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07/2021
Fishing Report by Scott Belbin
on Galloper (Brightlingsea, Essex)
Jul 2021 by Scott Belbin
Report on-board Galloper
Despite being busy on our general trips lately we have still made time to head offshore in search of tope in between. It can be a risk for a skipper to set aside certain tides for fishing like this but thankfully they were all filled quickly. The weather has been kind to us this season as well as the boat meaning we could work more weather when we wanted to. This meant we only lost one tope trip to weather and there’s no substitute for time when it comes to this type of fishing.
Our first trip of the year started well with a 39lb male fish for Richard. Not a bad fish to start the season. This would have been followed a while later by a very lively fish that managed to clear 300yards of braid from Deans reel in 3 powerful runs! With all the other lines in I started to haul the anchor but it was too little too late as it had already straightened his 10/0 circle hook! I reset the anchor for one last cast and Dean re-tackled while licking his wounds. Luckily he had another run soon after however this fish was different gravy to the one he had just lost. Still a nice fish to start his season with as it was a male of 33lbs.
We ended up chasing another fish on our next trip too. This was a decent fish although no monster. The reason we gave chase was a rather dodgy jerky clutch on Martins antique reel. I think the whole boat was relieved to see that fish in the net after such a nerve wracking fight in a strong tide.
After a strong start, we managed to find a few fish on most trips. Some times we had to work harder than others, moving around or staying later to get the best of the tide. most of our trips we were lucky enough to see fish to over 40lb if not just shy of it and we found steady numbers too. Tope fishing around here is often a waiting game nowadays so it is important to make the most of any fish that come our way. Using circle hooks has meant fewer missed bites and the majority of fish made it to the boat once hooked. Of course loosing fish is part of angling and we did our fair share of that too. A few fish were lost through hook pulls mid fight. I put this down to an unlucky hook hold most of the time. There were some gear failures too which are frustrating as many are preventable. These include people using mono rubbing leader that were too light as well as mono bite traces which were bitten off when the fish took the circle hook deeper than expected. Some are just unfortunate though Stephen Charles has had his fair share of bad luck tope fishing. on one busy day when we had a total of 13 tope he had a cracking bite which hooped the rod tip over before going completely slack. The bait must have been laying back up the mainline which meant when the fish took the bait it bit straight through his mono leader too! Shortly after I found my self berating Stephen Clarke instead as he had just lost a fish. I must confess after seeing several fish lost to tackle failures I can be a little fussy with the lads, I check tackle, traces and clutches regularly to try and prevent lost fish. Stephen is one of the lads I don’t worry about normally. He hadn’t long returned a fish of over 30lb when his reel screamed into action over slack water. With a bit of sea running the boat had already started to sheer on the anchor rope and the other lads soon reeled in out of the way when he hooked up. The fish went on some seriously powerful runs at distance which is better than waking up on a short line. one of the other lads even had time to pop to the loo and return with the fish still fighting hard then suddenly after some more head shakes it went loose. We assumed the hook had pulled however it turned out the fish had pulled through his double crimped trace! It seemed the previous fish had weakened his trace and a decent tope wont give you a second chance with weakness’s in your tackle. After this we took extra care to change traces after each fish to avoid loosing another decent fish. the following day I was joined by more regulars and we had another busy trip. No tackle failures although we did pull the hook on a decent tope. Andy had bought his daughter Honey with him for her first tope trip. Honey has fished with us several times over the last year and I have mentioned before how she is a natural angler. We were all keen to see how she would handle her first tope and we weren’t disappointed. Honey managed two decent tope. One at 27lb and one at 35lbs. her Dad Andy just pipped her with a 37lb male, one of several fish that day. Another young gun I was pleased to see amongst the tope was one of our other regulars Alex Canham. Alex has fished with Dad and myself since he was very young so to see him set a new PB tope of 39lb at the ripe old age of 15 was a pleasure. His Dad Steve said he enjoyed seeing Alex catch that fish more than he enjoyed catching his own PB of 47lb a few weeks earlier. Steve’s fish was joint biggest of the year. He shares this honour with Chris Bendall who now had also has a new personnel best to beat.
Other notable fish included a tope with a bent dorsal fin for Stephen Charles. It resembled the captive orca from ‘free willy’. Paul Willis had a tope with half of its tail seemingly cut off? Also a recapture of a fish that had already been tagged a fair while ago by somebody else. There wasn’t much info on the tag other than an address in leatherhead. If anybody has heard of this project please let me know and I will pass on the relevant info.
Although there is a chance of us picking up one or two more stray tope this summer we have finished our run of tope trips for now. For the next few months our offshore trips will consist of mainly bass trips with a few other special trips thrown in too. Please book these trips in advance where possible as they often require certain tides.
We should see plenty more hounds and bass over the coming weeks as well as sneaking some other trips in too. If I cant get you out soon then please remember the bass will hang around offshore into November so please ask to get the best tides.
i have individual and full boat availability from October onwards although my father Stuart (07850234077) on the Razorbill may have spaces before hand.
please call me on 07956411528 for more information
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