Fishing the nose

Imagine, if you will, that your entire attention is centred on a tiny float, its bright red top swaying this way and that in the breeze as the current seizes hold, then sends it swiftly past the rock upon which you are sitting waiting Anticipating.  

Anticipating

Garfish are great sporting fish though, sadly, not to every body's taste, due to their green bones.  They fight hard on appropriate tackle and oblige throughout the summer and autumn often when other fish decide that they are not going to play!
It was time to leave the boats in the harbour and head out to the rocky coast line of the north coast to try our hand at shore fishing for Garfish known locally as a "Long nose", or as we call them Pokey Nose.
I love fishing for them with a float rod and a small sand eel or strip of garfish. A simple sliding float set up works best, with your bait set from anywhere from 3 metres deep to right up near the surface at about a metre or less. Winter time can be a hard time to get sand eels for a spot of early session flattie bashing out on the banks, so these Gars were destined for the freezer for bait.


Last Sunday and Monday Gaz,Tuc and I went for a few hours.  
Our timing was a little off, and our walk from Fontenelle Bay to Fort le Marchant coincided with a high tide and strong gale force winds combined with torrential rain showers.  Normally a high tide is a good thing as it brings the fish slightly closer to shore, however a high tide combined with a reasonable swell and a strong breeze isn't a safe combination when fishing on an exposed rock.

 For a second or two the float shudders and jerks, held back as if restrained by some invisible force. Then, with a sudden surge, it shoots from the surface and keels drunkenly over on its side. Nor is it alone. A second later a long, silvery body erupts from the water, spraying water in every direction as it lashes the surface with its tail, then abruptly standing on its head it burrows underwater, the line trailing in its wake.
FISH ON...................And that's how we played for the next 3 hours

Fishing the nose 

Float Fished at the end of the the Fort using sand eel and Long nose strips,bites were plentiful and fun and resulted in us catching 16 Garfish....

Pokey Nose