It has been a poor week of fishing to say the least. I met up with Rod for a session one evening and we where fronted with perfect conditions. Apart from a couple of possible knocks we saw no signs of Bass being present. We decided on a move and we had a couple of casts at another mark. I had a Bass boil right next to me as it passed through with the tide but no takers on the lures…

After a frustrating week of pretty much blanking the time was right for a session in the dark. With high tide on the breach of darkness we felt like we stood a good chance to get a fish or two…

Just look at those conditions!!?? Where were the bass… Rod banging a SGE out.

I picked Neil up and we headed to our mark. We arrived pretty late in the evening as we where only really interested in fishing in the dark. We had a gentle offshore wind and the sea looked silky smooth. It was certainly going to be comfortable fishing when the darkness settled in.

I couldn’t help but instantly stick a surface lure on to work across the reef. I couldn’t really believe it but first cast I had a boil, it swirled at the lure but for some reason it didn’t take it. I tried to speed the lure up after it’s second look at the lure but it wasn’t up for it. I had a niggling suspicion that there would be some weed on the lure when I brought it in and there was. Not much but it’s this really annoying thin lettuce weed that really makes fishing a lure difficult. Second cast and I tried to wake the lure super slow to see if I wouldn’t pick up any weed and I could entice a take. It is a technique that has worked for me in flat calm conditions. I also tried to slow the lure before impact on the water as to hopefully stop it going down too deep and possibly picking up some weed. I started a slow wake as a fish soon swirled at the lure once more… A bit further on and I could see the fin of a fish just cruising behind the lure…

Neil had switched to the Z-claw Mullet pretty quickly and was casting into the mix. On his second cast he started to work the lure quicker and was resulted in a good smash and a hook up. He landed a nice 3lbish fish but as he was trying to get a good grip on the fish it slipped out of his hands and swam away very quickly…

After this it went dead and seemed like there was more weed in the water than before, whether we had just disturbed the fish a bit too much in these flat calm conditions, they had simply moved off or that it was just the weed affecting our lures I don’t know but that was the last of the action…

We fished on and tried all manner of things but it was just to hard to get through the weed. As the light started to fade the weed began to thin out though and I managed another few minutes fishing on the surface but without a sniff.

The darkness was creeping in but it just seems to take so long to actually get proper dark know. I switched to the Redgill EVO in pearl. I have a lot of confidence in this lure especially at night and was my chosen one to try and get the ball rolling.

Well the action wasn’t what we had hoped, it was a very pleasant evening to fish but there wasn’t much action. Probably half way through the session though I got nailed right close in. It felt like a good fish and was holding on, eventually it gave a proper kick and took some line. It took me an age to get a grip on the fish and thought it might come off but I got there in the end.

Photo Courtesy of Neil Burnell

It was  a long fish but once again it was skinny so guessing it has just spawned with the rest of fish? It nailed the lure real good though, only the head of the lure was visible out of it’s mouth and the hook was in it’s tongue and causing some bad bleeding. We took a couple of quick shot’s and I got her back in the water. She swam off quickly so I’m hoping the bleeding will have stopped pretty quick. Crazy how quickly it clots in the water…

It went quiet again and I just wondered if maybe there was more fish out there but they just weren’t that keen tonight. Normally the fish will always take it further out on the retrieve and this just seemed like the fish had followed it right in and went to nail it before it escaped. I switched to a surface lure and tried a slow wake for a 20mins but just didn’t feel confident. It was pretty late by know and without seeing much action we decided to call it a night.

It was still a promising session thought given the conditions. Seeing some fish take OTT in the daylight hours was good to see and that Neil had managed a nice fish too made for a quality evening.

 Blankety blank… Still with scenery and a sunset like this where else would you want to be?