THE HUNT FOR WRASSEZILLA- PART 1

Last weekend I met up with an old friend of mine, local retired diver Mac Mace over on the island of Byryher to discuss an assault on a wreck he used to regularly dive. This particular wreck was home to many large wrasse and one in particular, believed to weigh in excess of double figures - WRASSEZILLA!!!!
If it was still around, god only knows how big it would be, certainly a record that's for sure!!!


Mac knew this fish well and used to hand feed it whole 3'' edible and shore crabs that it used to swallow in one! Divers used to think it was a grouper as wrasse were never that BIG, but this brute was and its habitat is the reason why. Over time the sides of the wreck had fallen in and the various decks had dropped leaving 2-4ft between each one. In the event of bad weather the wrasse could hold up in the various lowered decks which stretched 50 yards or so and be perfectly safe and enable them to grow to such large sizes! The wreck lays in 50ft of water, swept by strong tides meaning that only around slack water would the wrasse be out and around the wreck and this would make them a realistic target on soft plastics. The rest of the time Mac said the wrasse would be right in the wreck, ambushing any prey that swam past. They would dart out, grab the unsuspecting blenny, goby etc and shoot back into their holes. This would mean we would literally get the one chance to drag them out and away from the wreckage before they realised - ambitious, HELL YEAH!!


As we made our way out to the mark, the fog that has surrounded the islands for far too long finally started to clear and that funny thing called the sun appeared we hoped it meant a good sign!  The tide was pretty slack so an old rock that would act as our anchor was lowered uptide of the wreckage and we payed out rope to position us in our chosen spot, directly over the wreck. This would let us alter our position with the tide and still fish the exact spot. Game on, lures were dropped down, I chose the old faithful wrasse tastic jacks lrf Hogs coupled with a 10g cone weight and flicked it 10 yards down tide. It hadnt even reached the bottom when the braid started to come off the spool quicker meaning something had picked up the lure on the drop. Bail arm closed I reeled in the slack until I felt the weight of the fish which tried its hardest to head for the wreck giving my new toy, a sparkly 7ft 6'' Major Craft Crostage a serious work out. (lovely rod which I will talk about more after some more testing)


After several dives and a spirited scrap up surfaced a nice pollack of 5lbs.

Not what I was expecting but great fun nevertheless! I cast out again and the same thing happened with a fish taking the lure on the drop, this was a much better fish that did me into the wreck on its first dive! A switch to the heavier Sakura Shinjin rated 15-50g that I had brought along I decided to go all out for the pollack seeing as it was alive with them down there! I chose a SavaGear Sandeel Slug  mounted on a 14g jig head and flicked it out again, what happened next was mental with pollack after pollack crash diving into the lures. These were all of a good stamp with fish from 6lb to 10lbs on every drop and the best bit was as the water was only 50ft deep they not only scrapped unbelievably well but they all went back alive without their swim bladders bursting!!!!

These were the lures that did the damage today, 7.5'' Slug-Gos - 16.5cm SavaGear Sandeel Slug-14cm SavaGear Sandeel Slug.

I got busted up by some serious fish on a couple of occasions and had a beauty to the boat that was a good 12lbs before I made a school boy error and lost it-ARSE!! Mac was well impressed as he had never seen pollacking like it with the light rods and soft plastics and I may have converted him!!


As the tide had virtually stopped it was back to the task in hand and try and get THAT wrasse out. Switching back to the Major Craft Crostage I tried many lures but everytime I hooked a wrasse they dived straight back into their underground hideaway and bust me up on the sharp wreckage. I finally managed to get a couple of fish out up to 3lbs. Sadly Mac was faring the same as me, the wrasse would bolt straight away and he lost a couple of incredibly powerful fish that gave him no chance. Thankfully he did get a couple of larger ones out up to 4.5lbs but not the monster that we were after sadly.

So its back to the drawing board as to how we are going to get old WRASSEZILLA out from its home. We will be back thats for sure, trying a few different things to entice it away from the wreck such as heavy groundbaiting 20 yards uptide with old crushed crabs so that we stand a much better chance of landing this beast. Failing that its going to be time to break out the heavy boat rods and drag the bugger out!!! Mind you thats if we can get through the outstanding pollack that also inhabit the wreck!!


Until next time...................

JINGLE BELLS = SAVAGE ATTACKS!

Again I must apologise for the distinct lack of new posts, work really does get in the way of fishing and having fun doesnt it!!!!!!!!


I have managed to get out only a couple of times recently albeit only very short half hour or 1 hour sessions trying a few new ideas and lures. Last night due to fog descending and causing flights to be cancelled I decided to nip out to a mark that I havent fished since I was knee high to a grass hopper and is only a 4 minute walk from my front door. It looked ''fishy'' with plenty of boulders and weed beds with some sand in between and with a flooding tide meant that I could see a few wrasse in the shallow water under my feet. Why have I only just remembered this place???? 
I started off using my usual go to lures but could see the wrasse were only following the lure and not being that interested. I was scratching my head but then remembered a conversation I had with Henry whilst he was over not long ago and after a rummage through my tackle box found what we were discussing. Wrasse are or certainly can be quite aggressive sometimes when you fish a lure such as an x-slayer because they have a built in rattle. Now being a tight fisted old sod I wont pay the daft money that x-slayers cost and always look for a bargain or two. I must admit that I like the sound of adding a rattle to the lures but am not that keen on using glass ones no matter how small as am sure that they could damage a fish were they to swallow them. So we looked on ebay and found some small 6mm jingle bells which looked fantastic. Nice and small that would make an awesome sound underwater when the cone weight knocked into it. Also they would rust in next to no time and thus not hurt the fish were they to swallow one and snap me off!

I cut off the hook, and added  one of the jingle bells and re-tied it all. A flick out to where I had seen the wrasse in the shallows and twitched the lure back on the spot for a second or two then BANG! A wrasse hit the lure very hard and caught me by surprise so I missed it. I twitched the lure back, it had only moved a couple of inches when the wrasse hit hard again and this time I was ready. After a brief but spirited scrap a nice fish on nearly 4lbs came to the rock.

I was using a funky lure that Monster Tackle had sent called a Molix Sligozzo. It has a nice big fat body that looks like it can handle being on the receiving end of an angry wrasse's hardware and a tail that will entice a bite or two as it flutters.

I had a few more casts with this lure before chopping and changing to see if it was the jingle bell or indeed the lure that was doing the business. I went for a small crawfish pattern from jackslrf and kept on the jingle bell. First chuck and as it was an imitation crawfish I decided to slow down the retrieve and twitching and see how it behaved. Well I hadnt moved the lure 2 feet before it was nailed again really hard (some sort of pattern forming here) and another fiesty wrasse was hooked. This pattern continued with several fish up to just under 5lbs.

They were certainly liking the crawfish pattern and the rattling from the red bell above it!!!! So I decided to take off the bell and just fish the lures to see how it compared. I still got bites and fish but they were no where near as aggressive in their initial bite or take so a change was on again with a different lure.


This time I started without a bell and put on a Mini Flipping Craw. First couple of chucks and wrasse tentatively took the lure and of only a couple of pounds but as soon as the bell was on again then the takes were far more aggressive and the stamp of fish was better too!!

Finally I put on a Junebug Senko and again the same conclusion, without the rattle, small tentative takes and with it,  far more savage and aggressive reactions.

Further proof that on quieter days it pays to experiment and try different lures, colours and also get yourself a rattle or two. It certainly paid off today and it was obvious that the fish were far more likely to attack the lure when I had the bell on the line as opposed to without it! Proves that its good to learn something new each day....

WRASSE AND......THE CHIP....??!!

It has been a little while since our last post, apologies! As the season gathers momentum and Scilly starts getting more much needed visitors, we all get busier and it becomes a little harder to get out and meet up for a session. This coupled with the recent unseasonably high winds, and some of our favourite marks have been unfishable! Sunday saw a dramatic drop in wind speed, and a change from west to east, which killed off a lot of swell and suddenly,I could get some shelter in a great spot, just inside Hell Bay on Bryher!  The weather wasn't great by any means, and the tides...well...far from ideal. I put the idea in Dels mind to come up to Bryher for a last minute Sunday session, but with the bad tides/times of high and low, was a little awkward for him, so a short solo session it would have to be!

With low water around 4:20, I made the "long" (15minutes), walk from my back door to my chosen rock. The sea was calm, had cleared up nicely and tucked away, low to the water, I was nicely sheltered from the wind. Literally first cast, half way back in, tap...tap-tap..strike...nothing! Reel in, and some cheeky little blighter has torn my "night crawler" coloured senko from jackslrf clean off! Put the same lure back on, and fish on! Small at around 2lbs, but a good start! Then....(tumble-weed!) nothing! Goes completely dead for the next 10 min. I am a recent convert to senkos, and until recently had no faith in them. Seen photos of others catching on them, but never had any joy myself, until I was reminded (on a previous session with Del), how effective they were, fished almost static, with just the occasional small twitch. So stuck to my new "go-to" lure, this time black with red glitter flecks. First cast...fish on! 

A beautifuly marked wrasse pushing 3 1/2lbs

Two casts later, and the tiny tap-tap of interest registered on the rod tip. "Annoying tiddler", I thought, then ever so gentle "vibration" was felt through the rod, almost as though the lure was being dragged over barnacles, and the worm weight scraping...- just felt weird? I tightened up to lift the senko off the bottom and all hell broke loose! First, big dive down, then bolted straight for the WRONG side of a ledge in front of me! Some quick but clumsy footwork resulted in a wet boot and a nice 4 1/2lb wrasse, with almost identical markings.

Then after that...dead quiet again! Secretly hoping for the possibility that Del hasn't lost his marbles and DID see a bass a few weeks back, on went a pearly fluke, and a much more aggressive style retrieve, which resulted in this little beauty

Two casts later and this guy hits the lure almost on the surface, right at my feet!

Then...you guessed it...quiet again!

Quick dig through the little bag of  "mixed lures" and this little chap grabbed my attention

What the hell is that! I hear you cry. Well, its the result of trying to model a stickbait when you have had a couple to many beers! I made a mould of it anyway, and decided to teach myself how to make Sps, with this, my first ever creation...that not even a mother could love!

Chucked it out, and thought "what the hell...it may look like a chip that's been in the fryer way too long and soaked up a load of oil!" but worth a go, nothing else is working! A few fruitless casts later and about to change off "the chip" for a real lure, I reeled in quick, and Smack, fish on! A beauty of 4 angry lbs!...oddly the first "orangey" wrasse of the session!

Then for the next 40 minutes, a fish a cast...all on the chip!

Most small, but a few decent ones amongst them, all on a very aggressive "twitch-twitch-twitch" ( 1 foot-ish twitches) then few seconds pause. All hits would come after about 5 seconds into the pause, and all very positive takes!

 Strangely of the 20 or so fish on "the chip", 80% were "orangey coloured....bit like the chip! Hmmmmm....

Last fish of the day, before the chip was too torn up to even survive being cast, was this little greeny-yellow guy, which seemed to fight like mad for a few seconds, then suddenly just stopped, and had some weird wounds on it. All looked like they had just healed a little, probably the result of a seal?

All in all a great 3hours on the water, the most inconsistent start, almost gave up and went home for Sunday roast, but saved by the humble little chip!

MENTAL FISHING AND NEW FRIENDS

This sunday saw me and Neil head over to St.Agnes to meet up with three fellas, Simon Murphy, Jim, Ross and Arthur the dog to have a crack at finding a fish or two. Simon had contacted me through this blog and was planning a trip over to the islands to target wrasse and pollack using lures and light tackle. His mate Jim was well up for it and their friend Ross (who isnt an angler) was coming to have a holiday with his dog Arthur, relax have a few walks and a couple of cheeky halves at the awesome Turks Head pub! I must admit to having not fished St.Agnes for pollack and wrasse since Henry came over with a mate 8 or ten years ago, so I was pleased that they would be doing the hard bit and would know where the fish were ready for Sunday-clever hey!!!

Sunday dawned and it was one of those magical sunny days and flat calm seas with no swell at all-perfect for wrasse!!!! We all met up and after a few introductions made our way to Troy Carn maze and the surrounding carns to start our assault. Fishing the ebb has proved to be quite difficult just recently with few wrasse coming out and today proved to be no different! Neil managed to winkle out a half decent wrasse but the great thing with this type of fishing is that we were all travelling really light, a rucksack and rod(no tripods, bait buckets and a tonne of lead). We could work our way around the south of the island, having a cast here, move to the next point and keep casting and moving until we found the fish.

I was using the same lure that did the damage last trip, a sandeel pattern with the other guys using various soft plastics in different colours but nothing was really getting nailed on a regular basis but thankfully before this trip I had spoken to Keith White the guru,who knows more on fishing for wrasse on lures than anybody else and he recommended using blue lures at this moment in time as the wrasse were spawning and would be very aggressive. If you look at the photos from the last post, every wrasse I had caught had blue spots and blue lips meaning they were spawning-weird!! A phone call to Andy Kendrick at Jackslrf and a bag of Blue jacks own tubes arrived in the post just in time!!!!!!! Cheers Andy you are a legend!

It was like switching a light on!!!!!!!!

Fish after fish were nailing the blue tubes like they were possessed!!!!!! We continued to find the wrasse and I was well and truly smashed up by a brute who tore into the kelp and snapped my braid as if it were cotton, damn that fish was powerfull!!! |The fishing slowed down with the tide approaching low water so we started to move again covering plenty of ground until we met up with Jim who had gone onto the spot where they had good success the previous day. What happened then was mental!!!!! Fish after fish all taking yep you guessed it blue lures!!!! I looked around and several times all four of us were laughing as we all had our rods bent double with heavy weight ballans doing their best to find the nearest hole or rock to smash us up and make us cry!! Ross and Arthur came down to find grown men in stitches as if we had lost the plot!! Neil lost a monster that he couldnt stop and I had a wrasse hit so hard that it snapped my hook!!!! I tied on a stronger pattern and cast out again then bang, fish on. This was another good fish that was using its big old tail to glide in the water........

What a mental fight with the Megabass Rod bent double I was sure that this was a 6 or 7lber, through the water u could see these monster blue lips and blue dorsal fins before Simon could safely net her.

She pulled the scales down to 5.10lbs after a few photos recovered well from the fight in a big rockpool before swimming away to spawn. They may look tough as hell but you still have to treat these fish with respect so that you can catch them again when next time they may be that magical 6 or 7lber!!!!!

We carried on but nothing quite as big sadly but this spot has certainly got potential thats for sure!!!! Jim with the average sized fish from today, all scraping like mad!!

As the tide strengthened the pollack started to show with a fish of 3.5lbs to Jim and a 4lber to me, again on the blue tubes.

By now we had lost count of the numbers of fish that we had caught and some of the guys had forgotten just how hungry they were so the pub was calling! As we were all walking back to the pub Neil and I decided to have a challenge and fish the next spot with the loser having to buy the drinks. Great plan until we got closer to the mark and realised that the water was barely deeper than our knees in places-BUGGER!!! Oh well being dedicated or is that mad anglers we had to give it a go as a pint was riding on it! The other guys headed to the pub laughing and left us two daft sods to fish. A couple of casts and Neil got a hit but nothing came to it(thankfully) so I made a longer cast into the three foot water and after a couple of twitches felt a slight knock. Keeping quiet I carried on twitching the lure until it got heavier and had the fish surfing before Neil or the fish knew what was happening. Neither of us could believe the size of the wrasse as at just over 4lbs it was the second biggest landed that day in water that was just ridiculously shallow!!

I can tell you that that pint tasted so good (cheers Neil) and was a perfect end to a cracking days fishing with some new friends and yet another island that has got HUGE potential! Now thats four islands done and only another hundred or so left to fish!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ESCAPING THE MADNESS

This weekend the Isles of Scilly held the World Pilot Gig Championships, a great event that was enjoyed by everyone but after driving and trying to dodge all the rowers and supporters (normally there are just over 2000 people here, but this weekend that swells to 5000) I had to escape the madness and go fishing!! It is the only thing that keeps me sane!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Forecast was perfect, tides perfect so I headed back up to Bryher to finally try and nail one of them bruising ballans that smashed me up the last few times!! In fact I dont think that conditions could have been better. There was no swell at all and the water clarity as gin clear as I had seen this year, PERFECT for wrasse I said to myself. It was a couple of hours before low water which was at midday so I left the best spot(the one the locals from bryher said held monsters) to the first of the flood which I was convinced would be the prime time. As it is quite shallow I didnt want to go casting and scaring any fish off before the best time so I decided to fish near Shipman Head at a mark called Mussel Rock.

Before I made a cast I scanned the water and  could clearly see fish swimming over the boulders and through the kelp, fantastic!! Cast out, twitch twitch nothing???? Very strange, as my lure came into view it was being followed by a stunning bright green wrasse of between 4 and 5lbs. It hadnt had a go at the lure but just followed it slowly, checking it out I assumed? No matter what I did to the action of the lure I couldnt get the fish to take it. I tried everything, every colour and every shape of lure that I had brought with me and nowt, just the same result, follows but no bite, not even a pluck-SOOOO frustrating!!!! I decided after an hour of trying to catch that one fish that a move was in order as I was starting to go mad. A move to the next gulley and first cast and bang, fish on!

Not the biggest fish in the world but after spending an hour trying to catch that other ballan I was just pleased that I had caught and my methods still worked!!!!!!

Sport was very slow on the ebb, only managed to winkle out 4 fish which considering the conditions seemed really weird. Maybe they just werent hungry or couldnt be arsed to even bite the lures out of annoyance, I dont know the reasons but I did notice that one of the wrasse coughed up a sandeel so maybe they were courged up on them?? But it was low water and so I made my way to ''THE SPOT''.

Perfect conditions, clear water and no swell with boulders everywhere!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

When the tide floods over these boulders the wrasse will be going mental for all the blennies and gobies that were darting around the rock pools, got to be a lunker in this boulder field later on!!!!!!!

Imagine fishing over this type of ground with normal techniques and gear, the tackle losses would make you cry!!! Fishing texas style, with the lure ''skinned'' (point of hook pushed gently into the back of the lure) no worries- PIECE OF CAKE!!

I remembered the sandeel that was coughed up so decided what the hell and hunted through my lure box and found the closest lure to resemble a sandeel that I had, rigged it up texas style and cast out. It hadnt even descended to the bottom when it was well and truly nailed, fish on!

A better fish that went 3lbs and fought like a much bigger wrasse. What happened next can only be described as MENTAL fishing!!!!!! Every cast and I mean every cast was nailed harder than any wrasse I had caught before, fish after fish falling to the sandeel pattern!!!!

Mental fishing without a doubt, it was hard to keep count of the number as I had never experienced wrassing like it, all better sized fish with most fish being between 2.5 and 4lbs topped off by a better fish of 5.4lbs that fought harder than any 5lb fish that I have caught before!! Total count was 60 fish landed and many others lost due to me trying to bully them!!!

Sorry for the dodgy picture but this is the lure that did the damage!!!! Half way through the madness a shoal of mullet came through the area and cruising slowly behind was no mullet! I nearly fell of my rock with excitement as there in front of me was a bass of 3.5-4lbs!!! Now we dont get bass over here in Scilly for some reason but bugger me there was one right in front of me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I made several cast for it and it did follow my lure on one occasion but didnt fancy the look of it unlike the wrasse and disappeared after a few minutes! Gutted I carried on casting the area it was in for an hour but to no avail, but who knows, maybe with the strange seasons and weather that we had this winter there might be more bass around the islands?? Christ I thought that I said fishing kept me sane..............................................................................