Dive report – 19-24th Oct

Well there has not been much to talk about spearfishing wise the past few weeks. The weather has eventually turned and winter is upon us. I think I’ll manage a few more dives still, but it’s just about time to dry out the suit and pack all the gear away for the season. But before I do that I wanted to post some pics of a good week’s spearfishing we had a few weeks back. Just not had the time to write this up so apolgies if I’m a bit vaugue on the details.

The dive week started on Tuesday as we headed out to our usual haunts of the Stannock and Kellen. Muddy did well breaking his drought and landing 2 bass. I got 3 (hehe) and we ended up with 5 good fish to take home for the pot!

The next day was bright and sunny, but bitterly cold. 8 Degrees! But we steamed out and I’m gald we did! I landed my best bass that day off the Kellen again. In deeper water this time between Carn Du and the Kellen. It was in a lovely shoal of about 10-20 fish, all good size. I dived down next to a pinnacle and as I hit the bricks I saw a big tail disappear round the pinnacle. I thought bugger, I’ve spooked it… but just then the shoal came steaming by, moving quiet fast and in the middle was this beauty. A solid 6 pounder! Very chuffed and my best bass to date.

Thursday I wanted to hunt some Pollock so we decided to dive the Conqueror and Low Lee! Home (ex) of my biggest Pollock. The conditions where great, flat calm and it was a beautiful afternoon.

On arriving at the Conqueror, I did one or two shallowed dives to warm up as it was high water so the Conqueror would be in pretty deep water. As expected I did not see anything special in the first few dives but then I started moving on the wreck. I dived onto what I think is the bow section which is still quite intact and dived onto the deck. Under where I was lying was a lovely big hole under the plates which looked like Pollock heaven, but did not see anyone home on the first dive. I dived it again and this time came right down next to the wreck and had a good look inside, nothing. I was so sure there’d be a lovely sized Pollock sitting in there! Oh well, no matter, lots of area to cover still.  So tried a few other sections of the ship and again never saw anything worth taking for the pot. I moved back up the ship and had another dive on the bow, this time I settled toward the end of the section, looking back up the bow. Been there for a bit and was just thinking about heading back to the land of O2 when over the plate comes a decent Pollock, he saw me and turned but I had the measure of him and got a good shot in. It went bananas though! It took off and immeditaly dived under the plate in the big hole, I finned out from the wreck trying to fight the fish out from under plate while still heading up from some much needed air by this stage! Successfully landed it and was chuffed to take another decent fish on the Conqueror.

From the Conqueror we moved to Low Lee. I had a few dives and had not seen anything major when I changed location a bit and dived a new section I’d not tried before. It was a nice drop-off which had a bit wreck on it, so I dived down the ledge and over the bit of wreckage, I nestled under it to wait… Nothing was coming from around the sides and a focused my attention to some movement from above and to the right. Coming down from the top of the pinnicale was a beautiful Pollock. It came faily quickly and at a bit of a distance, it was a fairly diffcult shot because of the distance but I’m pleased to say I absolutely nailed it and it just rolled over. When I got it up Muddy was sure it was bigger than my record so it was with great excitement we took it home to weigh. In the end it was smaller by 1lb, 10lb. Still a fantastic fish which quite a few people around the village got to enjoy!

The weather changed a bit on us then and we had to wait till Sunday to get out again. We steamed off to the Stannock to see if we could pick up a few bass, it was due to deliver a few! Unfortunately it was quiet again so we steamed to “old faithful”, The Kellen.

I had two drifts on the Kellen taking three fish, one really nice fish of about 4.5lb.

That was to be our last trip on the boat before the harbour closed and glad we got out and took a few fish. All in all a fantastic weeks diving and a good way to end the season off the boat.

Thanks to the skipper Muddy who faithfully steams us around Mounts Bay for little more than getting the piss taken out of him along the way and the odd bass or pollock. Thanks Muddy, it’s really appreciated.