Luke Aston operating the Clare Dragon Sea Angling Charter out of Carrigaholt Co Clare reports on angling</b>

LINK TO ARCHIVED REPORTS 2005 - 2006 - 2007 - 2008 - 2009

ANGLING REPORT DATED OCTOBER 2nd, 2005

Photo: A Specimen Tub Gurnard of 7.8lbs. which was caught on a rubber eel tipped with mackerel by Kenneth Hollywood from Nenagh

The last week with all the wind and rain puts the feel of winter in the air, and indeed my bookings have started to slow down as the days get shorter. However when I do get out clear of the land the fishing has been very good. I think that the best fishing here can be had during the winter, but it is hard to get the weather to oblige.

As for the fishing over the last few trips, as I said it is very good if I can get off the land and we have been getting a good mixture of fish. The Pollock are still the largest part of the catch with some nice patches of codling and whiting. We have also had some Saith, Ling, Haddock, Cuckoo Wrasse, Garfish, Ray, Dogfish and Spur Dog. Also we had a Specimen Tub Gurnard of 7.8lbs. which was caught on a rubber eel tipped with mackerel by Kenneth Hollywood from Nenagh.

On one of the windy days we were at anchor in shelter, when one of the crew reeled in to find a monster 9lb Lobster had got himself caught in the line. Needless to say there was a rush for the landing net!!

ANGLING REPORT DATED SEPTEMBER 15th, 2005

The fishing has been good, but on some days I have to move around a bit to get on some good fishing spots. Drifting off the loop is most likely to give you a good variety if you can get through the mackerel with a good if somewhat small selection of codling, Pollock, saith, ling, whiting and wrasse. The most interesting thing on this ground are some large scad with quite a few up to specimen weight and I am sure 1 or 2 have been in the boat that were over that.

Further off the fishing has been good and varied. At anchor we have picked up some fine thornback ray up to 10 lbs and a few good conger. Drifting over some rough ground has produced some fine fish with the first take from the Pollock offering good sport and resulting in a couple of broken rods! Takes in mid water from 2 or 3 large Pollock with room to dive offer some good rod bending action. The best one we have had to date has been 11lbs but a lot up to 9 lbs. I'm looking forward to getting my first specimen on the boat from this species.

Shark fishing has been good if you have the time to get down a good trail. It seams to take most of 2 to 3 hours to start getting some takes with the fishing better outside the 8 to 10 mile mark. This fishing certainly takes a lot of patience and a full day.

ANGLING REPORT DATED AUGUST 24th, 2005

Most of my trips over the last couple of weeks have been day trippers so we have not been doing much more than going down to the Loop and catching lots of fish!! There have been a lot of mackerel about if you stay close to the land and it is quite hard to get down through them without using big baits or shads. The up side of that is there seems to be a lot of big Pollock feeding on the mackerel and if you can stop the mackerel taking the hook you can get some fine fish. One incident that happened was while we were fishing shads through the mackerel one of the lads got a good fish on and was having great fun landing it in when all of a sudden the line went slack. On winding up his line he found that the shad was gone so obviously the line had parted. About 10 minutes later on the same drift another one of the party got a good fish on and on getting it into the boat it proved to be an 11 pound Pollock. As it had swallowed the lure I had to cut it open to get it out and there inside it was the shad that we had lost earlier! So I think that goes into my fishy tales book!

In general the fishing has been good with a lot of codling coming on to the ground which is great. We have also been getting a lot of very colourful cuckcoo wrasse. When I have had the opportunity to get of the land a bit we have had good fishing on some rocky ground with a good mixture of whitefish quite plentiful.

I have a party of Dutch anglers coming today for a week so if the weather is good we will have another crack at the blue shark and try some other things so hopefully I will have a good report in a weeks time.

By the way my boat is called the "Clare Dragoon".

ANGLING REPORT DATED AUGUST 3rd

Last week I had a group of Dutch and Belgian anglers out ( they are the group in the photo). We had lots of Pollock up to 9lbs with a nice scattering of codling, black Pollock, ling, haddock, whiting. We were fishing a lot of the time with shads and perks and it was on a perk that one of the lads got a 5.6 lb John Dory (photo) that is an Irish specimen and a new Dutch record! We also had some good Tope fishing, with 10 fish in the boat on one tide most of which were around 35 lbs and one specimen of 43 lbs. We also did a day at the Blue Shark last Wednesday and had 6 in the boat around 60 to 70 lbs. So all in all they went home very happy.