Chasing Beasts!!!

Chasing Beasts

Something I have been planning on catching from the kayak for quite a while now is a Common skate, a huge flat fish that can grow well over 200lb in weight, also while targeting them in this location there is a very slight chance of catching a Shark.

This started of with a phone call to Graham Smith, a very well know big game kayak angler, some people might have nightmares at what Graham would be taking them out to catch, tho after nearly 8 years of kayak Angling now I’m fairly confident in targeting something bigger now and it’s time to have a crack at the fish of a lifetime from a yak.

I drove up to Graham’s in Donegal to meet him then on up to the launch spot. We set up our kayaks and headed straight out to deep water picking up some fresh bait along the way.

Once at the marks we set anchors and got the big baits to the bottom, the waiting game commenced and to kill time I’d usually fish for other smaller species with a 3rd rod to amuse myself.

Tackle needs to be very heavy for targeting skate and shark as they I’ll break the best of gear and find weaknesses in all your terminal tackle fairly quickly. Rod class of 50lb minimum, a fairly heavy fixed spool or multiplier spooled with 80lb braid up……. then a rubbing wind on leader of 300lb mono and a good 300lb plus mono bite trace with a 12/0 hook. For the shark this is the same apart from the bite trace needs to be 400lb wire and a 16/0 circle hook.

As the day went on I had plenty of species on the smaller rod including some beautiful red Gurnard and my biggest Squid to date followed by plenty more, I also caught my first kayak 3 bearded rockling so it wasn’t a bad start to the day. Tho these where not the species I came for.

Mid afternoon I got a shout from Graham over the VHF to say he had just landed a 200lb skate and shortly later he caught a Trigger fish also on the smaller rod, the Trigger fish are very rare in Ireland with only a handful caught each year never mind this far north.
This got my hopes up and I was happy enough sitting at anchor all afternoon until it was time to head in with darkness approaching.

It just was not my day for catching one tho it’s too of my list for 2020, as soon as they start appearing I shall be straight up to try again.