October 2023 Catch report

October is always an exciting month in the calender, with the start of the Pike season and the hope of an early run of cod for our sea anglers. Fly anglers across the country were also out in their numbers to squeeze in their last sessions before the brown trout only resevoirs close in mid Ocotber. This months edition also includes some fantastic reports from anglers venturing abroad in search of some huge fish such as sharks, butterfly rays and Barracuda. 

Carp & Coarse fishing

Every year we hold the Colin Cook memorial match on the Wharf, otherwise known as the East Dock. As a syndicate carp water, these matches are a fantastic oppurtiunity for coarse anglers to fish for the lakes silver fish that are rarely targeted. The Crane area is known to be the most productive area of the lake, which proved to be the case once again during this years match. First and second place both came from the crane area and finished head and shoulders above the rest of the field. Tony Burt finshed on an impressive 157lb 6oz, beating Andy Neal who finished in second place with 111lb 4oz.

Winning the memorial match in 2022 followed by his 2nd place finish this year, it's fair to say Andy Neal has enjoyed his sessions on the East Dock. Here's what he had to say about this years match:

"The Wharf (east dock) in Cardiff always hosts the Colin Cook memorial and it’s a favourite match of mine! Some beautiful roach fishing to be had but it’s always going to be a bream weight to win. They seem to live around the crane area so obvs I’m going to drawn underneath it to give myself the best chance
Long story short I’ve had a lovely day. I’ve fished an XL window at 40m all day and rammed the bait into them. With every bite within 90 seconds of the feeder landing it was a busy day with plenty of grub!
Golf was on the phone, rod was going round… life was good… that was until I rang Ross and was told Tony had 25 by half time!! talk about piss on my chips!
I settled on catching a few and the peg got stronger. The 4th hour was epic and just as I was starting to think about the ultimate come back, the wind dropped and indications ceased!! I was left of 27 bream… a beautiful days fishing in fairness. These went 111lb which was 2nd to Tony’s colossal 157lb… what a day that is! So I couldn’t make two on the bounce but happily settled for second… a memorable day for so many.. some huge fish caught, 9lb 6 being the biggest to Mike Ayres. I think my first 14 (in one net) went nearly 70lb beautiful creatures!" 

Ryan, like many anglers enjoy targeting Grayling through the Autumn months, which can be fantastic sport on light float gear. The rivers of south Wales are blessed with thriving populations of grayling. 

Despite there being almost 100 anglers participating in the Wharf's anual Pairs match, the fishing proved to be quite tricky for most, possibly down to there being so much pressure and feed from all around the lake. With this being said, there were a handful of anglers who excelled over the coarse of the 48 match.  This was the best of two fish for our regular customer Darren Bradburry which helped him & his partner to a 2nd place finish with a total combined weight of 122lb 4oz. 

There are various methods to chose from when it comes to targeting Pike, most of which comes down to personal preference. Within the sea angling world, the use of circle hooks has become hugely popular in recent years and that has now transferred over to Pike anglers as well. Rhian Bomber is an experienced Pike angler using both dead bait and lure fishing techniques. With this being said, Rhian has been really enjoying the use of circle hooks since the start of the 2023 Pike season. Not only does it hook pike in the scissors of the mouth consistently, but it also makes it really easy to remove from the tooth lined jaws of any Pike regardless of size. For a closer look at how easy these hooks are to use, click on the photo below.

The change in seasons and heavy rain has certainly brought the bigger barbel on the feed in recent weeks, with the fish reaching their peak weights ahead of winter. Swapping the carp rods for barbel rods, Blake James hit the Wye near Monmouth alongside Kevin Clark, catching multiple fish up to a new PB of 11lb 12oz! A fine fish for the Wye, well done young man!

Harrison's homemade garlic hookbaits was enough to tempt this fine11lb specimen from the Glamorgan Anglers stretch at Monmouth. Heavy Korum River Cage feeders packed with Sonubaits Spicy Meaty Supercrush fished in nearside margin slack's ensured Harrison held bottom and brought the fish on the feed in flooded conditions.

Closer to home, Lloyd Prytherch continued his good run of fish from the river Taff, with two fish of 10lb 7oz (left) and 11lb 14oz (right) taking his tally of double figure fish since August to 6. All of his bites have fallen to large cubes of Spam soaked in garlic and chilli oil, fished hair rig style utilising the Korum Meat Stops - a real game changer for securing meat on the hair rig for long periods of time.

Sea Fishing

The Bristol channel has been stacked full of Rays throughout October, with some anglers even completing their Bristol channel Ray slam within one session! Garry Evans employee Ben Beal has been enjoying some ray fishing himself, making the most of the shorts windows of oppurtunity he has had. Ben has been putting his Tronixpro Cobra GT-2's to the test with Sandeel, bluey's and anchovies being his go to choices of bait.

When the tides and conditions are right, one of South Wales' most popular venues Barry Knap has provided consistent catch reports for us throughout October. Keith Jenkins has been having plenty of success on this mark catching dozens of small eyed and Blonde rays in particular. Sakuma 440 Circle hooks fitted with a dongle have been doing the damage for Keith, with sandeel & squid wraps as his bait of choice. Andrew Davies who is also pictured below (right) has been using half Beaks as his bait of choice on his dongles, resulting in similiar success as Kieth.

There has been a consistent run of competitions along the South Wales Coast throughout October, whether that be club competitons or Opens. The Penarth Open usually draws over 100 anglers, however the fishing can be few and far between, so 1 or 2 fish can catapult you to the top of the leaderboard. This year however, the fishing was execptional for anglers like Lloyd Summers who headed towards ‘The Ranny’. Lloyd shared his thoughts on his memorable session on his Social media:

"Well I never expected a session like that in all my dreams at penarth.

Final leg of the Garry Evans Seamasters league today and headed to the only spot on penarth I knew. Felt it could be tricky but reports from yesterday on Cardiff foreshore and further up in Newport were good so there was always a chance.

Fished 2 hookers to start with just to try and get a fish on the card. First cast resulted in a double shot of Whiting, one Insize and another just under. Persisted with these for the first hour before casting out a pully. Not long after the tip pulled around and back. Something was there but somehow dropped the fish after a few turns of the handle. I honestly thought this was my one chance and I missed it, That’s the nature of how difficult penarth can fish. After that I carried on being positive and fished a pully for rest of the match. About half hour before high I connected with a better fish that surfaced about 80 yards out and skimmed in along the top The first blonde of the match. In to the ebb I kept banging the drum and was rewarded with an eel and my second blonde on conservative casts. Last cast to finish off the card with another whiting. Back at the weigh in I’ve managed to take first on the day just in front of some very good bags."

The following weekend saw the Barry Angling festival take place in conjunction with the 43rd Garry Evans Seamasters Final.  Fishing the beaches of Cold Knap, Porthkerry, Rhoose & Fontygary. During the week prior to the event in reasonably settled weather conditions. A large number of blonde rays were caught in one section of the beach. Needless to say on the day of the match this area attracted a high number of anglers anticipating a bonanza of blonde rays. Wrong!!! The match day weather was a moderate south westerly which resulted in challenging sea conditions, particularly on the flooding tide .Only 3 blonde rays were caught in the whole of the match. 99 seniors & 4 juniors fished with 39 anglers bringing fish to the scales in this catch & release match. 8 different species of fish were caught. i.e. conger / silver eel, blonde / spotted rays, dogfish, rockling, bass & pouting Total match weight 96kgs. This years total prize table again equated to more than £3000.

The Canary Islands are becoming increasingly popular amongst Sea anglers as a destination for targeting huge species off the shore. Species such as Butterfly Rays, sharks and barracuda are amongst a long list of fish that can be caught from any of the Islands, which are also popular due to the relatively short flight time from the UK. 

Steve Tucker recently shared his report with Sakuma Fishing from his recent trip to Fuerteventura:

I’ve just returned back from my annual fishing trip. A bit different this year as I got let down by my ex fishing partner, so took the wife instead! So fishing for large species off the rocks wasn’t going to happen.

Arriving at Fuerteventura, we picked up the hire car and straight to the supermarket for to pick up some bait. The following day I made my way to fish low water not setting up the big rods due to me being on my own so I set up a float rod to target garfish and blue fish and another for to catch the bait (boga and sardine). Bait was plenty full but the only problem being that the sardines where massive lol. I had some savage takes on the float rod but all resulting in the baits being dropped which was frustrating. Later on in the tide an unexpected friend turned up, so a quick chat and he said he would give me a hand if I wanted to set up a big rod. Well I didn’t need to asked twice so an up and over rig made up with the new shock leader in 100IB with a wire biter with a 7/0 445 circle and a 6/0 Kong hook with a fresh sardine mounted and so the wait began.

My float rig consisted of a 35grm float to a 8ft 20IB Sakuma Fluor carbon hook length and a size 1 440 Sakuma circle which did result in a nice garfish.

Time was going on and I was just started to pack up when off went the big rod , a screaming run which I thought was going to spool me and this continued for the next 45 minutes. My colleague Darren came over and after another what seemed an eternity we finally got to  see the fish briefly before it went on one of its many runs and eventually got it to the rocks where an audience had gathered so we unhooked the fish some quick photos and realised it safely.

I didn’t have time to take any measurements but the fish was in excess of six foot and without the help of Darren Bennett none of this would have been possible and I owe him a great deal of gratitude.

The tides where proving difficult to fish and spend time to spend time and show the island to the wife. I managed to talk my wife in to fishing a night session, so a drive and stopping off for something to eat we made our way to the beach. Big rods armed with large fish baits set up on up and over rigs made up of 100IB of the new Sakuma shock leader armed with 7/0 Sakuma 445 circles to a 4/0 Sakuma Kong hook on a dongle rig where cast out and the wait began. Many hours went by with nothing happening other than some frustrating takes which I thought could have been squid, so I told Donna my wife we would call it a night around 10.30pm when off went one of the big rods. I asked the wife to wind in the other rod which she was good enough to do as the fish proceeded to run furiously taking large amounts of line to the left and right of the beach and after around 11/2hours got the fish to shore which turned out to be a huge butterfly ray in excess of 1.76mtrs. We did our best to get some good photos but the Welfare of the fish was our concern once again as despite it being late a large crowd had appeared so I needed to get the fish back safely which I did.

The wife not very keen on repeating this experience again so I continued my last few sessions on trying for bluefish, bonito and garfish and fishing for fresh bait.

No bluefish or bonito where caught and more garfish where lost than landed but I did have some great fun fishing for bait fish with some sardines being landed up to 15” along with some bream and palette?

Every winter we run a Cod Competition from October through to April  with plenty of great prizes up for grabs and an optional bass pool as well. This year it took a matter of hours before our bass pool was underway, with lots of nice fish being caught up and down the coast. Our first entry was this lovely bar of silver, weighing 2lb 13oz. Since this entry, we have received multiple entries to just over 4lb, let's hope for that some bigger fish start to show throughout the winter months!

Joe Shaw had the pleasure of welcoming Brandon Jones onto the rocks for a day of fishing in North Pembrokeshire. Here’s what he had to say about the session:

“Brandon is a bit of a ledge in the fishing world, holding none other than the British shore-caught cod record, which still stands at 44lbs 8oz, which dates back to 1966 when Brand was just 16. On top of that, it is the 3rd longest-lasting record for a British species, after the Dab and Salmon record which goes back a further 20-40 years prior to this.

Fishing wasn’t anything out of the ordinary but we did manage a quite a few wrasse up to 3lbs, and dropped a huss on the big baits, close in. No big toothy critters this time, but the calm conditons and beautiful scenery helped with that.”

Fly Fishing

The resevoirs holding just wild trout closed on October 17th, but Ceri of the fly shop headed out on the very last day of the season to Cantref Reservoir near Merthr Tydfil for a few hours, where he caught 10 nice wild brown trout to nearly 2lb using ‘flies from the lakes of Wales’ lures pulled back on an Airflo 40+ Fast intermediate fly line, which was housed on his trusty Hardy Ultradisc 6000 cassette reel, the rod being a 10' Vision 6wt. All fish returned for next season! The focus is now on rainbow trout from fisheries and reservoirs, for example Dare Valley and Llyn Clywedog.

Grayling are now in contention on our local rivers and when levels have allowed fly anglers have done quite well. Below, Lyn Davies with a lovely fish of 17.5 inches from the river Irfon. The fish took a red tag dry fly. Lyn uses and highly rates the Fishpond Crosscurrent pack, which is one of our most popular Fishpond luggage items.

With the trout river season over, Luke Gater turned his attention to some different species, including Pike. The Pike season traditionally starts on October 1st and Luke wasted no time in getting his campaign underway. He headed over the bridge to the Somerset Levels to meet up with his good friend Sam for an action Packed session. Set up with a 9 weight rod, Luke landed 4 lovely fish throughout the day.

Spinning & Lure Fishing

With October 1st marking the start of the Pike season, Pike anglers across the UK are eager to kick start the season with a bang. This was certainly the case for keen all round angler Hunter.

Hunter's parents are also keen anglers who claim Hunter has not stopped talking about the hope of beating his Personal best this season! Their first attempt was Port Talbot Docks, a venue that is suitable for targeting Pike using dead-baits or lures. The initial approach was a mixture of dead baits fished under a pencil slider float, however the strong winds made it difficult to use this method. After switching out the dead bait rods for the lure rods, it wasn't long before Hunter was into a big Pike. After a tough fight, Hunter landed his new personal best which tipped the scales at 18lb 6oz. What a way to start the season! 

The bass fishing has been superb throughout October, whether that be using a bait fishing or lure fishing approach. Lee Harrison had a session to remember when he headed out to one of his favourite beaches, armed with nothing but an LRF set up. Using 5cm jigs loaded on 3cm jig heads, Lee landed two magnifiicent bass of 7lb and 9lb 9oz! As you can imagine, Lee had quite the battle to land these big fish!

The Red Gill Vibro Shads have proved to be a favourite as of late, especially in the ‘cotton candy’ pattern, as shown in the photo below. Ceri swapped out his usual fly gear for some rock hopping along the Pembrokeshire coastline with his lure outfit. With a bit of colour in the water and overcast skies, the conditions were perfect to target the bass. Ceri was pleased to christen his new Spinfisher VI 3500 reel with a lovely 5lb bass within just a few hours of fishing, Caught around the Fishguard area.

From a little further a field, our friend Jake Jones is settling in nicely to his new home on the coast of Australia. Once again, Jake has been using the Samson Lures XH Todos and ‘bomb’ set up, which is proving to be irresistible for these powerful Pelagic fish.

Top angling as always Jake. Is Australia on your bucket list?

We hope you enjoyed reading this months review, for a chance to be featured in next months catch report, feel free to send in your catch reports with a brief description to our email or in the comments section for this blog. Make sure to keep yourself up to date on our social media platforms for daily content.

For tips and advice, don't hesitate to get in touch and we will be more than happy to help!