Fishing Report: 25th October 08 - St Osyth, Essex

I'd had such a busy night on my last session at St Osyth I was itching to get back at the place and see if the whispers of a few bigger Codling showing were for real. If I'm being honest I really had too much to do at home but there are times when you just have to satisfy the need for a few hours on the beach and so in the end I decided on the compromise of one rod and a short session amongst the rock groynes just over the wall from the car park.

I arrived at about 7pm and was surprised to find that I wasn't the only angler with the same plan and that my favourite spot was already taken so in the end, after a short walk towards the Martello Tower, I had to settle for the last available bay where I quickly got myself sorted behind the brolly and got a 150 gram DVice, loaded with two good sized baits, out in search of some fish. In sharp contrast to my previous session here, the weather was definitely a bit more like Cod fishing weather and I was glad of the shelter of the brolly to escape what could best be described as "a bit of a blow"!

It was pretty obvious from the start that the recent rough weather had broken up the Whiting shoals that had been here previously so it was never going to be a repeat of my last session, where Whiting were on the baits as they settled on the bottom, but I consoled myself that the lack of Whiting and the rough water might provide a better chance of Codling and stuck to it, chucking out decent sized Black Lugworm baits as far as I could manage into the wind every twenty minutes or so.

The flood was uneventful except for one missed slack-line bite (it always happens when you pour a coffee!) and a couple of smallish Whiting, but I soldiered on in the now strengthening wind, and as soon as the tide turned at about 10:30pm a bit of current appeared and at last I started to get a few bites. A couple of sizable Whiting showed up and eventually a good bite about an hour on the ebb finally produced the sizable Codling I'd come looking for, which came in with a pair of reasonable Whiting attached as well, one hooked on the top trace and the other connected to the top hook of the same Pennel trace as the Codling.

By now I'd had enough of being sandblasted and after a couple more unsuccessful casts in the hope of turning my solitary Codling into a brace I finally decided discretion was the better part of valour and headed back past the now pretty much empty beach towards the car park to meet my lift home, with a final tally of six Whiting (four sizable) and one Codling of about 45cm.