January Report

It has to be said, January has been a month of less than stellar fishing fitted in between some of the grimmest weather since we moved to Ireland.

New Year's Eve and Day were rough but on Thursday 2nd I headed up to Kerry to see if the spurs may have reappeared. It was a stunning weather day but the fishing didn't live up. I had plenty of bites but pretty much all dogfish. Somewhere in the middle of the session a solitary bullhuss took a mackerel head bait, but it turned out barely any bigger than the doggies. Disappointing day.

A wet and windy weekend followed. I was anxious to get down to Rosscarbery to open my mullet account for the year ahead of a really cold spell forecast for the week ahead, but I left it a day too late. I departed Kilcrohane in a balmy 9degC early on Tuesday 7th, but by Ahakista the temperature was down to 6degC and 3degC at Durrus. Shortly after Durrus I started losing the back wheels on patches of black ice. I decided the journey over the hills to Skibbereen would be borderline suicidal on the ungritted road, turned round and headed home. The next few days were bitterly cold with snow on the hills all round and a cutting easterly wind.

The cold spell was supposed to relent for the weekend, and on Saturday 11th I headed back towards Ross. This time I was a day too early! It was a decent 7degC in Kilcrohane but once off the peninsula the temperature dropped again reaching zero before Skibbereen ... at least without the icy road today. The temperature clawed its way back up to 3deg in the last mile or so down to Ross but there was still frost on the grass.

It was flat calm, at first glance there didn't seem to be much around but as I watched quite a decent shoal of mullet would bubble up occasionally, usually when spooked by a bird flying over.

They were well out of range but I'd see an odd straggler move closer in. It didn't seem exactly promising with the shallow water cold and gin clear, but I thought I was in with a shout of the mullet feeding for a while when the day warmed up and I was happy enough to give it a go.

I hadn't reckoned on the swans! They soon latched on to me. The four that hung around close in weren't too much trouble apart from winding the dog up something chronic, but one was all over my groundbait further out. I had to keep winding in and stop fishing to avoid hooking it, and in four hours there I doubt I managed even thirty minutes sensible fishing.

On the way out I pulled the car over well down the west side of the pool. The tide was up by now and there were plenty of mullet topping within easy range. I was contemplating getting the rods out again until I noticed the swans motoring across the pool towards me before I'd even opened up the car door. I drove on, disastrous day.

On Sunday I did what I should have done on Saturday, turned right at Durrus and headed down onto the Mizen.

It was a grey and drizzly day with a stiff SE breeze that was none too warm, but I managed to get down onto a spot where I could fish with my back to it, just about. I could see mullet topping occasionally, certainly not in the numbers that were present in December but still, it looked promising.

It took a good few minutes feeding small amounts of mashed bread before the fish came on the feed, but after that bites came regularly. They were mostly finnicky and difficult to hook, and I found it best to wait for the better takes that held the float under three or four seconds rather than striking everything and missing most. It ended up being an enjoyable session, eight mullet up to a leanish fish of 3:11.

Friday 16th looked the best opportunity of an unsettled week and I spent the afternoon at Bantry airstrip on what turned out to be a seriously slow session. I had one dogfish dead on low water, and a few other knocks and taps I took to be aborted doggie bites. Then about three hours up the tide, a classic ray bite on bluey/sardine cocktail that dragged the rod tip over a yard. It seemed unlikely a thornback as small as 3lbs could give such positive take, but there we are. I caught the target species I suppose ... but another disappointing day.

With the fishing seeming pretty attritional on the big rods, I decided on another mullet trip next, back down on the Mizen again on Monday 20th.

The conditions were almost identical to the last time I was there, and the fishing proved remarkably similar with nine mullet this time up to a best of 3:15.

I fancied I was seeing a few bigger mullet moving today, and last knockings I struck into a fish that bored deep and headed across to the far side of the pool. It was obviously heavy but I was concerned about the lack of head-shaking transmitting up the line. Sure enough, when I slid the net under it seven or eight minutes later, I found I'd hooked it in the root of one of its pectoral fins. I didn't weigh it but there wouldn't have been much change from 5lbs, or none at all. A disappointing end to a good day.

With Storm Éowyn rattling across the Atlantic to herald a very unsettled end of the month, I headed up to Kerry again on Thursday 23rd.

The session was off to a great start with a big slack line bite on a sandeel bait, first cast. I wound down into a solid-feeling fish and after a decent little scrap slid a huss just shy of 10lbs out onto the rocks.

Unfortunately that was it good as it got. After the huss, just a string of doggies as the tide peaked then ebbed away.

I hadn't intended that to be my last session of the month but poor weather - Éowyn was rapidly followed by Storm Herminia - a tooth extraction and finally messing up my fragile back gardening combined to put paid to any further January action.

We are away for a large chunk next month. I hope to get a February mullet on the board before we go and maybe the weather will settle down for a couple of sessions on the rocks when we're back. A brief report next month...