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  • 05/2013 Fishing Report by Gethyn Owen on My Way 2 (Holyhead, Isle of Anglesey)

    May 2013 by Gethyn Owen

    Report on-board My Way 2

    Smoothies, pollack, spurs - not bad when the winds don't blow ....

    Despite a healthy calendar, early May still fell foul to the weather gods. High winds once again leading to the cancellation of far more trips than we actually managed to sail on.

    When we did manage to sneak out, the back of the breakwater was still producing some nice Pollack. With plenty in the 1 to 2lb bracket, we also hooked into a good few up to 5lb in weight, offering a nice meal for the lucky angler. At anchor we started to see far more fish than the struggle we had through the bitterly cold weather in late March and April. With Dogfish , Whiting, Dab and Codling we also caught some small thornies and huss approaching double figures.

    It was though Smoothhound we really wanted.
    .
    After a break of 10days, cancelling every trip along the way through high winds, we managed a nice few days afloat from 17th May. This was to be our first attempt at landing a smoothie this year. Our day actually started with some drifting. Everyone tackled light and we had some great sport for a few hours catching pollack, cuckoo and ballan wrasse.

    By lunch it was time to head over to our anchor and try for a few hounds. The waters though were still fairly cold compared to recent years; this was seriously affecting the crab moult. Cold waters had stopped the big spring moult required to bring the big Smoothhound to our shores on the feed.

    Regardless we made our best attempt, primed with some quality Anglesey peeler crab. It took an hour before local angler Arron Miles had a clear bite and run from the first hound of 2013, as I jumped for joy and screamed "you hero" Arron lifted into the hound …… and lost it!

    To which I called him something else, "hero to zero in 10 seconds" Billy pointed out!

    Arron though had the last laugh as he went on to land the only two smoothhounds of the day and get My Ways Smoothhound hunt truly underway. The following day the wind was once again playing havoc with our attempts to get out fishing. Delaying the sail time to lunchtime, we once again set off with high hopes; sadly though no smoothies graced the decks of My Way that afternoon or evening.

    Proof to the ridiculous nature of the unsettled weather we are experiencing this year was these few days. The scenario was Friday light NW, Saturday strong NE and then Sunday, sunshine, no wind and calm seas.

    With the Smoothhound still being a little unpredictable I made the suggestion pm the Sunday that we make the most of the neap tide and glorious weather and head off shore in search of some bigger pollack action and maybe a few huss and spurdogs; not exactly what the crew wanted, but in fairness the guys were happy to take onboard my observations on the state of the current fishing situation.

    With nervous anticipation I set My Way up for the first pass over the wreck and as I called the warning the sunken vessel was coming up, I could see Marks rod tip bend over as a hard fighting Pollack hit his lure. On the first drift we had a few nice Pollack grace the decks of My Way including a 10lb er for Mark. A few more drifts and everyone was hooking into fish and a few the wreck! A couple drifts and Mark in particular had 3 fish in his bag for a return of 27lb, not bad fishing at all for our small part of the world
    Don Abbot also raised a smile when amongst his haul he managed a nice 10lb 4oz Pollack. At anchor we had spurdogs, a few small huss and a fair old number of dogfish! But returning back onto the drift when the tide was running, we were back into the Pollack.

    A few more cancellations followed before we were able to get back out to try for the Smoothhound in Holyhead bay. Each trip though started with a small amount of drifting or general fishing before the waiting game of hound fishing. Thankfully we were rewarded with some smoothies, all being double figure sharks. Sadly though the hounds are still not in the great numbers we normally associate with this time of year.

    But with the hen crabs now shedding shells in great numbers, each day should be a marked improvement on the last.
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