19 December - Day of the lunker

Having advertised mid week trips to catch a lunker or "really big cod" it then comes down to waiting until the time is right. 19 December turned out to be the day...

We set off with a a select band of anglers to fish the middle of Poole Bay. At first we stopped for whiting and were pleased to find increasing numbers and size. The best fish was a 3lber for Becky Clews

The whiting suddenly stopped feeding and the reason soon became apparent when Nick Briant's rod bent into a good fish which turned out to be a 33lb conger.

With the whiting slowing up in the ebb tide I decided to move out a few miles and position Silver Spray on a cod mark. The tide was really flowing hard and Nick switched to braid and after about an hour's wait he had what looked like the cod bite we had been waiting for. After a good scrap we were really suprised to see a 14lb ling in the net. A fine fish and quite unusual in such shallow water.
Well when your luck is in its in. The tide slackened and Nick had another good bite. We had just had two congers on at once and Nick was sure it was another eel. After 10 minutes of patient work a huge cod broke surface. It was real struggle to get it into the big net but somehow it went in and was flapping on the deck. The fish was weighed officially at Poole Sea Angling Centre by Andy Robins at 31lb 13oz.

Nick reported that the cod really had a beer belly including an empty stella can together with a number of whiting!