A great mix of species for Donegal shore anglers

Stefan Martin reports for the Killybegs Mariners in Donegal…

All night rock fishing at midsummer solstice, 20lb congers, 11 species, 60 fish, a nice report from Cormac and the lads at the Weekend…..

With the lovely calm and mild weather this weekend there was never going to be a better opportunity for an ‘all-nighter’ on a local deepwater rocky mark for myself, Gavin Dorrian and Johnny Byrne – and the effort was well rewarded 🎣

Ten hours’ fishing through the night brought us in excess of 60 fish made up from 11 different species (and excluding the whiting, flatties & red gurnards that this mixed ground mark usually throws up).

My highlight of the night was a new personal best for a conger from the shore @ 20lbs and while Gavin coaxed in some of the hard to get smaller species such as three-bearded rockling and goldshinney wrasse, Johnny’s persistence out in the deeper water was rewarded with a fine thornback ray.

Solstice competition results

Calm conditions and the midges dancing for the league outing on the longest day of the year brought very few flatties with just the one over the minimum size of 23cm which was a 31cm flounder for Sean O Donnell. A haul of 3 dogfish and a few undersize flatties for Christopher Noctor won the first place prize and his 2nd league win of the summer. Sean O Donnell won the longest fish prize with a 31cm flounder and also the 2nd place prize money. League table after 4 outings attached. Well done to all who took part

Upcoming Boat Competition

Mariners sac FishComm Ltd boat species competition will take place this Friday 28th June —- boats Evie Rose & Fiona Tee (6 anglers on each boat but room for late entries) – anglers will draw boat when paying entry fee of 50 euro.