Carrigaholt Sea Angling: Most of my fishing over the last month has been day charters and when the weather is suitable we have headed for Loop Head to try for bait then off to some whitefish marks to fish on the drift.
Most of the time it has been a quick and easy job to get some Mackerel although we did have one trip where it was hard work. Indeed normally we have been coming on some of them on the drift further off as well. The size this year is noticeable up on last year and I would say so far they are also a lot more plenty full which is good.

Last Saturday was the first trip this year when we were out in an ideal light south west breeze as most of the wind has been coming from an east or north east direction. Also this has meant that the water temperature is colder than normal. However despite this I’m glad to report that the fishing is going well. Every trip has produced a good session during the day and different rigs seem to be to the fore at various times. On some sessions the trusty old devil rigs and muppets are top dog, while we have also had a couple of trips where soft plastic baits have been out catching all other rigs. This is the first year I have had a supply of these on the boat and am trying them every day, so I am interested to see if they live up to the hype. For certain on the trip last Saturday, Shads on lead heads were by far the best rig with a fish on every cast. Also while we have been getting the odd fish in double figures all along, Saturday also turned up a bigger average run of fish.

So our main catch at the moment is the trusty Pollack which is providing great sport on light gear. We have also been turning up some nice Cod in the 6 to 10lb range. The first decent Whiting also seem to be coming onto the ground now and we have had catches of Haddock, Coalfish and Gurnard among others. One thing I have noticed is that the numbers of Ling so far are down, with just a few small ones about. The Wrasse are showing well when conditions are right to fish the shore and last Saturday one of the fisherman had a Dogfish on the drift that was just under the Specimen weight at 3.15lb.
Luke and Mary Aston
Rahona, Carrigaholt, nr. Kilrush, Co. Clare, Ireland
Phone 00353 (0)65 9058209
or direct to skipper 00353 (0)87 6367544