Red Bay 19th June 2016
4th trip of the season and first of 2 with Skipper Hamish Currie on board “Predator” out of Red Bay in Cushendall. 6 members took part.
Alan Buchanan
Martin Buchanan
Mark Buchanan
Paddy Trainer
Glen Murphy
John McCourt
Pretty fast tide today, and with a North East wind and heavy rain predicted the omens were not good for a great day afloat. So it proved unfortunately, we anchored up in the prime spot for Blonde Rays and Cod, but despite our best efforts we saw neither species on the day. We had come prepared with a large box of Calamari squid, supplemented with frozen Mackerel, and also, Skipper Hamish provided some Mackerel and Sandeels caught the day before, topped up throughout the day with freshly caught bait.
We started our day at 9.00 sharp, and headed straight to the marks, where the day before Hamish had hit some Blonde Rays. Hamish set the anchor and we baited our long flowing traces with Squid and Mackerel and waited for the bites to arrive. Apart from the LSD,s, fish were shy on the day, and we didn’t unfortunately hook up with our intended targets.
Near the end of our session however, Marty Buchanan got a good take on his Mackerel baited rig, and this was obviously not a Dogfish. After quite a struggle in a strong tide, a nice Tope emerged, putting up a fierce resistance, coiling itself in a number of lines on its journey to the surface. Hamish managed to tail the Tope onto the boat, and it was weighed at 25lb, the best fish so far of the session and season.
Not long afterwards, Mark Buchanan took a nice Spurdog of 8lb on a Mackerel flapper bait to lift our hopes again, but it was not to be, this was our last decent fish of the day.
Basically that was the trip. Tides were a big issue and fish were hard to find. The highlight was Marty’s big Tope setting a target for biggest fish of the season.
1st place Martin Buchanan 25lb Tope 15 points
2nd place Mark Buchanan 8lb Spurdog 10 points
3rd place Glen Murphy 2lb Dogfish 5 points