THE ULTIMATE ANGLING BUCKET LIST

Plymouth and some of the surrounding ports played less to the holiday crowds. But even there the
pursuit was tarnished, and for many years had virtually little if any following at all except for 'proper'
anglers fishing over in Ireland.
The discovery of good but short lived porbeagle fishing along Cornwall's north coast was probably
another nail in blue shark fishing's coffin.
Obviously, some blue sharks were still caught both sides of Lands End. But not in either the size or
quantity range previously seen. And so it remained for many years until Andrew Alsop revived interest
in the species with his exploits out of Milford Haven in Wales.
There he has located and catches vast
numbers of very good fish, many going over
a hundred pounds, and some even topping the
two hundred pound mark, including one
which had it been brought ashore would have
bettered the British record.
Instead however, it was weighted at sea at
222 pounds before being released, which
thankfully they all are these days, providing
a good solid platform for the species to
recover as evidenced not only by an increase
in average size, but catches of up to sixty fish
and more in a single day.
Wayne Comben, dinghy Blue Shark
July 2016 saw a second record plus blue
shark of 242 pounds estimated and released
by another of Andrew Alsops clients out of Milford Haven, the captor this time being Danny Fitch. And
again no record claim will be either made, or entertained by the British Record Fish Committee, because
yet again the fish was not killed and weighed on solid ground as per the BRFC antiquated rules.
As for my own recent personal exploits, these have mainly be out from Hugh Town on the Isles of
Scilly, fishing the deep water fringing the south east of St. Mary's.
Back in the 1980's when I first visited the place, we would get the occasional bird watcher booking on
the trip too, as besides drawing in sharks, a rubby dubby slick will also draw in a wide variety of open
water sea birds picking up fish particles floating on the surface.
It was something of a novelty back then, which if nothing else gave you more fishing room on the boat.
How things have changed. I was back there in 2006 by which time it was groups of specialist bird
watchers booking the trips and me tucking in amongst them with the whole fishing well virtually to
myself.
Better still, the twitchers would bring along additional rubby dubby of their own to help attract more
feathered interest. To me the birds were all 'seagulls,' but the twitchers would be literally wetting
themselves with excitement over species like wilson's petrel and fork tailed skua, which are just a couple
of the names imprinted on my brain.
We'd be out a long way in some quite big seas at times too. But don't let that rule out the prospects of
dinghy fishing for blue sharks which Graeme Pullen and Wayne Comben have done with great success
on a couple of occasions recently out from Falmouth.
Obviously you have to pick your day to be heading right off, which they did. There is however the fall
back situation at Falmouth of staying inshore if conditions further off are not too good.
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