Boat Match Results – 6th November 2018

Here are the results for Tuesday boat match out from West Mersea.  

1st Barrie Senior 131 points – 5 dogfish, 9 thornbacks, 6 whiting

2nd Alan Porter 63 points – 3 dogfish, 3 thornbacks, 3 whiting

3rd Chris Leonard 61 points – 1 dab, 1 dogfish, 3 thornbacks, 1 whiting

4th Chris Bull 59 points – 4 dogfish, 2 thornbacks, 4 whiting

5th Robin Joy 53 points – 4 dogfish, 2 thornbacks, 1 whiting

6th Colin Crocker 43 points – 1 dogfish, 2 thornbacks, 2 whiting

7th Brian Grundy 42 points – 3 thornbacks, 2 whiting

8th Paul Hart DNF

Beach Match – Aldeburgh Summer League 10 June 2018

Braintree Sea Angling Club members fished the first of their Summer League evening matches at Aldeburgh. With a strong East North Easterly wind whipping up the white horses fishing was not easy until the tide turned and the wind dropped. Only a few small whiting were caught until the tide turned. In the last hour and a half when Graham Nash found several dogfish to win the match 289 fish points from his cagch of 6 whiting. 1 sole and 5 dogfish. Second place went to Paul Drake with 5 whiting and a smoothhound for 77 fish points. Barrie Senior had 7 whiting to take the third spot with 67 points.

Match Report – Aldeburgh – 29th April

Braintree Sea Angling Club members fished Aldeburgh in trying, grey and damp conditions at their recent match.  With strong north easterly winds casting was difficult but Paul Drake caught a codling on his first cast which raised expectations. This was the only one caught and the fishing was poor for the rest of the match.  A run of dogfish an hour and quarter before the finish meant that all the anglers had at least one fish on the score sheet.  Paul Drake capitalised on his good start to win with the codling, 5 whiting, a pout and 3 dogfish for 364 points also the best fish a dogfish of 63cm.  Barrie Senior was second with 5 whiting, 3 dogfish and a pout for 281 points. 3rd was Graham Nash with one dogfish for 84 points.

Earlier in the week a few of the members had taken a trip to St Osyth and managed to find a few thornback rays the best being a 6lb 12oz fish caught by Paul Drake.

Match Report – Pevensey Bay East Sussex

Braintree Sea Angling Club members headed down to East Sussex for their latest match at Pevensey Bay hoping for some plaice.  With a south westerly wind and a calm sea the fishing conditions looked reasonable.  The fishing was slow with a the occasional fish being caught.  Three of the anglers managed to catch at least one plaice.  Barrie Senior started with a plaice and steadily caught fish throughout the day and ended up with two plaice, one flounder, six dabs and seven whiting for 229 fish points.  Second place went to Paul Drake with the best plaice of the day a fine fish 35cm and three whiting for 83 points. Chris Leonard took the third spot with 54 points from his catch of one plaice, to whiting and a small smoothhound.  

Match Report – Sizewell – February 2018

we fished Sizewell today, with the wind over our right shoulders off the land and a lot of sunshine it was a pleasant day  with good weather, good conditions, good bait and good company what could go wrong?

it turned out however to be a quiet day, even the seagulls were quiet, they had flown to Denge Marsh thinking we had rescheduled the match against all the odds three elite sea anglers from the National Braintree Sea Angling squad took on the hard fighting dabs of Sizewell in a
head to head battle that left no punches pulled, coming out on top to eclipse any double world gold medal in the winter Olympics.

Dab for dab the match started out slowly, slowing down somewhat in the middle then then petering out all together until the turn of the tide then like a tour de France rider with a dodgy jiffy bag Robin ‘he’s one of our own’ Joy gave the dabs a good bashing with 26 straight victories
bettered only by doffing up a monster rockling giving him a total of 27 fish for 179 points.

Graham ‘coat hanger rig’ Nash also gave the dabs no quarter with whiting and rockling also not able to escape the inevitable end for a total of 111 points from 15 fish.

Squeezed in the middle between the above two lotharios was El Drako with 19 fish for 125 points and no passes.

Numerous undersize dabs, whiting, rockling and bass were caught, should we reduce the limit to 12 cm to give these fish a fair chance?

Call the Midwife is about to start so I must dash

Result:

1) Robin 27 fish 179 points

2) Paul 19 fish 125 points

3) Graham 15 fish 111 points

all 3 had a fish of 24cm so prize for longest fish shared

dab 24 cm Robin & Paul

whiting 24 cm Graham

rockling 21 cm Robin ( it looked a lot bigger than 21 cm to me)

Match Report – Dengie March January 2018

47 hardy Braintree anglers fished Denge Marsh today to avoid the biting onshore winds on the east coast.  A fierce battle soon ensued, squeezing in amongst the World Dab Championship anglers was tough going 2 of the regular squad, messrs Leonard and Drake set up in front of the Nuclear Power Station about 65 paces from the water’s edge why so far up you may ask, I had my fitbit on and was trying to get my steps up, 65 paces to the water at the start and it did not improve quickly either with a dusting of snow and sleet in the air it was a tad chilly for us oldtimers but at least it was coming over our backs casting was easy but there were a lot of snags to contend with as we both found out to our cast fish however soon started coming in and although mainly whiting and dabs there were a number of rockling, a pout, a bass. a plaice and a doggie only two of the anglers found their way back to the team headquarters with a ll others being disqualified for poor timekeeping.

In second place with 49 counting fish was Chris with 464 points

In first place with 57 counting fish was Drako with 606 points

Dab 30 Chris

Whiting 30 Chris

Rockling 22 Paul

Pout 18 Chris

Bass 23 Chris

Plaice 28 Paul

Doggie 45 Paul

E & O E ( and a few porkies)

The Denge Roving Reporter

Match Report – Walton Pier- Fur and Feather – 27th Dec 2017

Seven members of Braintree Sea Angling Club braved the rain , sleet and strong winds to fish the last match of the year after Christmas on Walton pier.  Fortunately the wind was off the land so there was some protection for the anglers. Fishing was slow until the tide turned with the occasional whiting and dab being caught.  The wind dropped as the rain went out to sea and the tide turned and the whiting began to come of-n the feed providing most of the anglers with plenty of whiting for the last hour and a half.  Paul Drake was victorious with 35 whiting and 3 dabs for 411 fish points winning him a bottle of whiskey. In second place was Robin Joy with 299 points from his catch of 22 whiting, 1 dab and a pout.  Third spot went to Chris Leonard with 23 whiting and 269 points.  The prize for the longest fish went to Barrie Senior a whiting of 34cm.  Paul’s win consolidated his position at the top of the leader board as best match man over the year with 156 match points.  Runner up was Chris Leonard with 98 match points closely followed by Robin Joy with 94 points.

Beach Match Report – Holland on Sea – 17th December 2017

A frozen beach greeted Braintree Sea Angling Club members when they arrived for their latest match at Holland-on-Sea.  Fishing was slow with a few whiting and the occasional dab and small bass taking the mainly lugworm baits.  Although the day eventually warmed slightly it only brought rain no improvement in the fishing.  At the end of the day it was close with Barrie Senior securing a win with a catch of 20 whiting and 3 dabs for 262 points.  Paul Drake had 24 whiting and a dab for 255 points. In third spot was Graham Nash with 106 points from his catch of 6 whiting, 2 bass, 3 rockling and a dab.  Wednesday 27th at Walton pier will be the last match of the year.

Boat Match Report – West Mersea on Enterprise – November 2017

The last Club boat match of the year was held mid-week fishing out from West Mersea on the charter boat Enterprise.  Whiting were the main catch with some dogfish, thornback rays and pout, no cod. Barrie Senior won the match with 51 points.  Second was Graham Nash with 41 points and third spot went to Paul Hart with 28 points. Third place together with his wins from the previous boat matches was enough to secure Paul the Bolduc Cup for best boat angler.