My last couple of attempts at snagging squid at Brighton Marina have been dismal failures, with the last one being particularly annoying as I had one but lost it at the net. In an attempt to break my squid Duck for 2010, I was back at the marina early this morning, making sure I got a decent spot before the weekend hoards filled the spaces – although this time, the East rather than the West arm was the venue.
I was on location in bay 48 on the arm by 6.45 am on a lovely bright morning with just a slight Southerly breeze ruffling the surprisingly cloudy water; I was hopeful that the sea would clear later as the tide rose. I set up my gear and used the usual terminal tackle of a float fished Tronix jig – pink to start and green later and then back to pink. As high water wasn’t due until around 2pm (depending on which tide table you read), I wasn’t expecting too much in the way of action, so I just enjoyed the peacefulness of it all, having not been out too much this year. As the hours wore on, the breeze dropped and it got quite warm but the on the business side of things, I was still squidless.
After a few hours, Richard, one of the guys from WSF turned up with his mate Nick and started fishing a couple of bays along from me. Handily for me that they’d brought a drop net along (left mine at home again) because at about 1pm, I had a slow take and a squid was on. A minute or so later, after Richard guided the net-handling Nick, my first landed squid of 2010 was on the deck and what a relief it was too.
The rest of the day was dead, no further takes at all, not so much as a sniff. The only highlight was reuniting Fishyrob with his leather hat he’d lost the previous night and found by me while walking out on the arm today. I left the marina by about 4pm and once home, the days catch was cleaned sliced and fried for tea, there’s nothing quite like straight from the sea onto the plate freshness. Anna was going to do her squid casserole but we decided that today was going to be “Calamari” as Alex has been pestering me about squid since last year. The next one will definitely be going casseroled though. Here’s a few pictures of before during and after. Click on images for larger versions.
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Prepared
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Dusted
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Doing
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Done
Very brief report from another days fishing down at Brighton Marina yesterday, trying to catch my first squid of 2010. Having failed miserably on Wednesday, I started early, at about 6.30am and fished through until around 4pm. Fished the float bays at the far end of the West arm. End tackle was a 1½ oz rated float, suspending a pink Tronix jig.
Result? One squid which dropped just before being netted by the bloke just along from me about 2 hours into the flood. Apart from that, I was squidless and although disappointed, I didn’t kick myself too hard when I found that the squid were not present in large numbers and apparently only two were landed for the day.
I’ll be doing a visit again on Saturday but trying the East arm instead and see if I can’t lose my 2010 squid virginity!
Had my first outing today since the ticker problems. Decided to go light and target the squid at Brighton Marina, having heard that the critters are around.
Got to the West arm at about 10am to find some of the guys from WSF forums in the first bays and having had a few squid out already. I set up in the next vacant bay and started fishing in earnest – a float fished pink Tronix jig cast out and left out to drag through in the current. Despite my best efforts and using identical jigs, floats etc., I could not get a take at all. The squid seemed to be concentrated in one particular area, which sadly was not the one I was fishing in!
I stuck it out until around 3pm with a quickly dropping tide before calling it a day. Disappointed to blank but it was great to be out again, no problems encountered, no pains – I feel like I’m almost back to normal.
Yesterday was set for the re-scheduled squid competition in aid of the RNLI organised by Fishyrob and to be held at Brighton Marina, so I arrived at the ‘Tackle Box‘ at 9am ready for pre match get together prior to the 10am start. Unfortunately, because of the new date, the number attendees was somewhat reduced to the 10 or so of us. After making sure all was set and entrance money was handed over, George from Tronix generously handed out some complementary jigs to everyone before we set off over to the East arm.
The wall was pretty busy with quite a few people taking up many of the bays and it wasn’t until we had got up near the end and we were in the higher numbered bays that we got enough space for us all to fish reasonably near to each other. Fishing started at 10am and we were all hopeful of a good result even though conditions didn’t appear absolutely perfect.
From then on, it was non-stop inaction with nothing remotely interested in our jigs. I tried pink, green and blue, baited and non baited but nothing could be enticed into snapping them up. The only things I managed to land were a starfish and a Masked crab. It wasn’t until quite late on into the match that Matt, who was fishing just along from me, landed a nice looking Cuttlefish. I should add here that although a Cuttle isn’t a squid, the competition was for all Cephalopods. Spurred on by the first critter to be landed, we carried on forever hopeful. Alas it was not be and at 3pm, the competition closed.
Now Matt was fully entitled to be crowned as the champion and take the spoils but he was so sporting, he elected to decline the trophy and agree to the competition to being re-run in two weeks time in the hope that there would be more action than just one being landed. I personally applaud him for his sportsmanship. Now I know this was just a bit of fun and not being taken seriously but all the same it was a great gesture.
I decided to fish on after the competition as the weather had dramatically improved and it was a lovely afternoon to be out in the fresh air. I continued to fish the jig in the hope of a squid for tea and carried on with the baited ‘flyer’ above the jig which is essentially a spur of line coming off the main line above the jig with a baited hook and offers the opportunity of catching other fish while still jigging. I was standing watching my float, when it suddenly dipped down and hovered just under the surface. I reeled in slowly hoping to connect with whatever was grabbing at the bait, and I could feel a slight quivering through the line and I knew immediately it wasn’t a squid. I retrieved the jig only to find a Lesser weever had taken the mackerel baited flyer. It was carefully unhooked using forceps and shaken back into the sea.
I fished on until about 5.30pm letting the floated jig work itself while I thrashed around with a set of Sabikis in the hope of mackerel or few. This seemed a fruitless waste of time with nothing showing any interest, so decided to cut short the intended time and head for home.
Popped down to the East arm of Brighton Marina yesterday afternoon to try and bag something squiddy-like for tea. I reality, I wanted some sneaky practice before the squid catching Championship‘ which was supposed to be last weekend but was cancelled due to bad weather prospects (as it happened the weather turned out to be perfect but that’s another story) and is now being held this Sunday
As soon as I arrived, I could tell it was going to be a bit lumpy and windy with a brisk South Westerly breeze whipping the sea up. Undeterred, I headed out and got a spot at bay 20. Trying to fish a float in the big swell was near impossible, so gave that up. Tried ‘sink and draw’ with a Tronix pink jig but that resulted in no takes and me getting wet by standing too close to the ‘Vees’ and when gushers came in.
Finally decided enough was enough so tried for some mackerel to take for tea and some for bait. Sent out a string of Sabiki lures and in a few attempts had half a dozen for the bag. Having taken what I needed, I packed up and set off for the early evening crawl along the coast road to get home.
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My last couple of attempts at snagging squid at Brighton Marina have been dismal failures, with the last one being particularly annoying as I had one but lost it at the net. In an attempt to break my squid Duck for 2010, I was back at the marina early this morning, making sure I got a decent spot before the weekend hoards filled the spaces – although this time, the East rather than the West arm was the venue.
