GBASS Secretary Andy Hockey gives us a full report on the event from the picturesque Channel Island…
The weather was fair with a stiff westerly breeze at the start of the weekend, but anglers managed to find themselves parts of the island to fish in.
212 people entered Guernsey’s premier fishing festival comprising 118 shore anglers, 56 boat anglers and 38 entrants choosing to fish both shore and boat. There was a chance to win all manner of categories, from the main shore and boat prizes to kayak, dinghy, best lure caught, best visitor fish and many others. There was also a bar of silver for ‘fish of the day’ in shore and boat with the tag line of ‘a bar of silver for a bar of silver’.
39 shore fish were weighed in; 12 in the 3lb bracket,19 in the 4lb bracket, 5 in the 5lb bracket, two bass of 6lb with the winning shore bass being a 7-3-0 caught by local angler Glen Cortez free lining a live sand eel.
Glen, using a Daiwa spinning reel coupled with Daiwa Tournament 8 braid, was fishing with friends and he was aware that one of them had lost a big fish earlier in the session, snapping her trace off on a reef. Having hooked his fish, Glen slid it onto the shore and saw line hanging from the fish’s mouth. Worried it was a ‘double hook up’ Glen checked it wasn’t attached and sure enough, his friend confirmed that it was her trace in the fish’s mouth so it must have been the one she lost.
The best junior angler from the shore was Bailey Tulie (12yrs) who weighed in a healthy 5-13-0 bass also free lining a sand eel. Bailey was woken at 4am by his dad Dean to take him free lining. Dean himself a keen angler, hadn’t had much success over the weekend and Bailey hooked into a fish early on, out-fishing his dad by landing a healthy 5lb bass. Whilst Dean was weighing this fish, he heard a shout of ‘Dad’ and when he got to Bailey he was sliding his second 5lb bass onto the shoreline!
21 boat fish made the grade. 4 in the 4lb bracket, 5 in the 5lb bracket, 3 x 6lb fish, 4 x 7lb fish, 2 x 8lb, 2 x 9lb and the 10-3-6 winner.
The boat section had a family affair about it with the winning boat fish being caught by local junior angler Joe Collenette (15yrs) who scooped both the overall boat champion prize and the junior prize. Joe snatched the junior prize away from his younger brother Dan Collennette (9yrs) who had been leading the section all weekend with a healthy 7-6-7 bass caught on a lure from a dinghy.
Dan had been trolling a lure when it got smashed by the 7lb-er which came up to the surface and then began diving down under their dinghy. Dan’s dad Jon was giving the instructions to Dan as his rod was doubled over in the fight, giving Dan the fight of his life. When the fish was finally brought to the boat Jon wanted to make sure it had no chance of escape and whilst grabbing the fish it gave a final lunge and Jon ended up with a treble hook in his finger for his troubles!
Overall the festival was a huge success and enjoyed by all anglers even if they didn’t manage to weigh in a fish.
GBASS would like to thank Daiwa for their continued support of this festival. Daiwa’s sponsorship provides the backbone for the festival and offers all anglers an opportunity to fish for quality tackle and prizes. This festival continues to be ‘the one’ that many bass anglers want to get their name on and this is evidenced by the 212 entrants both local and non-local.
