May Report

I'll start with mullet fishing. May is often an inbetween sort of month with the big winter shoals gone and fish gradually moving onto their summer venues.

I started at Rosscarbery on the 1st, legering by the bridge. I had a good take second cast on my left hand rod fishing into the channel, but the fish came off after a few seconds. It didn't seem too important at the time, but after another ninety minutes I was beginning to wonder. Then my other rod pulled over and I was into a hard-fighting thicklip that turned out to be a lean 3:09 with a great paddle of a tail on it.

Sadly that was it for the day, but undeterred by a very slow afternoon I was back for more on the 4th. To be honest much of today was slow too but I did enjoy a couple of active spells when I landed three decent mullet, topped by one that just scraped 4lbs. David Norman dropped by for a chat in time to get the action shot of my last of the day, and landed a mullet on my other rod that took while I was playing it...

On the 8th I tried at Ross again and suffered my first mullet blank of the year. I was surprised to be honest because there were a few about, albeit harrassed by a pair of cormorants for a lot of the day. Fern is a pretty good swan deterrent but the cormorants just seemed to bemuse her.

For a change from the mullet I had a couple of sessions with Alan who

was down from Cork. On the 3rd we had a halfway decent session at the Airstrip. Between the dogfish Alan bagged a decent huss nudging double figures while I had a smaller huss and a middling thornback...

On the 6th Alan was down again. We fished the mark in Dunmanus Bay where we'd struggled last month, having convinced ourselves it might fish better on a dropping tide. It didn't, not at all. After a couple of hours with just a single dogfish for me we'd had enough and decamped back to the Airstrip.

Since our last visit the place had been invaded by starfish. Almost every cast we were winding one in, Alan sometimes two at a time on the two-hook rig he was fishing. It seems there's fat chance of catching a fish with a massive echinoderm sitting on your bait after a few seconds, though I did catch another dogfish that must have been quick out of the blocks to reach it first. Alan blanked for the day, which was a pity.

Mid-month my fishing ground to a halt with a ton of exam papers arriving to mark and days of online meetings to do with that. 

I didn't get out again till the 25th when Sylvi and I headed up to Kerry to fish on what was threatening to be the hottest May day ever in Ireland. It was indeed sweltering on the rocks with the sun beating down and just a hint of east breeze, but fortunately a little sea breeze puffed up from the south-west for the afternoon to take the edge off the heat.

I started on one rod with a wishbone rig and small hooks, thinking I might pick up a gurnard or a spotted ray. In the event it just proved to be a deadly dogfish rig, some casts bringing them in two at a time. I soon reverted to bigger baits on both rods but the doggies were still up for it and in the end I settled on using mackerel heads and big chunks cut right through the body. That worked to an extent, or maybe the dogs just quietened down. Anyway I started picking up better fish, specifically thornbacks...