1st of April Bass

After spending the day gardening I headed out for the beginning of the rising tide on Sunday evening. I had intended to dig some lug but having spent all day digging in the garden I couldn't face doing it again for another hour. I had a few crabs and took three packs of razorfish. The razor fished very well for me last week so I reckoned that would suffice.

Since there was just a light northerly breeze I expected the sea to be flat but was surprised to see a moderate surf rolling in. I set up two rods. One with a 4/0 pennel pulley bait with crab, the other with a two hook flapper (3/0 hooks) baited with razor. The tide was just beginning to push in by the time I cast out. About ten minutes later as the light was fading I spotted some subtle knocks on the rod with the crab, picked it up, felt another light tug, struck and hooked a fish. It was fighting strongly and a few minutes I had a 47 cm bass flapping on the beach.

There was then a long slack period with only a 33 cm flounder taken on the crab. About three hours before high tide I began to get bass bites but the fish were cautious, dropping the bait before I had a chance to strike. Eventually I succeeded in securely hooking a 43 cm bass on the two hook flapper.

I had a few more missed bites and then had a good knock on the same rod. This felt to be a better fish and was fighting strongly so I was expecting to see a decent size bass when I hauled it out of the surf but it was a bass double, two small fish on the two hook flapper rig. They were both much the same size, about 35-36 cm.

After that the bites began to slacken off. I was still getting the occasional knock but nothing was hooked. I had used up all the crab and switched the other rod to razor as well. A little later I had a strong tug and was convinced I had another bass but it turned out to be a large dogfish. Shortly after high tide I had the smallest bass of the night on a razor baited pennel pulley. This little guy was only 29 cm but still gave a lively fight.

So not as good as my previous session at the same beach, but with 5 bass, 1 flounder and 1 dogfish I was happy with the session, which brought my bass total for the year to 50.