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.
