even though I went for Plaice, was trying for Turbot, I had found Gurnards and what beautiful fish!! I had been given another Plaice by another angler so I had a brace to take home.  I even didn't feel sick in any shape or form, so I guess I found my sea legs, or maybe as I suspect I may be a fair weather sailor, give me time and I'll start pushing my limits again looking for that special fish. 

Gutted Gurnard and Plaice and ready for the pot.

Thornback Ray Fishing, Hythe

Rainy Rays and Super Blood Moons

Hythe, Kent. UK

January and Febuary fishing here in the South East UK is normally very quiet, it's been known as the scratching season in the past, where small baits and hooks is the order of the day, and bags are made up mostly of small Dabs, Whiting and Rockling, but in recent years the Thornback Rays have made very late, and very early appearances, giving the impression they never went away. And it didn't take long this year to find them. After a few failed sessions along the coast from Dymchurch to Hythe myself and Paul hit the Jackpot. It was a Thursday night with high tide at 11.50pm and a massive spring tide, which was something to do with the super blood moon, wind was 15mph NE and was briskly off our backs, all though we felt quite sheltered behind the houses, the sea was fairly lumpy with a little surf. the weather was supposed to be dry, but it was raining the whole session, but that soon didn't matter as our minds would soon be concentrating on the job at hand.

Bluey, a Kent Rays favorite

I had made 4 x long 3' pulley pennals, 60lb straight through from lead to a single size 3/0 sakuma manta extra hook, which I offset with a pair of pliers. Bait wise I took 3 Blueys, a super oily fish similar to mackerel, which was cut into fillets and then fairly small pieces and bound onto the hook with bait elastic and a sequin and rubber stop pulled down to stop the bait sliding up the snod line. All though a big super blood moon affecting this big spring tide, fishing was comfortable with a 5oz breakaway lead, and I was able to hold bottom most the night through the flood. I was using a pair of Yuki Taylor Q7 rods, continental rods with very thin tips, I really like these rods, can get a good cast with them and they even show me crabs farting next to my bait. My reels were 2 x Shimano Ultegra XSD's loaded with 14lb Rovex X10 mono in high vis red, I use these bright lines, as it helps me fish at night, seeing the lines I'm able to determine weather I'm crossed over or not, very handy in strong tides where leads and rigs travel in the tide. I don't worry about spooking the fish as the last 12 meters are clear tapered leaders With the baits out, fishing was normal, a few Whiting, a couple of small Dogfish and a Dab, and then it just got better.

New PB 9lb 8oz

Rainy Rays

Paul kicked it off with the first Thornback of the night, a female of around 4lb, this got us both excited as it was quiet early on in the session, and for good reason, they just kept coming, between us we landed 2 Rays per hour right up to the last casts, the amount of bait we went through took us both by suprise, In fact the only reason we stopped fishing was because we both ran out of Bluey, and I'm sure we would have caught more if we did!! WE both caught numerous Whiting and Dogfish and Paul ended up with 6 Rays, from 1lb 7oz to 5lb 11oz, and myself, a tally of 4 Rays from 4lb 3oz to 9lb 8oz. I may have caught bigger than 9lb 8oz in the past, but this fish was officially weighed, and is now my official PB, no more speculation. It had been a cold, wet and windy night, and as I packed up soaked head to toe, I pondered about one of the best nights fishing I've had in a very long time. One thing did surprise me, of the 4 Rays I caught, I never had a big bite, a pull down or a slack liner. I had always seen the initial couple of gentle pulls on the super thin rod tips, then I sat and watched sometimes up to 20 mins without another moment or indication, only to lose patience and reel up the slack and lift into a fish, they were just sitting on my baits and for some reason unwilling to swim off. 

PS in case some of you are wondering, I got  no picture of this truly wonderful rare super blood moon, well it was hidden behind the rain clouds, but I'm assured it was by the news and papers lol