Yet another fantastic day beckoned but…it was Friday so my wife would be home, I was mid-shift and I’d slept badly the previous two days. But like I said, another fantastic day beckoned and I can always sleep when it rains in August. So, a quick text out to everyone, the plan being a hound hunt for another change. The bass fishing may be great and productive and sporting and all that but they need a rest and it’s too same-same to go more than one in three sessions and there’s more to life than bass in my world. Besides, I haven’t had a hound yet this year and I love them!
So, eleven we’d meet. Then I checked the tides. That was no good. The only viable option was to go for nine which was straight after work. That’d be a struggle, I’d need coffee first…my wife was not happy, I had a list of stuff to do and it was a long list and it had to be done and…I said I’d do it after as I’d be back around twelve and not in bed until three. So I went home, did half of it in quarter of an hour and then grabbed bait and the pile of bits I would have put in my pot if it wasn’t stolen a few weeks back; might as well give the various critters some freebies.
Hounds. Long fish. More entries for the Warbird 220 competition and they’d really be a giggle on those reels especially with the soft and short Ice Pike rods. Besides, Ken was starting to gain too much ground of late with his big undulate rays and I’d only come fourth last month! I grabbed the gear and headed across town to Corton with Hopton still closed for work on the beach defences; I think this is affecting the hound fishing at both these marks with the disturbance so perhaps we’d have enough distance down south. Shaun had picked up James whose car was in the garage and the pair of them pulled up behind me.
Ten minutes and we were into a fine, flat sea. Low wind, bright sunshine and bit of tide. A fast paddle out around five hundred yards and we dropped anchor; the tide was ripping through at over three knots which was a surprise but I figured it out once the baits were in. Yes, I’d got luck on my side – with no electronics running I’d stuck myself slap bang onto a drop off, I could tell because the inshore rod went straight around to just past the centreline. I had a single 4/0 on a running leger on this rod with the last pack of frozen blacks being used in conjunction with squid heads on this. The wrong hook size and rig but it was the first that came to hand. A 3ft hooklength on a running leger and I banged it out around fifty yards.
The offshore rod had my favoured 2/0 pennel, again 3ft hooklength and a zip slider. 8oz of lead was required because of the flow and with a whole squid on this one, hooked in the top with the bottom hook pushed down and the head and guts on here, hooked through the eyes. The squid was peeled as the water wasn’t too murky so a bit of visual attraction from the white flesh would be good. Then a quick call to Cleveland Princess to see what was occurring out on the three mile marks; dogs for now but the tide would slow soon and then things would turn on.
We sat there for a hour through zero bites between the three of us. The next hour brought me a few small rattling dropped bites, baits too big for what was likely to be pin whiting. Then a couple of better bites that were dropped as the tide started to slow slightly and the water began to clear. One good one that I missed. So, I rebaited and bashed the body with the butt of my safety knife then raked it lightly with the serrated edge to get the juices flowing…and then the rod nodded. Felt light. Nodded again, felt light again. Nodded again – I’m moving it a foot or so at a time, could I induce a take?
Yes I could!
The tide had dropped off considerably now and the fish ran up towards me so I thought I’d lost the fish and the lead…but mo, I gained the slack line again and with the fish under me I started bringing her up. Not too much of a scrap as yet but that’s often the way here, they’re sedate until they catch sight of my jaws and then they go crackers! Up, up, beautiful in the clear water, good hound! The white stars very vivid on this one and I’d got what I came for and what I miss, I adore these fish, from the skin markings and the eyes to the slender body and solid muscle not to mention the searing runs and hard fight they give. Up, up, alongside, head by my hip and now I need to get her in. Normally a foot below the body and a quick lift does the trick but that wasn’t going to happen right now. So I went for the tail root with Shaun and James looking on…
Ha! My aunt told me, never touch the tail as sharks are ticklish. The moment I grabbed it and started to try and lift her – reaching across the kayak from the other side – she went loopy, writhing and flailing and banging around, water flying everywhere and cooling me down as I got a soaking! The others were wetting themselves with no help from any fish and down she went before I pulled her back up to the surface for round two!
I grabbed the tail again and lifted her in and then set about unhooking and photographing her, one hook in the mouth and the other outside, an easy release. This was when things went wrong. I had no intention of retaining her as although I love eating hound I’ve got enough fish for the time being and wouldn’t really have time to cook for a few day, plus it was a female. So she was going to go back. But no, a large quantity of crushed and semi-digested crab was deposited all over my leg and the kayak which is no issue, but then the stomach was ejected. So there’s a lovely fish with a bag hanging out of its mouth. I couldn’t get it to stay back down so rather than risk wasting her for nothing I decided to knock her on the head and avoid a second day of KFC with lunch for the three of us. James had wanted to try one anyway so my reluctance was tempered with the knowledge she wouldn’t go to waste. 91cm and nine pounds or so of solid muscle was duly deposited in the tankwell and another bait went down.
Well, from then on it was a few rattles, a few knocks and two definite hound pulls but with no hook ups and the tide stopped so quickly that the peak time was short lived, especially as hounds trace routes so tend to come along in bursts then return after a while for another round. With the yaks now starting to drift towards the anchors and the leads starting to snag it was time to head in.
An easy landing and there ahead were forty kids from my daughter’s school. We dragged the kayaks up and then I heard “Excuse me mister can we look at your fish please?” and “Is that a shark?”. So yeah, I showed it to them…and then made the offer of an anatomy lesson, something I used to do on the beach years ago abroad whenever we brought sharks in. So, the different fins, the markings, the gills and ampoullae of lorenzini, the eyes and the teeth pads. Then, after warning the ones of lighter dispositions that it’d be messy, I slit her open and showed the stomach (sadly empty of curse) and digestive system, the eggs, the livers and so on. “Has it got a heart?” So, I cut up to the head and found the heart and showed them that and then they had to return to school. One asked me if I could cut the nose off; I did and then exposed the jelly in there and explained about that too. Then my daughter’s street cred went up (she wasn’t there) when I said that she went to that school and came ‘shark fishing’ with me sometimes. Some of them knew her and her geography teacher was one of the staff; she asked me if I worked for CEFAS too which was quite amusing, she must have been impressed!
Right. Hot day, midday, a hound and close to home…we loaded up and shot back to mine; San Miguel into the freezer and within half an hour of pulling anchor the hound was finned, skinned, the spine removed and the flesh chunked, rinsed, tossed in salt and self raising flour and then deposited into the deep fat fryer in a couple of batches. Out came the chutney and a couple of different chilli sauces and after a few minutes the crispy nuggets were out and on the plate for the three of us to scoff, letting my wife and her friend have a taste. The verdict? Up there with cod and bass and very sustainable to boot, beating yesterday’s KFC. Not a bad result for Friday the thirteenth!
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