It has been nearly 2 weeks now since the birds have been going crazy in the river and on the open coastline. The bluefin tuna are here in Cornwall and the reason why they are here is because of all the food that is in abundance. They are mainly chasing the garfish but they will literally eat anything in their way. This drives everything into our shores and up rivers as the smaller fish are trying to get cover. Additionally, the small silver sprats are here and the mackerel are going nuts for these small silvery fish. Not only are the mackerel going nuts but the bass are also devouring anything that's edible including these silvery sprats and especially the huge mackerel that are getting fatter by the day. We have taken a few mackerel and bass recently for family members to enjoy and when we have gutted them we have been amazed at how full the Mackerel and bass are with these silver sprats. One bass we opened up had over 30 sprat in its belly which is absolutely unbelievable.
We have caught most of our fish on the surface in deep water accessing them from rocks but some have been taking sub-surface lures and even shallow diving lures. We have tried medium and large topwater surface lures but we are finding that the bass are more interested in a small lure thrashing along the surface rather than a larger lure. When the bass are attempting to hit our small surface lures the sprat are coming out of their mouths as they are so full. It's incredible to see.
Normally we catch bass in the river this time of year but because it's so frantic in the mouth of the river and open coastline we haven't really fished the river much but we will return in October and especially November for the larger bass when the bait fish are no longer here.
Lures that have worked for us this summer:
105mm Surface Lure
98mm Sub Surface Ranger lure
Our "New" 120mm Shallow Diving Lure
Medium Surface Lure
We’ve had a great time so far and we are always putting our lures under pressure to ensure that they work well. A few grip and grin photos before the bass were released back into the sea. Both fish were well over the mid 50cm mark. A great size fish to navigate whilst trying to land them on the rocks.
