Dorset 26th August 2011

Back down to Dorset this afternoon, I arrived around 4:30 ish, smack on HW. Fishing was hard at first although I did have a really decent fish follow on two occasions. This was quite weird, I'm sure it was the same fish as it looked around 6/7lb and had a distinctive white mark on its back, perhaps a scar or something but the follows were about 2 hours and 100 yards apart!

With no fish landed though I decided to stay on into darkness and just as the last of the light had gone, the fish switched on and I had 4 bass, losts a couple of others and a few pollack all in the space of 30 mins. No great size though, all around the 3lb mark. All the fish came on a Komomo II in Joker Flashing Plate. I would have liked to have stayed on but I'd told the wife I'd be home around 10:30ish and with no signel on the mark I couldn't txt to say I was going to be later so had to pack up while the fishing was still hot.

Thats the first time I've seriously plugged into darkness, and like getting there before dawn in the mornings, it is plain to see how much difference it can make at times. I'm on holiday next week so will plan another trip only this time I will fish on into the night and hopefully bag a decent one.

Plugging Chesil - 20th August 2011

When it comes to bait fishing, Dorset's Chesil beach is by far and away my favorite place to fish. Its 18 miles of shingle is one of the country's most famous venues, it provides easy fishing  for 10 months of the year with a numerous array of species that can be realistically targeted with the bonus of knowing virtually anything may swim by!

But when it comes to plugging, where do you start on a place like this.....

I have to admit its a mystery to me, I know some regulars do really very well plugging here, but I am not one of them. I have caught a couple of lunker bass on plugs from here (including the one pictured on the right of this blog), but in reality both were just lucky fish, as I was just throwing a plug to pass the time whilst bait fishing with the beachcasters. Whenever I come down specifically to lure fish, I inevitably blank!

So onto todays trip, I arrived just after daybreak, and conditions were perfect (or at least how I imagine perfect shoud be for here). There was a lightish SW breeze, enough to kick up some chop but the water was still clear and weed free, the tide was just starting to flood.

I worked my way eastward along the shingle for a couple of mile, casting as I went. I started full of confidence but after a while of no activity this started to wane, there was no sign of any fish, no mackerel activity which is unusual and it started to feel like another chesil blank was looming. Then finally, when I had nearly worked my way back to the carpark area where the feather chuckers were gathered, this little fella took pity on my fishless state and nailed my zonk to save the day!

So I got a fish, but feel no closer to unravelling the mystery of chesil plugging....

Dorset 14th August

Yesterday morning I headed down to Dorset again, for the first weekend for a little while I gave myself a lie in and missed first light, arriving at my mark aound 8am....I paid for such laziness! When I got there it was pretty much HW, as I'd timed my trip to fish the ebb, which based on recent experience has been better. It was very bright and breezy though, never my favorite conditions and it was consequently hard work.

I started off well, landing a fish around 2lbs pretty quickly, taken on a mullet Feed Shallow, and lost a slightly better fish in close. The fish I lost was one of those annoying fish that refuses to fight properly, it took the lure right at my feet and then just flopped around on the surface. I could see it was lightly hooked and I just knew it was going to come off!

After that it dried up though and I fished on for three more hours without a sign of another fish.

No pics from yesterday, as the bass I caught was bleeding prefusely and didnt survive the experience, I don't mind taking the odd fish for the pot (I do a mean baked Thai style bass) but I dont think putting up pictures of dead or bleeding bass looks particularly good.

So here's a picture of a nice plaice instead! I caught this from Chesil the year before last, 4lb 2oz and my PB plaice. The reason I put it up as it's just feeling a bit autumnal today, and it got me thinking of plaice fishing. After lure fishing, plaice are my favorite target, I'm not sure why, waiting by a beachcaster for a plaice to hang itself and be winched in sounds kind of dull now, but for some reason I love catching them, so I'm starting to look forward to calm sunny October afternoons when I can dust off the zzippies and have a crack for a spotty....and if I get a fish near the size of the one below I'll be very happy!

Dorset - 6th August

I had a horrendously early start this morning, and arrived at my mark at around 04:15. Conditions were lovely with a light W wind and cloud cover holding back the day break...I started off working surface lures and it felt like I had a couple of enquiries (it was too dark to see!) but no real positive takes so I switched over to a Komomo II in Joker Flashing Plate. I love this lure but until this point it was my favorate lure never to have a caught bass, but second cast changed that and I was in.....

This put up a really good fight for its size (around 3lb). I was using my 3-23g rated ESG II today, far more sporting that the Rod Bar!

As it got lighter I went back to the surface, with the Patchinko 100 which small pollack immediately took a liking to and I had half a dozen over the next hour and loads more "hits" before finally getting another bass, a smaller fish this time.....

He needed some recovery time so it was into a rockpool to get over its ordeal!

After this the fishing died off, as tends to after LW here, so after a couple of fruitless hours I decided to switch tactics and try for a wrasse...sure enough the Xlayer soon did what Xlayers do and out came this pretty fish....

I had one more of these and a half decent pollack (2lb ish) on a weightless senko before calling it a day and heading home.

1st impressions on the Rarenium? Really nice reel, I'm very pleased with it.

On Tuesday I blanked,......

So I bought myself a new reel to cheer myself up!

Lets deal with the blank first, I fished E Devon Tuesday evening between 6 & 10pm…no takes and just a follow from a tiny basslet being the nearest I got to a fish. I’m a bit disappointed by this, I fished this mark a few times early this season for just a few wrasse but I put the lack of bass down to the time of year (late March / Early April) and resolved to come back on a nice warm summer evening with a flooding tide…..so much for that theory then and another failure for me on the flood….I’m really starting to prefer fishing the ebb tides now!

Anyway over to the reel, a Shimano Rarenium 4000, personally I think Shimano fixed spools in 4000 size rule the roost when it comes to lure fishing, at whatever price point you choose to go in at. I’ve wanted one of these for a while now, this is a slight upgrade on my Technium and pretty common fare across the UK plugging scene. Everyone seems to have one!

I’ll do a review at some point when I’ve abused it for a while but I don’t expect many negatives.

Whilst I was in the shop I also picked up this, a Duo Terriff DC90, in keeping with my current small lure fad, if anyone has used one of these I’d be interested on your views on it!