After having time to reflect from yesterdays dive to a new spot on the East Devon coast somewhere. I thought it only right to write an account of the days fishing after posting my contribution to the FOM competition for May.
You know after looking at gin clear water and seeing patches of reef from the car park on the beach front, you’re in for a good dive. Getting into the water didn't disappoint with 10+ metres of visibility, which I have not seen for a very long time. After a bit of a swim I found a patch of boulders in about 8m of water. Looking down I saw a large grey-blue tail slide in between the boulders. A quietly dived down and landed on a patch of sand about 4 metres from the boulder and manoeuvred myself side-on to a significant undercut on the boulder. Tucked up in the far corner a good sized bass was laid up, which I took with a clean shot through the gill plate. Leaving the gun I swam back up until things settled. Diving back down to pick up my bass I could see there were plenty of huge boulders with slits and under-cuts to explore. Gently pulling my bass out from under the boulder I could see it’s was a good 5 to 6 pound, a great start for my first bass of the year.
Giving myself time to recover and plan my next descent, with the top to bottom visibility was not difficult. I spotted two bass in front of me, no more than 20 metres from my first bass. Again, I dived away from the bass and then changed direction towards the fish once on the bottom. Moving very slowly towards a flat boulder with a massive undercut where the bass had been. Keeping my gun just above and alongside the undercut I peered in from the edge into the dark cavernous space. A large head, with a white lip looked back at me and was turning on itself to make its escape out of the other side. I brought my gun into line with the fish and got a great holding shot. I knew I had a good fish and gently pulled it out off the hole. Swimming to the surface took some effort; looking down at the bass I could see why, it was huge - could it be a double figure bass from a shore dive - surely not?!? The bass that I had seen from the surface was not the bass I had just caught!
After swimming around for another 30 minutes I had lost interested in diving as I was so happy with the 2 fantastic bass I had caught. I got back to the car, admired my catch got changed and waited for Dave to return. Weighing the bass, the big one was 11lb on the nose and the other a great 6lb.8oz. Dave also had a 7lb.8oz bass, which made for a really great afternoon out, especially considering the slow start to this year’s spearfishing in the South West.
After lots of photos of the fish, they have been filleted and will be marinated for a BBQ when the warm weather arrives next week.
Happy days!!
