Client Catches – Crash, Bang, Wallop!
It’s been a curious start to my 2024 guiding season… I’ve ‘sighted’ some hefty bass, and in numbers at times too, yet we, as in my clients with me as their guide, have only managed to place one of the ‘better ones’ on the deck – the gorgeous 60cm specimen in the featured image of course! Sure we’ve landed lots of the smaller brethren, and yes, we’ve endured some blanks in between – which is to be expected early in the season when the bass are often extremely localised, and exceptionally fussy in regards to what they’ll take…
Observations…
As I’ve said and written many times, during the early stages of my guiding and personal fishing season I will visit as many different stretches of this marvellous coastline, and all of its tidal inlets as possible, in order to gauge where the bass are, as well as what they may be feeding on.
I’ll save my personal experiences and observations in this regard for my Marc Cowling – Bass Lure Fishing website/blog as they do make for an interesting read, but needless to say, when it came to the decision of where to guide and Andrew (the happy chappie holding the bass in this post) and his friend Mark, the decision was a relatively straight forward one.
For a start, the area is where I will very often observe the first sandeel shoals of the season (which indeed I did the day prior to this session) in addition to being rugged enough to house bass nosing in around the weed and rocks for the peeling crabs – especially if a bit of warmth has been experienced.
Moreover, due to the water being shallow (6ft here over high water on this small neap tide) with some drop offs and interlinking gullies sited in and around what is a section of reef surrounded by an otherwise sandy foreshore, it was more likely that a surface lure would be taken over anything else in the exceptionally clear water.
Final throw!
I won’t lie, for a good few hours the guys ‘peppered’ the reef and the adjoining coves as I took them through the full inventory of lure types, tactics and techniques as they had requested – and it did look good today, with a grey sky and slight swell washing into the area. “Retrieve the lure as if there is a bass following it at every turn“, I said, as I surveyed the seascape for any hint of where a bass may be positioned now that that the once strong, laterally-running current has all but halted.
“We’ve got one final throw of the dice here guys”, I proclaimed, as I pointed towards a specific corner of the bay where it appeared the water was swilling and swishing through, over, and around the rocks and wrack more than anywhere else. “It’s just possible”, I added, “that a bass may look to move into that zone over high water and in readiness for the ebb as it provides the greatest levels of concealment”.
Drooling…
Sensing that their arms and backs were starting to creak with all of the day’s casting and retrieving, I reiterated my earlier statement about bass ‘being behind the lure’ as I attached a surface lure to Andrew’s clip that I have a real affinity with – the Patchinko 125 ‘copy’ that is a Seadra Spitta 125 V2 in Ayu.
Settling into the water next to him in order to check his technique and to ‘chew the fat’, despite the day having so far being a non-event in the bass stakes, I attempted to genuinely supplement mine and his levels of expectation by announcing that “if we had just just arrived on this mark, I would be drooling at the condition!” It looked that good – the quintessential open coast bass lure fishing scenario of a grey sky, and clear water with a bit of movement to it – albeit very localised. But that is why we’d shifted location remember, if only by 100m or so…
Crash!
Having stood, whilst checking this venue out over the bleakest of winter periods, precisely where Andrew’s bass absolutely ‘annihilated’ the Seadra Spitta, I had imagined and envisaged a bass or two manoeuvring into position here. To the trained and experienced ‘bass eye’, this clearly defined drop off (of only 18″), off of a flat ledge of rock into a sandy gully running parallel to the shore had come up trumps at the first time of asking!
And what a crash, bang, wallop it was too! I had only recently remarked to Andrew just how well he was now “working the lure” compared to the start of the session when, almost out of nowhere, the water erupted! It was one of those heart-stopping surface lure attacks where the bass hits the lure and just keeps on going in one staggeringly violent motion! I was in heaven in that moment I can tell you – and so was he!
Honestly though, and I did relay this to Andrew and Mark afterwards, if this bass had been hooked between June and November, when the sea is warm and they’re battling with real vigour, I reckon he’d have lost her to the weed or rocks. However, due to the fact she’d probably only recently spawned, in conjunction with the fairly cool water at 11.6oC, I believe her lack of energy assisted Andrew and his rather placid style of playing her! Get them on the surface and keep them there is what I say…. A lot!
Thanks for reading
Marc Cowling
South Devon Bass Guide Ltd 