Bull Bay - first kayak fish of 2009

I took advantage of the weather and a day off work today to get the first launch of 2009 under my belt before the wet and windy weather moves in this weekend.

Met up with another local kayaker at Bull Bay just after lunch and launched off the beach at Bull Bay - we were going to give one of the west coast marks a go for codling but the wind had picked up by this afternoon so we opted for the shelter of Bull Bay.



Paddled north to our usual coalie marks and tried trolling and jigging baited feather and shrimp rigs on the drift accross the marks. It was very quiet on the last phase of the ebb, so I then opted to drift further out on the light offshore breeze whilst my mate stayed in close and put on a conger trace and fish bait near to the cliffs out of the sun in the hope of tempting out a conger at dusk.












I had some good bites on the black lug and local herring baited shrimp rig as I drifted further out into deeper water. Didnt connect into anything and assume they were pin whiting. After paddling back inshore to meet up again we moved into the middle of the bay and i went further out again and tried a mark next to a pot buoy where we had previously had triple headers of whiting - nothing doing so as the sun started to go down we moved back towards the launch site against the now flooding tide and I tied up to a buoy over a deep hole in the main headland rip - bang, deep water and straight into fish 8-)
I pulled in a medium size whiting and saved the first blank of the year as well as photographing the first species of 2009 off the yak 8-) . For the last half an hour I pulled in four more fish of between 1/2 pound and 3/4 pound - all returned to grow bigger.




Paddled back into the beach and slipway around 30 mins before it got dark, and then spent 10 mins checking out the effectiveness of the dry suit and thermals underneath by wading out a bit with PFD still on to try out the water temp - still not too bad but toes got cold with just one pair of walking socks on :lol:

The moon was out when we came back in:





Avoiding the blank was a welcome start to kayak fishing in 2009, and end to what had been a pleasant paddle in flattish conditions in the remaining sunshine of the afternoon.

Sunday 4th January 2009

First boat fishing trip of the year. Met up with Alan and several other locals for a trip out of Holyhead on My Way charter boat. The plan had been to fish inshore in the morning and then head out to fish holyhead deeps in the afternoon. Unfortunately despite several calm days preceding the trip there was an increasing westerly and a swell which meant we had to stick to inshore marks in Holyhead bay.

The fishing started off slow with pouting and whiting but at least I was off the mark with my first fish of 2009 a pouting, followed by two more.



We moved to couple more inshore marks and Pete landed the biggest fish of the day, a huss of around 6lbs. I managed a couple of dabs for another species:



Just after a nice lunch of the skippers home made chilli and rice pots, the fishing picked up as we hit a nice shoal of good size whiting and I was bringing them in two and three at a time for a period, then back down to mixed singles.

Despite the swell I managed to overcome the sea sickness feeling that was lurking around most of the day and we moved again to anchor over an inshor wreck for the last hour in the hope of some huss and conger. Neither obliged but some more pollack and poor cod came on board to keep up the friendly catch and release points competition that was running on the boat. Pete managed to win on both points and the largest single fish.

Alan and Pete gave me some good advice on rigs and bait presentation, and Alan supplied me with another batch of rigs to try - cheers mate! Here is Alan giving a pose on board in between marks:



We headed in around 5pm, content that we had had a good days fishing despite the swell and cold westerly wind. Company was great and we had a good laugh on the boat, with Gethyn the skipper and Paul his crew supplying lamb chops, chilli, biscuits and hot mince pies, as well as lots of teas and coffees throughout the day - thanks guys!