Reconnaissance...

Its been a while that I have been identifying fish-holding marks on google Earth but due to the early of the season and the unstable weather, thought not to gamble and waste my time there, instead preferring the 'surest' marks. last week though we were blessed with good weather and slight winds and I made the call to try out two areas. the first one didn't offer a single bite (shallow, but might be worth checking over in a month's time..) but on the second one i struck gold! Found large numbers of very decent coalies in a shallowish bay along with good numbers of pollock, surprisingly close to the shore... This is definitely a mark to be re-visited especially with the lrf gear and maybe some topwater lures...
On the day I had the chance to use some flies from my friend Tolis of  Smart Flies . I decided to add them as teasers to my usual metal combo rig and they really worked a treat! I was really surprised when towards the end of the session, and with the bites practically non existent, I managed a nice 2kg pollock that hit the teaser instead of the metal! For the past sessions, most larger fish would go for the main lure but obviously this fish saw something it liked...

Worth the trek...

Coalies are suckers for teasers...

Nice coalies on this mark... This one with net wounds..

LRF gear next time...

Spectacular!

Big pollock couldn't resist the sandeel teaser..

On Thursday, I had the morning off and decided to have a short session on Aird as the tide was good.
I reached the mark bang on high tide and started fishing away with metals. I got a nice fish on the metal but then bites tailed off on the metals. I then switched to a brass n glass Texas rig with a 10g weight, a 8mm glass bead and a 2/0 EWG hook. lures were a variety of slim paddletails, modified stickbaits with an added curly tail and straights. this way I was able to cover the area more precisely and keep the lure in the strike zone, in this case being close to the bottom as the tide was ebbing and the current intensified. I got the best results by casting 'upcurrent' and parallel to the rock-wall, working the lure with short hops on the bottom and bits of straight retrieve. Most fish would hit soon after touchdown or at the straight retrieve immediately after some 'hops'.
After catching some average fish, I got a solid take and the drag started to sing! I was using my KG Evolution Basic (2.7m, 7-23g) and it really was bent to the limit... This was a better fish and after a few runs it managed to get in a snag. I fed it some line and it soon came out, allowing me to bring it up with sharp pumps of the rod. I got a couple pics and then released this strong fighter.. It was interesting to note that the fish had some worms and parasites on it thus I suppose it hasn't been very active so far...
After that fish there was no point fishing any longer so I called it a day and went home for a nice meal.
Below some pics and videos of the action!

The first one on a metal...

And the rest on Texas rig...

Thought the larger profile might get me larger fish...

... Nope!

A good fighter!

Thanks for reading and don't forget to contact me if you fancy sampling some of this great fishing!

Gear used.
Rod:  MC KG Evolution KGS-902L, 2.7m, 7-23g.
Reel: Daiwa Freams 2500
Mainline: Duel Hardcore X4 PE 1.0
Leader: Duel Hardcore Powerleader FC 20lbs
Lures: metals with teasers and brass n glass Texas rigged softplastics.