Tope and the Queen Victoria

A mixed bag of thoughts this week. Starting with catch reports, it looks like the early summer is in full swing, plenty of mackerel and garfish in the usual places. Bream are still around in numbers – and not just over the traditional rocky marks either. You can pick them up over many other areas of hard ground as well. Smoothhound are being caught on crab baits with some coming to squid baits as well. And the best news of all is that some good tope are being caught, so there will be some excellent sport if we can get to the tope marks in Utopia and off Selsey.

On the subject of tope, I have met a number of small-boat anglers who have yet to catch a sizable one, but they are not that difficult to locate and catch. Here’s how I have done it. Firstly, location. Tope seem to like running through deep channels, so find yourself a deep hole or gully especially if you can find one that narrows, concentrating fish and food. Tackle is simple – a running ledger with a long trace and at least 6/0 hook, either with a wire trace or 150lb+ mono. They have sharp teeth. Bait is equally simple: whole mackerel or part thereof. I have had success with flapper (whole mackerel with just the backbone and tail removed); Arron prefers the whole fish. He should know, see his catch report of a 36 pounder.

Let the bait fish away with the rod on free spool, or just enough drag to stop the tide taking it away. A tope will pick up a bait and run with it – let it go, and tighten up only after it has stopped, turned the bait and run again. If you get a good hook hold, be prepared for a running fight that can last half an hour!

One word of warning, when landing it be wary of a tail-hold only. Fish are able to change direction by bracing their tails against the water. If you hold their tails, they are able to turn and bite – and they will. Hang on to some front fins as well!

Finally, when out with Tony recently on Summer Breeze we were passed by the latest Cunard mega-liner Queen Victoria. Am I old-fashioned or is that one ugly sea-going block of flats? What happened to those sleek liners that used to cruise past us?

How to catch 101 Bream

Here are some combined thoughts on catching bream. Bream maestro Arron and two crew boated 101 the other day, so I'm going to share some of his tips and my own. There are some good fish around Boulder, Bullocks and Hounds at the moment so hopefully these will help.

1. Use small hooks: I use size 4 down to size 10 but watch that the smaller hooks are not too soft. Bream fight hard and can straighten a small hook. Try trout fly hooks and barbed carp hooks.

2. Use a mono hook length of 15lb or less. Bream will shy away from heavier mono.

3. Use a simple trace with two clear booms or small 3-way swivels, don't use beads or heavy booms - bream will get frightened.

4. Bait with a strip of squid, mackerel belly or garfish strip, about 1cm x 5cm hooked at the end. Alternatively use half a small squid head.

5. Hook lengths can be from 40 cm to 1metre, depending on conditions.

6. Rig your lead with one or two booms above it: bottom one about 10cm from the lead, the one above it should be adjustable. Try moving it up from about 30cm if you are not catching - at slack water bream feed further off the bottom.

7. A bream bite is the classic tugging rattle. Arron recommends not striking - let the fish take the bait then wind in - if it has taken the bait in its mouth, tightening up will hook it.

8. If you miss a bite then get no more for a few minutes, wind in and re-bait. Somehow a fish can register one bite but take two baits! Also, bream like very fresh bait, they will often ignore a bait that has been in the water ten minutes. Keep re-baiting.

9. Keep feeding ground-bait in to keep fish interested. I like to lose feed squid chopped into fragments into the water, just a squids-worth every ten minutes. In deeper water over 35 feet or in very strong tides you may need a bait dropper - see here for a cheap tip. Better to have little and often than a bagful you leave in all day.

10. Use a soft rod. If you are using braid and a stiff rod you can pull the hook out and also there will be more resistance when the fish takes, which can put them off.

11. Female fish fight harder. You can recognise them from their girly pinkish hue. Please put them back to spawn.

12. Keep only as many as you can eat, and preferably just males. Minimum size is 9.1inches/23cm length. They make great eating when fresh, but lose a lot of flavour and texture if frozen for too long.

13. Try float fishing at slack tide if bites fall off. The fish may be up in the water, and a sliding float will cover more ground and depth options to find the fish.

Thanks again to Arron for some of the tips, and to Tony for taking me out on Monday. We had a great session, with plenty of bream action. We kept just a few for the pot and I can recommend simple grilled bream with salsa verde!

Garmin Chart Plotter Review and other updates

As you will know from my last blog, Salar is out of action for the moment with a sick engine, so I am confined to shore fishing or prevailing on the generosity of other boat owners. On Friday I went trout fishing for the first time in probably two years, and although the weather and the location at Meon Springs were idyllic, it was all a bit too easy compared to sea fishing. Still, home smoked trout makes a nice change!


Last week I was going to post a review of the new Garmin GPSMAP 4008 Chart Plotter, which was delayed because of Salar's little adventure. I have now completed the review and it is posted on the Boat Angling web site. I won't repeat it all here, but one feature makes it stand out against the competition - it has a true video VGA screen which is much better than the previous generation of chart plotters.


I have also had time to post another couple of updates on the web site: how to make a bailer for nothing; and a downloadable chart of the general marks published on the site. No, none of the detailed, private or secret ones are there I'm afraid!

A fishing blog wouldn't be worthy of the name if I didn't mention catches: I have it on very good authority that Boulder Bank is producing more and better bream than Bullocks Patch or Brackelsham areas. However, the shoals are very localised and the difference between over 100 (true and verified!) bream and just a few fish can be just a few yards. More bream-catching tips from my friend the bream-meister next week...

On Tow

It had to happen sooner or later: my Mercuiser diesel hasn't missed a beat for four years. On Sunday morning however, cruising towards The Hounds the engine note suddenly changed, the lights came on and the buzzer screamed. Oo-er. Remembering the drill, I switched off the engine, had a good look round to see if I was in a navigation channel or near some pots: neither, and there was only 25 feet of water so the anchor went down while I worked out what to do next. When I looked under the engine casing a very mucky sight awaited me - about a gallon of black engine oil was spread over everything. Fishing was off then.

I am a member of SeaStart (an AA of the sea, and I recommend them to anyone who goes out in a boat with an engine). Like the AA, they will try and fix the problem but if that is not possible, they will tow you home. I called SeaStart on the mobile as I was only a mile from Chichester Bar, exchanged details, and 20 minutes later they phoned back with an ETA for the rescue boat. Another 20 minutes later and Hayling Rescue, an 8 metre RIB was alongside. Now that's better than the AA. Without another gallon of oil on board there was not a lot he could do, so we had a text-book tow back to Southsea Marina. It was so textbook, I have put that section from "Angling Boats" on the Hints and Tips section of the web site - complete with pictures. Full marks to Seastart, let's hope Scott Doble from 1 Deg. West Marine doesn't mind getting his hands dirty when he goes under the casing - it's not a job I could even contemplate!

This distraction is a great pity, because I wanted to post a review of the fabulous new Garmin GPSMap 4008. It will have to wait. I can tell you though, Peter Gander has a cracking new t-shirt design in the shop - with special appeal for Merry Fisher owners!