EFSA SPECIES COD 2012, Dunmore East.
28th and 29th April
At 0730 on Day one the 65 competitors assembled ready to board one of the 7 boats full of hope and anticipation of landing their share of the cod available.
Weather conditions at the start of the day was a wind of force 4 to 5 blowing so the boats were able to go out to the further grounds. But as the day progressed the wind increased a good force 6 and as the tide had turned to be against the wind all boats came closer inshore to get a bit of shelter off the land. Both inshore and off shore the ground was similar with undulating rock and large areas of kelp, which meant almost everyone came back to shore with a lot less tackle and lead weights than they started the day with! There were still fish inshore as offshore with the similar drifts of nothing for some time then 2 or 3 fish on at the same time.
As is always the case the number of target fish caught depended on your fortunes with the boat draw as much as the angler’s ability to catch the fish. And so it was that the amount of cod boated ranged from 14 between 10 anglers on one boat to the top boat with over 60 fish between 10 anglers, and on that boat 2 caught more than their share one with 13 fish and the next with 12 fish. Overall next best was 9 fish, then 7 fish for 5 anglers. Most cod were in the 31 to 50 score band for 5 points, with a few better ones 50 to 60 band for 8 points, best cod of the day was 65cm, with only 3 over the 60cm mark
On the Saturday we were all aware of Sundays forecast, which was gale 8 so the decision was taken that Sunday could not be safely fished so the day was cancelled and so Saturday’s results were used for honours. It was without doubt a good call as Saturday’s conditions resulted in couple of cuts; several bruises and I believe one broken rib!
It was a shame the second day could not be fished as with a change of boats combined with most anglers ideas from the first day on how to improve their score the scores would be different but we will never know!
So the pin winners were:
Gold Billy McCormack, Scotland. 13 fish for 88 points
Silver David Rylands, Ireland. 12 fish for 81 points
Bronze Pete Bailey, England. 9 fish for 60 points
So congratulations to Pete Bailey who was well chuffed to get his first EFSA pin and I am sure not his last.
The England Individuals Results were:
3rd Pete Bailey 9 fish for 60 points
5th Kim Bowden 7 fish for 51 points
9th Richard Russell 6 fish for 45 points
19th Paul Hart 5 fish for 30 points
20th Matt Osborne 4 fish for 30 points
22nd Barrie Senior 4 fish for 27 points
38th Mike Smith 2 fish for 15 points
38th Jim Philipson 2 fish for 15 points
44th Dave Clark 1 fish for 6 points
48th equal were the next 12 anglers including some (you know who you are) from England you unfortunately did not manage to catch any of the required species!
Richard Russell was first of the seniors section.
A full set of results is available if you contact me.
Report by Kim Bowden
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