Sea Anglers have been enjoying varied sport along the coast with thin lipped mullet providing top sport in the estuaries. On the open coast bass and smoothound are giving good sport with spider crab among the best baits. Ali Laird landed a bass of 7lb 10oz and Ross Stanway a bass of 7lb 12oz.
Paul Hutchings landed a brace of smoothound on dirty squid from a local beach the best 10lb 3oz.
Thick Lipped grey mullet can offer superb sport for specialist anglers in local harbours and rock marks.
There have been some stunning catches of carp from South West Lakes Trust waters in the past couple of weeks with Lower Tamar featuring heavily in the following round up. This water is a day ticket water that provides more than just carp with double figure bream and large tench residing in its waters along with specimen perch and eels. The South West Lakes offer anglers an alternative to the heavily stocked commercial waters with carp that are more challenging in less manicured surroundings that many carp anglers prefer.
Steve Gliddon has been on the banks of Lower Tamar Lake on the Cornwall/Devon border. Steve landed 5 fish from 7 runs which included two 18lb commons, two mid double commons and a lovely looking mirror just under 10lb. Steve fished to a small clear spot in the weed with little and often baiting tactics working well.
(Below)Mainline’s John Kneebone enjoyed a cracking session on Lower Tamar landing 13 commons to just under 20lbs and two mirrors, one small one and this stunning 20lb 6oz fully known as the ‘little fully’. All of John’s fish came in a 24 hour session using Mainline cell boilies.
(Below)Amy Maunder has been on the banks at day ticket water Lower Tamar lake on the Cornwall/Devon border and banked this cracking tench at 5lb 8oz along with a double figure common. Both fish fell to Mailinie Essential Cell boilies.
Adrian Morgan caught this cracking 19lb 4oz common from Jennetts reservoir on a trimmed down Bloodworm boilie popped up from the silt.
As always there have been some bumper catches at the ever prolific Stafford Moor Fishery near Dolton where Joanne Combes and her family have invested to make this one of the countries top commercial carp waters.
Jack Griffiths and Dan Head who had 13 fish out using Sticky Baits Manilla and Krill boilies and also mainline cell. They fished up on lodge lake for 48 hours.
Carl Spear fished on the back bays on Beattie’s where he 7 fish up to 21lb 5oz using CC Moore live system and fake corn and Mainline diamond whites.
Darren Palmer landed 18 fish in a 48 hour session up on lodge lake on the dam wall using Sticky Baits Krill boilies. Darren normally always fishes on Beattie’s but fancied a change and had a fabulous session.
Mark daughter Chloe and wife Emma Downing fished on the back bays of Beattie’s lake for 48 hours. They had 34 carp out in total (they had many out of Tanners too 😜) fishing Sticky Baits Manilla boilies. ( Below) Chloe Downing
(Below)Lee Galley (dad) with sons Nick and Brandon Galley. All fished up on lodge lake had over 20 fish between them using home made baits.
Carl Hutchison and Nikki Parker fished up on lodge lake on the first double swim on the dam wall . They had 28 fish out between them and Nikki had a new personal best of 21lb using home made fruity boilies.
Apologies for the short break in output due to a week long fishing excursion in Havnnes Handelssted, Northern Norway. I will put a blog post up on the event in due course but in the mean time here are a few pictures of our adventures including the capture of a huge cod weighing 41lb to the rod of North Devon angler Rob Scoines who tempted the huge fish on a lure and light spinning rod purchased from Summerlands Tackle in Westward Ho!
(Below) Wayne Thomas cod 38lb
Adrian Morgan has been having plenty of fish from Darracott reservoir, Torrington, recently with fish to just under 17lbs all caught on floater tactics.
Mark Garrett, 46 and Son Kieran Evans Garrett 22, from Wales had one hell of a session on the Kracking Carp Lake, Mark smashed his Personal Best with a 39lb Mirror and Kieran caught a 26lb 5oz Common topped off with a 31lb Mirror!
They both used fake pop up sweetcorn popped up about an inch from the bottom and a few scattered sweetcorn around it. They used their own rigs, made from Korda N-trap coated braid hooklink, stripped about an inch past the eye and the rest left stiff, fake corn was attached via a hair rig and size 6 Korda wide gape. The lead was attached via a led clip on to 15lb mainline.
Mark caught his 39lb Mirror on Peg 1 by the Lilly Pads to the right, Kieran caught both his 26lb 5oz Common and his 31lb Mirror to the extreme right of peg 2 by the side of the weed.
Rain brought a slight rise in local rivers that brought in a trickle of salmon and sea trout. On the Torridge Duncan Betts fished a mid river beat and landed four grilse, all fresh run fish of around 5lb.
Sea trout specialist Martin Weeks and his brother Ed fished two nights on the Middle Torridge to land 17 sea trout up to 3lb.
On the Taw salmon to 11lb were landed and a huge sea trout of over 14lb is rumoured to have been caught on the River Mole. Edwin Barclay landed a brace of fresh run 8lb salmon from the day ticket Weir Marsh and Brightly Beats of the River Taw. 
At this time of year salmon and sea trout anglers fishing the lower beats are often privileged to witness the prehistoric looking sea lamprey spawning. These eel like fish are an encouraging sign, as they require good quality water in which to survive. Reaching lengths in excess of three feet they are often mistaken for eels but unlike eels they cannot be caught on rod and line.
(Above) Thomas Downing sent me this picture of a dead lamprey on the Torridge estuary
Purchase a fishing ticket in July or August & you can come back as often as you like until you have reached your bag limit! That’s right, so if you purchase say a 5 fish ticket you can keep coming back through July & August until you have caught your 5 fish… Bargain!
The Van Koutrik family visited Creedy Carp Lake near Crediton and enjoyed a hectic session with thirteen year Woodrow van Koutrik landing a 16lb 10oz common and younger brother Wilder aged 9 landing a fine an 18lb 2oz common.
Ashley Bunning has been among the fish at Lower Tamar, not catching anything bigger than 12lb but plenty of action. The larger fish are being a bit elusive at the moment! Ashley had this to say:
‘PVA sticks with Burton Bait Rollers ‘Puzzle’ and ‘Full S.P.’ with a ‘Plum and Garlic’ pop up was the winning method. Lakebed Leads 4oz distance leads which were dropped on the take, with Ultima ‘Vantage’ Shockleaders and XR mainline helped me hit the distances i needed and play the fish through the weed.’
