Salthouse 10th April 2011 – 1st Leg Summer Accumulator
The club’s first match of the new season kicked off in weather reminiscent of mid-summer, a pleasant change from those months of cold north-easterlies. Selecting Salthouse over the top of the tide to hopefully tempt an early bass or a quality flounder. Our expectations were high that this just might happen with a light east/south easterly giving, a reasonable swell and some colour in the water. A slightly reduced turnout gathered at the beach car park for an early start with a few new potential new members not making an appearance, seems to be the norm these days.
Pegging was the usual stretch, westward from Great Eye and infront of Little Eye. The favoured pegs were 1-3 where good flounders and bass were caught last year. Some members decided to camp on the top shingle bank and the more adventurous a level down on a flooding tide. With a relatively small tide we all knew that we could remain parked on the bank for the whole of the session helping to make a pleasant relaxing match. Unlike recent matches everyone was rather lethargic at the whistle, probably the one month break had taken effect.
First few casts is always a good indicator of what could be expected and with traces coming in either completely stripped or untouched showing that vermin was about and that it was going to be a struggle. This was further confirmed when those pesky pin whiting started to appear, one, two and even three at a time, when are they going to disappear? First to register was “class act” Thorburn with a sizeable whiting and he immediately thought this was his day but sadly that was the only fish he recorded all day. With the tide flooding fast the fish were not playing ball apart from those pins and finding the fish became the name of the game.
A change of tactics by “yoda” Thomas with 2 hooks at distance and slider in the gutter resulted in a small sizeable flounder on the slider. The tactic of fishing the gutter was soon taken up by “our henry” who soon had a flounder in his bucket followed by another one and then by a couple of coalies. Much to the disgust of “loose change” Conway whose vast array of rigs and bait was yielding nothing. Then out of the blue his rod sprang into life and a healthy 37cm bass was on the beach on his long flowing boom trace with lug and fresh crab’s legs doing the business. All of this was happening on the high numbers and everything was looking very quiet on the low numbers, or so we thought.
At the other end, “end peg” Allen had managed to find a couple of rockling and “last cast” Watts had a rockling and a decent 26cm dab but finding the fish was still the challenge. The pattern appeared to be that the gutter was producing flounders and 30-40 yards rockling and pin whiting. 40-80 yards produced rockling and a few dabs and 80+ yards seemed to just to hold crab with everything stripped within minutes. A flurry of activity occurred around top of the tide but as slack water came it as usual went quiet apart from those pins and crabs.
At the whistle it was steady Mike “last cast” Watts who took the honours with 2lb 5 2/3oz from 7 fish with a 36cm bass on his last cast just to rub it in. For Mike fishing at distance all day with big baits paid dividend and he’s certainly a contender for the Summer Accumulator this year. Second on the day was that man with the other bass Dene “loose change” Conway with 1lb 4 2/3oz from 2 fish closely followed by ex-junior Henry “red stuff” Randell with 1lb 3oz from 6 fish. With 5 league points also awarded now for heaviest flat and round in each match, Dene took the round with his bass and Mike the flat with his dab.
A pleasant although quiet day’s fishing was had by all and missed by that “olde gentlemen” Dick Able who was taken into hospital at the weekend with a blood clot on his lungs. They are getting him fixed and hopefully he’ll be back on the beaches and rivers for the summer season, we wish him a speedy recovery. Also, would like welcome a potential new member Albert “piffy” Randlesome from Lowestoft way who came and tried the club out under the club’s new free trial match option.
All in all an excellent match where the bass did actually show at an excellent venue which ironically could become a thing of the past. Under the Net Gain project the shingle ridge from Cley car park to the pillar box at Kelling is being proposed as a MCZ (Marine Conservation Zone). If this goes ahead the worst case scenario could identify sea angling as incompatible with such zones and that sea angling of all forms could be banned from this stretch of shingle. This would mean that 100s of anglers would be prevented from fishing their favourite and best shingle beach on the East Coast which they have been doing for generations. However, nothing has yet been agreed and the club are taking a calm approach to this situation and are currently in full consultation with the Net Gain project team.
Anyway it’s back to another favourite venue next week in Kelling which could be part affect by the above MCZ proposal. Fishing on Saturday 16th April with an early start from 8:30 – 1:30 and new members are welcome.
Club Match Result Top 5
1st Mike Watts 2lb 5 2/3oz
2nd Dene Conway 1lb 4 1/3oz
3rd Henry Randell 1lb 3oz
4th Tony Thomas 0lb 11oz
5th Ivan Allen 0lb 9oz
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