GET TO THE POINT
This mark in County Donegal has to be Ireland’s most consistent venue for wrasse
Discover Ireland’s most consistent wrasse venue.
The saying “Wind in the north, the skilful fisher goes not forth” can, in my experience, be true. I hate north winds! I was in Ireland’s County Donegal and had suffered a few tough days of snotty weather and big seas. Thankfully, there was a brief weather window looming that suggested sunshine. Unfortunately, the wind would be in the north and fairly strong.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained, as they say. Consulting my fishing companion Kevin Crowley, a fisheries officer with Inland Fisheries Ireland, we decided our only real option was a wrasse session, and where better than St John’s Point near Killybegs? This famous peninsular of rock is one of the most reliable wrasse venues, and, fortunately, the south side would give us protection from that dreaded northerly.
We didn’t worry about specific marks, for it’s just a case of finding a parking spot, walking seaward and seeing what’s in front of you. We spotted a break in the generally parallel shoreline where an L shape of rock cut deep into the side, with an individual rock out in open water providing a narrow channel between it and the shore. It looked ideal for wrasse.
The water was clear, which raised my concerns about its clarity and the uninterrupted sun, which was not conducive to ideal fishing conditions. We hadn’t any green crabs with us, but we did have a good quantity of ragworms, although they tend to find the smaller fish. That said, we were looking for sport, and any big fish would be a welcome bonus.
TACKLING UP
I set up with a stiffish 10ft 6in rod matched to a 4000-sized fixed spool loaded with 30lb braid. Normally, I’d fish the braid straight through, but with it being so bright and the water clear, I added 15ft of 30lb fluorocarbon that would be less obvious to the fish. On to the fluoro, I slid on a 5mm bead, a cigarshaped float, then added a 1oz round lead followed by another 5mm bead.
Sometimes when wrasse fishing I like two hooks, so I tied on a three-way swivel. This lets me fish a secondary bait on a short hooklink off the middle eye of the three-way swivel if needed, with a standard flowing trace tied to the lower eye and usually about 2ft or 3ft long.
I make my hooklengths from 25-30lb fluorocarbon for its abrasion resistance and limited visual impact on the fish. If I’m hitting a lot of fish, I take off the upper hook, but this higher hook can add extra fish when bites are hard to come by. It also lets me fish two different baits.
My favourite hook is a Mustad 79515 in size 1/0 to 3/0, depending on bait and if I expect any specimen-sized wrasse. I chose a size 1/0 and would go bigger if needed. Wrasse are greedy and can take a hook deeply quite quickly, so some anglers choose long-shank hooks. The reality is that if a long-shank hook is deep, as the wrasse bores for the bottom, the long shank can act as a lever and pull the hookpoint clear, thus losing the fish. As a result, I prefer the shorter medium shank of the Viking hooks. I also hone the point a little to make it ultra-sharp because wrasse have tough mouths.
Use 14lb Powergum and a five-turn grinner knot to tie a stop knot on the fluorocarbon above the top bead. Keep the tag ends a little long so that they stop the bead as it tries to slide up the line.
KEEP IT TIGHT
It was just after low water and there was a slight swell with a 2ft or 3ft lift. I set the float to fish about 8ft down, but this was not enough and I reset to 10ft. With the float riding proud of the surface by about 2in, I wound in any slack
line and fished to what was almost a tight line with the rod tip just touching the water. This pays off when the float dives as it reduces the amount of reaction time when hitting a bite.
I’d positioned the float to work just on the seaward side of an obvious drop-off where kelp fronds rose upwards and danced in the tide. My eyes watched the float, it briefly shuddered and shot under. My reactions were still slow and I missed this first fish. New bait on, and the float back in place, I waited no more than 15 seconds before the float disappeared and I struck into a lively wrasse that fought hard for its size. It looked around 1lb 8oz when released.
Kevin was over to my right and plucked out another wrasse about the same size from a ledge along the main shoreline. He followed this with a small but greedy corkwing.
I was only fishing a patch of ground about the size of an average living room. I couldn’t see the bottom much, even when wearing polaroid sunglasses, but used the float setting to explore the seabed for features. I found another shelf out in front of me to the right and took several ballans in quick succession, including a fish maybe a little over 2lb.
BULLY-BOY TACTICS
I’d rested the first kelp ledge and let the water deepen a little. When I went back to fishing this, I found I needed to raise the float another couple of feet to get the bait trotting just up off the bottom.
The knack was to get the float coming inwards with the tide and into a small cutback in the rock. Every time the float got close to the cut-back, down it went. I had a steady trickle of wrasse, then watched the float disappear out of sight and felt a better fish hammer into the kelp. I kept the pressure on and forced the fish through the jungle and up on to the surface. Bully-boy tactics are necessary to keep the wrasse out of any snags. This was a better fish of around 3lb and full of fight. Kevin was keeping pace, too, with ballans during the early flood, including several nice fish between 2-3lb.
As the mid-tide period came, the bites increased. The float would cock, drift a few inches, then dip as another wrasse took the bait. I didn’t really need to switch to different bits of ground because the fish kept coming from the same spots.
It was hectic sport. I added a couple more fish that might have scraped 3lb, but though trying hard, I couldn’t find anything bigger and rued our lack of crab baits.
MARAUDING CORKWINGS
With the pushing tide came a spell where sometimes the float would shudder and partially dip, or dip under a few inches but suddenly come back. These were marauding corkwings and, instead of striking at the float, the best way to hook them was to draw the float back towards you slowly and gently, and they’d snatch at the bait and take the hook.
Some of these corkies were big, exceeding 8oz, with a couple looking like 10oz fish. If we’d reduced the hook size, we could have caught more, but it was the ballans we wanted so stuck with the size 1/0 hooks.
As the tide increased and the bright sun dipped, the fishing intensified, and on every drop we were hitting fish from 8oz to 3lb,
but nothing bigger. We tried the deeper water further out with bigger baits, but still found the same stamp of fish. Sport was relentless. We were physically depleted with the constant action, and took a breather and a sip or two of water to recuperate. We had a further half-hour of constant sport, then decided to call it a day.
In our five-hour or so session we caught more than 60 wrasse, and if we had possessed some crab we would have taken much bigger fish. St John’s Point has been one of Ireland’s most consistent marks for specimen wrasse (close to and over 5lb), and I’m told there are still plenty there.
If you want non-stop sport, then use either rag or lug, but if you want the big fish, you must have crabs. You don’t need peelers, just normal green shore hardbacks about the size of a 10p piece up to the size of a 50p piece, which can usually be found along any shallow muddy, stony shore line.
Having done a lot of wrasse fishing in many different places, I can confirm the numbers of fish in this area are staggering.
If you take the time to find a mark off the beaten track that is not often fished, you will enjoy incredible sport. The other option is to travel light with minimal gear and just walk and fish as you go. Covering a large amount of ground gives you a better chance of coming across a big fish. ■