On Sunday, 7 members of the Irish kayak Angling Club took advantage of the settled weather to launch at Roches Point and fish Cork Harbour.  The calm conditions and small tide allowed fishing the Harbour Rock and, with the lack of commercial traffic, drift fishing of the shipping channels.
A small pod of 3 bottle nose dolphins kept the anglers company getting very close to some!  While Cod were caught on soft plastic lures, Sabiki rigs tipped with squid and mackerel yielded great results with double hook ups of Codling to 3lb and anglers landing multiple Whiting, Dabs and Pollack.
It was great to see the numbers of Codling as the Munster League, earlier in January, had only seen one in almost 3,000 fish.  There was the usual banter between good firends on the VHF as catches were announced.   Good sized Mackerel were also caught in surprising numbers for this time of year allowing a switch from frozen to fresh bait.
All anglers landed 3 or more species with 2 landing 7 each.  Species caught were Ballan Wrasse, Coalfish, Codling, Dab, Lesser Spotted Dogfish, Mackerel, Pollack, Poor Cod, Whiting and Scorpion fish.  A great result for January and, following on from similar species counts in November, shows that the harbour is fishing well.
On shore as backs were slapped, and stories were told where the fish that got away got bigger, we planned for our next trip.
Go fishing…
To find out more about Kayak Angling visit www.irishkayakangling.com and register on the forum.  Membership is free and the forum is a great resource to learn about safety, venues and techniques.  Experienced members will answer any questions you have and everyone is welcome to come to a meet to learn more.
You can also follow the Irish Kayak Angling Club on Twitter @irishkayak and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Irish-Kayak-Angling/277427952176 for details of the 6 meets (Galway, Wexford, Donegal, Kerry, Cork and Monoghan) that make up the All Ireland Kayak Angling Championship 2017.
