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Ireland Spearing, 2011

Thread Status: Hello , There was no answer in this thread for more than 90 days.
It can take a long time to get an up-to-date response or contact with relevant users.
Actually maybe it will look good loaded with Cod....
The first run of cod has officially started in east cork... reports of catches of 30+ are coming in from the lads down here!
Now all I need is a little break in the weather and a few fat codies :)
 
I know that you can spear anything ;) but I just thought they are way deeper as I haven't seen one of them in water before. Will they be easy enough to spear? Or they are one of those tricky ones?
 
I'll put it this way.... Bobdonny is a lethal deepwater Spearo as we all know (remember that pollock from the depths which secured the much sought after tee shirt?) and he hasn't managed one yet.
Seriously though, I only ever saw one and missed in about 12M this year. U can get them shallow but the only come shallow in estuaries and harbours and love dirty brown water.
So in summer when they are manageable they can be deep enough but if u look around u will spot one. They stay very close to the bottom in kelp and are known to be very lazy fish.
Next fine day is cod day!!!! Still waiting nearly two months on......
 
Baldy.... on that trip i did see one and took the shot.... but my spear hit the kelp and stuck hard...

I think Sunday could be good - though evening and night would be my preferred time.... all the east cork cod have been at high water at night. I'm thinking that reef bout 80m SSW from that slip where ye normally do the night diving... 6-8m on low. Actually maybe the high on neap is doable.... I've shot decent pollock there and seen plaice and sole. I reckon it would be good for cod and didn't the kayak fishermen say they caught a few there a few months ago....

Low tide at 9am or pm.... hmmmm, I reckon the evening would be best.... what do ya reckon?

It will be 4 days since the last rainfall.... 3 days with northerlies flattening out the swell.... I'd say there will be about 2m shallow and 3-4m out deeper.
 
So we hit the water yesterday.

Down at the boat for 10am to scrape the ice off.
Conditions looked amazing from the outset, but getting closer to the water it was brown.

Infortunately as we left the harbour the conditions improved slightly with viz on the surface at about 2m. We hoped it was just a surface layer of bad vis but when we hit the bottom it was darker and thicker with less than a meter viz.

We dived from 7m to 11m in two different locations. Maybe 25 dives and gave up in the end.

We took out the rods and tried practically every single mark outside and inside the harbour but the fish obviously could not see our lures also... and we failed to catch any mackeral for any decent bait or scent trail.

So unloading the boat at 5pm Dennis had a nice codling of about 2lb the only one caught of the day. Johnny donated him his coalfish of about the same size. And I did not catch or keep anything decent. We landed about 7 species of fish but nothing of any decent size.

But.... who can not smile having spent a day on the water like this :)

10am
374260_2566396956546_1152836871_3076519_1744190299_n.jpg


5pm end of the day
309508_2566397876569_1152836871_3076520_575996363_n.jpg
 
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not sure of the weight...ill check tomorrow. They are manufactured in Us of A in Cali by John banks, he has actually posted a few threads here... Great piece of kit, would suit bluer water like yours!

Thanks for the story, important ot get reality checks like this every now and then!
 
Yep, havn't met any nasties yet but it's inevitable. Found a place that does them banks boards in Oz, $400, not bad I suppose. How much did you pay for yours Bob if you don't mind me asking. I've been looking at plats for a while now, there at the top of my wish list, second is a shark shield:)

Starting to warm up a bit here now with some decent fish starting to come in.
Here's some pics from last week. No weights as I've no scales yet, sorry.


Six spine leather jacket hanging from my spear gun, the big one in the pic is a trevally and the small one is a sweep. The sweep is the closest thing I've tasted to mackeral here. All taste pretty good.
 
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Yep, havn't met any nasties yet but it's inevitable. Found a place that does them banks boards in Oz, $400, not bad I suppose. How much did you pay for yours Bob if you don't mind me asking. I've been looking at plats for a while now, there at the top of my wish list, second is a shark shield:)

Starting to warm up a bit here now with some decent fish starting to come in.
Here's some pics from last week. No weights as I've no scales yet, sorry.


Six spine leather jacket hanging from my spear gun, the big one in the pic is a trevally and the small one is a sweep. The sweep is the closest thing I've tasted to mackeral here. All taste pretty good.

I have a link to a guy that sells them in the states @ $200.00. If you want to PM me mate
Cheers, Don Paul
 
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