Ed Rands fished at Blakewell Fishery to tempt a 9lb rainbow and witness another angler land a stunning 15lb blue trout ( Below)
Bideford and District Angling Club Coarse Section July monthly Comp results:
1st Colin Cherrington 33lb 11oz
2nd Keith Mountjoy 23lb 10oz
3rd Steve Bailey 19lb 4oz
4th Keith Copland 18lb 10oz
5th Richard Jefferies 16lb 13oz
6th Martin Turner 13lb 8oz
7th John Lisle 9lb 7oz
8th Tyler Scott 9lb 4oz ,
20 fished , Hot sunny conditions proved to be just perfect for Colin’s winning tactics on peg 18, he has had half his catch on the pole using meat and several good carp on the pellet waggler. Second spot was a super net of mainly smaller carp and skimmers on soft pellets on the pole by consistent Keith on peg 6. Secretary , Steve was 3rd of peg 8 with some larger specimens on the pole.
Salmon from the beautiful River East Lyn
Will Barret spent a recent weekend fishing the East Lyn landing a brace of salmon estimated at between 5lb and 7lb both caught on flying c and homemade mepps. The river was low after a small spate but producing fish non the less.
If you have read my book “I Caught A Glimpse” you will know that I have a great fondness for the East Lyn and its salmon so I am grateful to Will for sending his recent pictures showing that the river is still producing a few precious salmon. I walked the river recently as the river was swollen by a brief summer spate. I took a few pictures that I intended to share on here as I know several readers enjoy seeing pictures of this beautiful river.
Family Boat Fishing off Ilfracombe
The Welch family enjoyed a superb day afloat on their boat beneath a vivid blue sky and on calm waters. Tope, pollock, bass and bull Huss all gave good sport.
Some stunning weather and good sport on the boat this weekennd , went out Saturday and Sunday for short sessions over high tide. The mackerel are still very scarce and no pollack inshore either. Saturday was all about the tope with quite a few, nothing big most around 20lb, big enough to give a good scrap especially for my wife Lyn I think it’s her first tope. Sunday was a trip out with my dad loads of bass and pollack all caught on light spinning gear the best was a 10lb 8oz pollack. All but a couple fish were returned. As the tide slackened off we decided to put the anchor down and try for some tope, no tope but we had some nice Huss to just over 13lb. I did hook and lose what felt like a really good tope but unfortunately the leader broke. Welsh boats fishing the west side of Lundy were reporting good numbers of mackerel so hopefully we will see them on the next set of bigger tides. Fingers crossed for some more good weather.
Surprise Catch
Chris Nicol tried a local beach on the flood tide hoping for bass and it paid off with a cracking sea trout at 6lb caught on bluey and squid 30 yards into the surf fish went back to see another day. ( Note there has been some debate as to whether it is a salmon or sea trout and I have sort expert opinion and the consensus was probably a sea trout. Difficult to be 100% certain from a photo)
Summer salmon run on North Devon Rivers
North Devon Rivers are producing some splendid silver bars following a welcome spell of rainfall. Paul Carter enjoyed success on the Lower taw tempting these two stunning salmon on recents trips to the river the larger of the two estimated at 14lb. The salmon were tempted on a small black and yellow barrels double that dropped out in the net. Ian Blewett also enjoyed success banking a 7lb hen salmon. Note all salmon reported are carefully released to continue their upriver migration.
A large salmon estimated at 20lb left one angler heartbroken when his leader snagged and broke on a submerged rock.
Boat Sport with improved weather
Boat anglers have been able to get afloat and enjoy some great sport with some of the channels predators. James Gubb Fradgley fished from his own boat off Lynmouth to tempt this hard fighting conger of 36lb.
Stef Jones had a good day chasing tope boating four best going 42lb, he also tempted huss, pollack, a nice plump codling about 4 1/2lb, mackerel and loads of smoothies best 12lb 6oz.
(Below) A nice tope landed on Bluefin.
Bass on lures
Ross Stanway has taken the lead in Combe Martin SAC’s lure fishing competition sponsored by High Street Tackle Ilfracombe. He tempted a fine bass of 70cm that was estimated at 8lb 8oz. The fish was caught from a rock mark using a Black Fiiish minnow.My biggest bass to date 70cm exactly. Ross said ” Unfortunately I didn’t weigh it as I’ve taken to not carrying scales whilst lure fishing. But I estimated it at between 8-9lb. And theres a length to weight chart on uk bass that suggests a 70cm averages 8lb 8oz. It was a brilliant scrap in some pretty challenging conditions. Stiff nwly winds and a fair swell running. After a few quick snaps I slid it back in as quickly as I could. It was awesome to see it swim off. I’m over the moon to have caught what is definitely a PB for me. A little bit gutted that it happened when I was on my own but on the other hand it was a magical moment that I’ll never forget. Also landed 5 smaller ones around 2lb mark.”
Several members have been targeting the bass with Dan Welch landing several from local rock marks. 
I fished a shallow and rocky beach mark in a brisk North West Wind to tempt a pleasing bass of 62cm (estimated at 6lb 8oz). The bass took a Mega bass spindle worm in water of no more than 18″. The soft plastic weedless lure enabled effective presentation in the weed strewn shallow rocky water.
Bideford Mid week result
Results : Evening Series match No. 5
1st Kevin Shears 16lb 1oz
2nd
Stephen Craker
14lb 7oz
3rd
Robin Glover
13lb 6oz
4th
Martin Turner
12lb 7oz
5th
Keith Mountjoy
10lb 11oz
6th Les Polden 8lb 11oz
20 Anglers took part. The winner of the 5th round of the evening series was Kevin , on peg 17 . He has had a nice net of skimmers and a couple of bonus carp on the pole at around 7 metres, Steve’s second spot was taken on peg 23 on hard pellets fished across to the island, Newcomer , Robin has had some cracking bream on peg 15 for a well deserved 3rd spot.
Specimen smoothound
David Jenkins fished a North Devon Beach to land a specimen smoothound scaling 12lb 1oz.
