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Mountbatten this morning

Hughie

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Pinched the wife's boat and went for a little mooch out of Mountbatten as it looked like a nice morning, it certainly was. Only a handful of mackerel, and got moved on by the harbour police to clear the way for a warship, but very nice to be out on the water.
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Wonderful pics. Nothing like messing about in boats. Great morning for you, perhaps not so good for the mackerel 🤣

Excuse my ignorance but where is Mountbatten?

Alan
 
So Matt you fish off your Kayak? You mentioned catching Mackerel. Its probably a different species entirely but in the South seas they fish for Mackerel offshore in deep water. Is it just navigationally challenged stragglers you caught or are your Mackerels inshore fish?
 
So Matt you fish off your Kayak? You mentioned catching Mackerel. Its probably a different species entirely but in the South seas they fish for Mackerel offshore in deep water. Is it just navigationally challenged stragglers you caught or are your Mackerels inshore fish?
wasn't me on the kayak i just live here :rofl:
 
So Matt you fish off your Kayak? You mentioned catching Mackerel. Its probably a different species entirely but in the South seas they fish for Mackerel offshore in deep water. Is it just navigationally challenged stragglers you caught or are your Mackerels inshore fish?
The mackerel are shoaling fish, they can be found anywhere from right on the shore to off in deep water, and from right on the surface to right on the bottom. I used to fish for them commercially using handlines with 30 hook traces, either manually using a technique called "looping" or using a gurdy/stripper/outrigger setup, best time of day for catching them is first and last light but you can catch them on a nice sunny day too. From the kayak i'm just using a rod with a few feathers.
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Hi Hughie

Sorry, senior moment. 🤯 Was confused by Matt’s response there.

Thanks for the clarification. I don’t know much about fish or fishing, but I knew that the Mackerel here were usually caught offshore and as you say, sometimes by commercial line fishing, which I’ve never understood.

So you say the lines are can be dragged from outriggers and have up to 30 hooks a line? Do you swing them in to retrieve the catch? Is the boat still moving as you fish?
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Must be great to have access to the water, a kayak and be able to catch decent eating fish like Mackerel. And you obviously have the skills and knowledge. You’re probably closer to self sufficiency than any of us....

Cheers

Alan
 
Hi Hughie

Sorry, senior moment. 🤯 Was confused by Matt’s response there.

Thanks for the clarification. I don’t know much about fish or fishing, but I knew that the Mackerel here were usually caught offshore and as you say, sometimes by commercial line fishing, which I’ve never understood.

So you say the lines are can be dragged from outriggers and have up to 30 hooks a line? Do you swing them in to retrieve the catch? Is the boat still moving as you fish?
.
Must be great to have access to the water, a kayak and be able to catch decent eating fish like Mackerel. And you obviously have the skills and knowledge. You’re probably closer to self sufficiency than any of us....

Cheers

Alan
Mackerel are preditory fish and very competitive. They are, to use a 'dog' analogy, a sight hound. They will chase anything small moving through the water and try to eat it. For us this is their Achille's heel, all we have to do is 'bait' our hooks with something as simple as a brightly coloured feather or a piece of shiny foil, move it through the water and they will chase and swallow it. If the shoal comes close to the shore they can be caught on rod & line from the beach or rocks. A 4oz/100grm weight on the end of the line and 4 hooks with feathers before that. Cast it out and haul it back in - you'll be hauling back 2 or 3 fish as well. Commercial fisherman also use the same technique but on a bigger scale.
 
Hi Hughie

Sorry, senior moment. 🤯 Was confused by Matt’s response there.

Thanks for the clarification. I don’t know much about fish or fishing, but I knew that the Mackerel here were usually caught offshore and as you say, sometimes by commercial line fishing, which I’ve never understood.

So you say the lines are can be dragged from outriggers and have up to 30 hooks a line? Do you swing them in to retrieve the catch? Is the boat still moving as you fish?
.
Must be great to have access to the water, a kayak and be able to catch decent eating fish like Mackerel. And you obviously have the skills and knowledge. You’re probably closer to self sufficiency than any of us....

Cheers

Alan
Hi Alan, the hooks are attached to a line with a 3lb lead on the bottom, the outrigger is just so you can get that many hooks across the boat, they aren't used for towing the line, in the pictures you can see the gurdy, which is like a giant reel, and the stripper box, the hooks are wound through the stripper which is basically a couple of bars which are wide enough for the hooks to pass through but not the fish, hence the fish are "stripped" off, the boat is moving but in a circle above the fish in an attempt to keep the shoal active. So basically once you have found some fish either by trolling the line along till you hit some or seen the fish on the sounder, you put the wheel hard over to put the boat in a circle and carry on fishing until you lose them, then start looking for some more. Can also work the hooks by hand but I wont bother trying to explain how that works, it's one of those things that is much easier to show than explain, cheers m dears
 
Very nice.

I was down there for a few years before relocating with work north of the wall.

Now we've got the trossachs on our doorstep.
 
Mackerel are preditory fish and very competitive. They are, to use a 'dog' analogy, a sight hound. They will chase anything small moving through the water and try to eat it. For us this is their Achille's heel, all we have to do is 'bait' our hooks with something as simple as a brightly coloured feather or a piece of shiny foil, move it through the water and they will chase and swallow it. If the shoal comes close to the shore they can be caught on rod & line from the beach or rocks. A 4oz/100grm weight on the end of the line and 4 hooks with feathers before that. Cast it out and haul it back in - you'll be hauling back 2 or 3 fish as well. Commercial fisherman also use the same technique but on a bigger scale.

Paul.

I'm no fisherman so your dog analogy was helpful in explanation

Thanks!

Alan
 
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