THE TWO DAYS OF FISHING

And so, to the fishing. e Hampshire Police Angling Club had booked two days on the water. I was fortunate enough to join them on the second day, which proved to be a glorious early spring day with little or no wind and sunshine - a rarity so far this year. e angling crew on Deep Blue consisted of Andy Simpson, Barry Talbot, Duncan Beck, Paul Gelman, Pete Kerley, Peter Rhymes, Kim Bowden and Tony Smith. Another member of the crew was Simon’s dog Oxley, a very well behaved and curious German pointer.

On day one, partly because of the higher wind speed, the anglers concentrated on inshore plaice – with some pretty good results. ere are a lot plaice being caught of the local beaches so there was no need for the boats to go more than a couple of miles offshore. In fact, plenty of fish were caught at the Fairway Buoy which marks the entrance to the marina at Eastbourne.

is was something of a surprise bearing in mind all the marine traffic – although I would add there has been a dredger operating in the marina entrance and maybe all the material dumped a little way down the coast might be attracting fish inshore as the mud, containing lots of food no doubt, is washed up the coast with the tide. During the day, all the way from the local pier to Pevensey Shoals, there were plenty of fish to be had by the teams including a coalfish or two from a mark a bit further out.

Day two dawned with, as mentioned, spectacular spring weather and the crew decided they’d like to have a go at catching some early season turbot. e plan was to go to a mark about 14 miles offshore. Called Billy’s Banks, it is a range of sandy ridges in 40m of water

discovered some years previously by another local charter skipper. It has been fished hard over the intervening years and isn’t as prolific as it once was. However, given the right tides and season it is still productive. It was a bit early in the year, but there are plenty of other fish to be had there and since the trip was a species hunting adventure it was thought to be a risk worth taking – especially with the weather being so favourable.

ANY TURBOT?

We steamed out there with mackerel baits at the ready. Once there, rigs were dropped in high anticipation and fish started to come over the side straight away – but sadly not turbot. Greater weavers and a lot of decent sized whiting dominated the catches along with gurnards. ey were coming up at such a rate that it was a job for the crew to keep a proper tally of fish caught.

Both John Little, skipper of Manx Belle, and Simon Logan, Deep Blue’s skipper, were keeping scores, although I’m not sure how seriously the anglers were taking the competition. ey managed to keep a tab on all the fish coming over the side pretty well. Certainly, Oxley was.

WRECK POLLACK

After a couple of hours of everything but turbot we decided to move inshore to fish on one of the many wrecks which litter the channel off Eastbourne and try for some pollack while there was still enough tide to make it worthwhile. We steamed to a big wreck called the Alunia which lies north west/ south west just south east of the Sovereign Shoals. On went the Sidewinders and on the first drift up came the first of many quite reasonable fish – it was good to know they were there, although the size was a good deal smaller than what we have come to expect on these Sussex wrecks at this time of year.

While we were out there a huge shoal of bait fish broke the surface, which we spotted because of the hundreds of gulls and gannet attacking the fish. It was difficult to get too close to them in a big boat so we just watched it develop hoping we’d drift through it to see if there were bass underneath it – in vain as it turned out.

is is an unusual sight for March because we don’t usually get bait fish in numbers on the surface before May – and the fact that Kim Bowden had caught a mackerel earlier on suggested that because the water temperature has not really dropped to usual winter levels the fish had come up the channel earlier than usual.

REEF FISHING

Nonetheless, it proved very good sport until the tide slackened. At which point we went to the reef on which the now dismantled lighthouse stands. e reef to the south has a wide variety of fish on it including lots of different types of wrasse, pollack and even coalfish. In the couple of hours we drifted over this mark the team carried on catching – including a pollack much bigger than the ones we’d been taking on the Alunia.

INSHORE PLAICE

To finish off Simon steamed inshore and set up a drift a mile or so outside the marina – just beyond the