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Friday, 8 July 2016

My first guiding session and a lot of rain!

I was unlucky with the weather this week as it was raining practically non-stop during both my days off! Moreover there were strong Southwesterly winds that made fishing even more unpleasant..
I had a session alone on Wednesday and caught some fish in the shallows with a mixture of hard and softbaits. Unfortunately the wind didn't allow for the use of topwaters and that was a pity as I found a good number of fish active and willing to hit shallow runners but not OTT...
Looks like a scene from Jurassic park!

Megabass Zonk 120 sw...

DUO Realis Jerkbait 120sp for the best fish of the day..

 A video of the session.

On Thursday I met up with a friend who wanted to get a taste of saltwater fishing on Skye. Robert is from Poland and had never before fished in the UK. Therefore I promised him that he would catch his first Scottish fish on the session! Thankfully the rain was less intense in the morning along with a lighter wind. Thus we quickly drove to one of my northern marks as we would only have a short window of opportunity before the tide and conditions change.
We arrived at the spot and it was looking pretty good. A light chop on the surface and plenty of birdlife about along with a seal, indicated that there was something going on under the surface. I prepared the rod for my friend and set him up with a 15g darting jighead and a slug type lure.  I pointed him in the direction that I though the fish would be holding and told him to just let the lure sink on a tight line and to start a steady retrieve as soon as it touched down. Well that didn't happen as the lure was intercepted on the way down (first cast!) and my friend had a good bend in the rod fighting a decent sized pollock!
This is how the session unfolded with more fish and some good fights. No monsters on the day but considering the conditions, I think we did well...
It was interesting to note a good blitz we saw on the surface although we didn't see what caused it...
We had to cut the session short as the weather deteriorated after a while and it just became too much hard work trying to control the line, feel for bites etc.. My friend Robert was very happy though as he had a few fish for dinner and a very productive session. I think he is now hooked on rock fishing!
Happy faces...

A good bend on the rod!

Number one!



A happy angler!
Something Ive realised on these two days is how insufficient normal rain-wear is under these conditions. On the first day I was wearing my usual Vass waterproof smock and waterproof trousers, but by the end of the session (a few hours long) I was absolutely soaked to the bone! I think its time to look more seriously into some dedicated rough-weather clothing as it appears that I will be on Skye longer than I had planned and autumn and winter will bring even worse conditions...

Thanks for reading and tight lines!

Gear used.
Rod: MajorCraft Solpara SPS-1002LSJ, 3.05m. max 50g and Tica Seha graphite 2.70m,~10-30g
Reel: Shimano SW Biomaster 4000XG and Abu Garcia Soron Stx40
Mainline: YGK G-Soul X3 PE1.5 and Duel Hardcore x4 PE1.5
Leader: Duel Hardcore Powerleader fluorocarbon 20lbs.
Lures: various

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