Good bass session - 18th August 2011

Thursday was a calm partly cloudy day and I reckoned the conditions would be ideal for a good mark that I had not been able to fish recently due to rough conditions so I finished work early and headed off . The sea was quite calm, just a little choppy, and the water was clear with very little weed so it looked promising. I started out with some some soft plastics and after about 20 minutes I switched to a Feed Shallow. After a few casts the lure was grabbed by a bass. At first it was not struggling too hard so I thought it was a small fish but as I got it in close I could see that it was a decent size. As it approached the shallows it began to fight much more strongly and thrashed about wildly. I eventually eased it on to the rocks. It was a 65 cm bass, weighing 5 lb. It had almost totally engulfed the lure.

I continued fishing with the Feed Shallow but it was quite for about another 25 minutes then the lure was struck by another bass in close, this was putting up a better fight than the first one but was only 50 cm.

Shortly afterwards I had another, again in close. This time the bass dived into a gulley and the line was rubbing against the rocks on the edge but I managed to raise it and landed it without snapping the line. This was an almost identical 50 cm fish.

I cast across the same area and shortly afterwards was struck by another bass, this one erupted behind the lure, lept out of the water, crashed back in and fought fiercely. Then disaster - the line snapped and the bass was gone along with my favourite Feed Shallow!!!! The line must have been damaged when the previous bass dived below the ledge. I was kicking myself for not checking it and cutting off the damaged section.

I switched to a weedless Slug-go and lobbed it across the same area. On the first cast the lure was grabbed by another bass, this one was the smallest of the session at 45 cm.

Shortly afterwards I briefly had another on the same lure but it came off. Then a few minutes later I had the fifth bass, another 50 cm fish, which again grabbed the Slug-go from the edge of the same gulley that most of the bass had been lurking in.

I hooked another bass a little later, had it on for a few minutes but as I got it in close it came off. Next cast I had a good size pollock. This was followed by a few more pollock but the bass shoal seemed to have moved on. I moved further around the bay but just had another couple of pollock. I fished for a while in darkness but could only get one more pollock.

So I was very happy with the evenings fishing, that was my best lure session so far this year; 5 bass and 6 pollock.