IRSA Sea Angling

IRSA & CSSC National Open Shore Angling Championships 2003

IRSA National Open Shore Angling Championships 2003

As with the previous year IRSA shore anglers combined their own IRSA NOSAC event with the CSSC NOSAC held at Loch Etive, near Oban, Scotland on 8 November 2003.

Ten keen anglers from England and Wales travelled the long and winding miles to Oban. Some took the high road and some the low, and a few found themselves crossing the Erskine Bridge (goes across the Firth of Clyde when skirting Glasgow) in both directions and that’s just on their way to Oban. We can only imagine what happened on the way home after the local malt from the Oban distillery had kicked in. I did not ask.

Compared to the bashing we took at Abersoch, Wales last year the day before the competition was Scotland’s hottest November day on record, calm, warm and sunny. So the question on the competitors lips was would the local fish appear next day wearing sun oil and shades or would they have gone looking for a cool place to hang out? Whatever sixteen woolly jumpers per competitor as a precaution against the expected icy north wind was now looking more than a bit over the top.

Our scenic venue on Loch Etive was in front of a church and accessed by a single-track road. Although having had the assurances of parking in the church car park clearly a young couple who had decided to tie the knot had not been warned and decided to bring half the highlands with them. Our chaps did as best they could and even parked on the beach while we all were serenaded by the bagpipes at the church.

And the fishing……(Oh yes we had started the match by this time)….. but instead of watching our rods and lines all competitors eyes were still on the church and approach road. Guest’s cars were now strewn along this single-track road for half a mile or more and many obviously had not expected to have to walk so far in their high heels (no silly – the men were wearing kilts it’s the women in Scotland who wear the high heels and trousers). Then the expected gasps as the bride, in a gleaming white Rolls Royce, approached. Would she or wouldn’t she? That was the question now as quite clearly there was no way that ‘roller’ was going to make it to the church on time along that single-track road littered with cars.

Guests were summoned from the church and cars were turned into off-road vehicles, reversed into ditches and moved out of the way of the Rolls. But as no-one came to move one car four burly gents in kilts decided to ‘bump it off the road’. What a sight! But eventually the bride made it to the church and the pipes ceased for a while.

And the fishing? Oh yes, about an hour later bride and groom emerged from the church having obviously decided to ‘go through with it after all’. Confetti, photographs and more bag-pipes. Yes a splendid morning had by all.

And the fishing? Well, after all the excitement had died down most of us realised we had been fishing for best part of two hours and not had a single bite yet. Maybe the fish didn’t like weddings or perhaps was it the pipes? The sun would soon be going down behind the mountains and there was now ‘promise’ on the shores or that darkening loch.

Loch Etive proved and interesting venue to say the least. We started fishing at low tide and some competitors casting nearly 100 yards or more found their lines came to rest ‘almost straight down’. Yes we were in effect fishing off the edge of an underwater cliff that plummeted some 250 feet straight down. But that was not the bottom of it as for those who could whack out their bait well over 100 yards got over a further ledge and found another seemingly endless drop. As the tide came in and anglers were pushed further up the shore it became increasingly difficult to get tackle back over the ledges. But we had come to catch a fish that lives in such depths and the elusive* Spurdog (*that means non-of us actually saw one never mind caught one) that apparently averaged around eight pounds, was our intended quarry. We carried on in hope non-the-less.

There was the occasional break in the excitement (or was it the lack of it) by the wonderfully weird and spiny Spider Crab population that decided they liked our fish baits that were of course aimed at the Spurdog. The crabs also provided some good exercise, which became increasingly more arduous the further up the beach and further we got away from the first ledge.

There was also the odd shout from small groups of the forty odd anglers spread out along the beach as a wayward Whiting or Gurnard found its way onto hooks intended for much bigger prey. A solitary Dogfish turned up as well as a single small Pollack and a few underfed Codling but still no Spurdog. As usual fish were measured by length rather than weighed-in and were returned to the water alive, however, my five-metre flexible builders ruler was just a tad under stretched on this occasion. Ah well we would be back at the hotel soon and after a hearty meal of mince, neeps and tatties the bar would be open for a welcome wee dram, till the early hours.

John Downing took first place in the IRSA competition being the only IRSA angler to catch two fish (both codling). Iain Colquhoun (yours truly) was surprised to find  himself in second place with a solitary Gurnard that beat Alwyn Jones’ codling by only three centimetres. John’s codling of 35 cms meant that places for both longest (aggregate) bag and longest individual fish went to the same competitors.

CSSC NOSAC

John’s pair of codling also carried him into the prizes in the CSSC competition by giving him a first place in the Longest Bag and a second in the longest fish competition. Out of 49 anglers only 12 recorded a fish on the day and of these 12 we had six IRSA anglers. There were no flat fish recorded and prizes were allocated to the other categories.