This Is Guernsey

By Len Le Page

THE Jennings family have a stranglehold on the West Coast Sea Angling Club’s Summer League.

George, who already had a huge lead in the competition, added no fewer than nine qualifying fish since the beginning of June to further increase his domination.

He now has 15 species for 726.81%. His recent entries were 15-0-4 pollack, 2-14-0 pout, 15-0-6 ling, 1-0-13 cuckoo wrasse, 2-10-14 ballan wrasse, 5-6-7 bass, 30-0-0 tope, 1-3-6 red gurnard and 3-1-10 black bream.

Rob, who was languishing in seventh place, went one better and entered 12 qualifiers.

They pushed him up to second spot with 12 species for 510.42%. His entries were 2-6-10 lesser-spotted dogfish, 1-0-6 pout, 5-13-8 brill, 4-7-0 ballan wrasse, 1-2-0 cuckoo wrasse, 1-1-0 mackerel, 27-15-0 conger, 11-9-10 bull huss, 25-0-0 tope and 2-13-2 black bream.

Shane Huxster has come from nowhere to take over third place.

He has five species for 282.48%, with all five qualifiers coming on the same trip. He boated a 1-13-2 pout, 13-15-2 bull huss, 2-3-8 lesser-spotted dogfish, 1-1-5 red gurnard and a 2-8-4 black bream.

Fourth is Adie Exall, who had one qualifier, an 11-0-1 pollack, which takes his score up to five species for 205.46%.

Mark Addlesee had a 9-3-8 pollack, 1-6-10 lesser-spotted dogfish and a 4-6-9 ballan wrasse to occupy fifth spot with four species for 164.60%.

Lee Gillot is sixth, his three qualifiers – 13-3-8 cod, 19-9-0 ling and 1-12-15 pout – giving him 135.17%.

Tim Froome is seventh – a 17-1-5 turbot and 12-5-5 bull huss giving him 132.07%.

Martin Mourant and Bernie Le Gallais, who had blank months, are eighth and ninth with scores of 116.92% and 92.49%.

The league’s top 10 is completed by Dave Vaudin who boated a 13-13-8 bull huss for 84.87%.

A measure of the Jennings’ dominance is their lead in the league’s pairs competition. They have 1,207.23%, while Shane Huxster and Jack Thoume have 282.48% and Mark Addlesee and Martin Mourant 281.52%.

The club members have had a busy time for they also fished an all-day on Herm match. The event attracted 10 anglers, but only three found fish, all landing grey mullet.

Shane Huxster had two for 6-4-0 and 65 points, Steve Huxster a 2-12-0 fish for 31 points and Glen Cortez a 1-14-0 fish worth 27.5 points.

The members actually landed 15 mullet, but 11 were under the club’s 43cm size limit.

The match did have an effect on the overall championship for Shane Huxster, who has won the club championship for the last three years, has now gone up to the top spot in this year’s list.

OVER the last seven or eight years white bream have been caught in Jersey.

This species’ normal habitat is the warmer waters of the Mediterranean so it is no surprise that they were first reported in the warm water outfall of Jersey’s power station.

At first they were small fish, just a few ounces, but they grew and spread out to other marks in Jersey, to the point where the Jersey and Channel Island shore records have been pushed up to 1-10-11.

There was much speculation about the possibility of them spreading out to the other Channel Islands. This has now occurred.

Andy Marquis was float fishing with a bread bait at the Salerie when he hooked a 0-2-5 specimen.

After being given a very detailed examination its identity was confirmed and it was formally weighed before being returned alive.

A record claim has been submitted and once it has been approved it will appear on the mini record list.

Apparently there was a shoal of these fish, so more could well be caught in the future. And if Jersey’s experience is anything to go by, the weights should quickly increase.

The bream is similar in looks to the black bream, but it has vertical black stripes on the body and a distinctive black spot at the beginning of the tail.

JOE COLLENETTE has entered a shore-caught bass in the July Fish of the Month competition.

He was spinning with an artificial lure at the Alderney lighthouse when he hooked a 9-5-0 specimen. It will be judged against the 18-6-5 Bailiwick shore record.

The young angler has also entered his catch in the Phoenix Fish Bass competition.

Junior angler Brandon La Touche has submitted an entry in respect of a turbot, which he caught at Godine.

The 15-1-14 flattie was tempted by a mackerel fillet presented on a running leger. It will be assessed against 30-4-0 Bailiwick boat best.

One surprising fact from this month’s FOM contest was that all of the first four entries received came from junior anglers.

The first entry from a senior angler came from Walter de la Mare.

He legered a peeler crab from a north-east coast mark and caught a 6-7-2 gilthead bream, which will be judged against the 8-8-8 shore record.

THE Collenette Jones award for the heaviest bass of the month in the Bailiwick Bass Club went to Ross Le Brun for his 8-4-10 specimen.

During June, eight club members weighed in a total of 11 shore-caught fish.

Steve Greenway topped the catches with bass of 7-2-9 and 5-6-9 for a 12-9-2 total.

Two other members landed two, Ben Mahy 6-8-4 and 4-0-9 and Jason Brouard 5-12-0 and 4-3-11.

Members with a single fish were Jon Collenette 7-2-5, Ed Downing 5-14-4, Mick Damarell 5-5-2 and Glen Cortez 4-5-5.

The current championship leader Shane Bentley had a blank month but has retained his overall lead.

Ben Mahy has taken over the runner-up spot from Mick Damarell.

It is all very close in the pairs competition, with only 7-2-0 covering the top three.

Jason Brouard/Ben Mahy have nine bass for 42-6-5, Mick Damarell/Shane Branquet have seven for 37-14-1 and Shane Bentley/Paul McLaren six for 35-4-5.

THE Guernsey Sea Anglers’ Club juniors have beaten the seniors in their annual match for the Marquand Cup.

The juniors are awarded 120 bonus points, but must be congratulated in giving the experienced senior team a very competitive match.

The two teams of six were taken to the Canupes for the three-hour evening event.

All the anglers found fish, the total catch consisting of 101 pollack, 11 mackerel, two red gurnard, one bass and one Couch’s sea bream.

One measure of the juniors’ success was the fact that two of the youngsters had the first and second-best catches of the match.

Lyndon Le Billon had two mackerel, seven pollack, one bass and the Couch’s sea bream for 14-7-0 and 150.75 points, while Sam Teed had 10 pollack and four mackerel for 16-8-0 and 120 points.

The top senior was John Davey who is enjoying a good competitive season. He boated 11 pollack, one mackerel and one red gurnard for 18-3-0 and 119.75 points.

The seniors’ points total was 563.5 while the juniors had 514.25 plus the 120 bonus pints for a winning score of 634.25.

Article posted on 22nd July, 2009 - 2.29pm