Fishing forecast for Chesil Beach, Portland & Weymouth. 23rd Spetember 2012

It’s a pretty mean Easterly wind blowing at the moment. High tide Weymouth is just after midday. If you want to catch a Bass then get yourself to Preston Beach armed with some Peeler Crab or a nice flank of Mackerel and catch the top of the tide. If you don’t fancy the idea of battling the weather on a Sunday afternoon, then you could take advantage of the shelter offered by Chesil and head there. Reports are that there are lots of plaice coming all along the beach, even up to Ferrybridge. As usual the larger numbers are coming from West Bexington. Have a look at the video below to get an idea of conditions on Preston Beach

I am most likely going to be staying away from the fishing today as I have had a manic week, fishing almost everyday, so I am exhausted. I have to say that it has been one of my best weeks fishing for a very long time. Sunday was just amazing for Bass, with plenty caught between my friend Ade and myself. The 9lb Bass was probably the highlight of the week, but I had lots of other memorable fish as well. What really made the week fantastic was meeting a great bunch of people through my guiding. Every one of them was keen to learn and took the information on board and all left having caught fish and learned new techniques. I have had emails back from a few of them telling me they took the knowledge and techniques and have gone on to catch more fish. One of them went out the next morning and landed a 4lb Bass on a surface lure.

Changes to the website!! I have been saying for quite a time that I have been working on version 3 of the website. This is now nearing completion of its early stages. I hope to start rolling it out this week. Hopefully everything will go smoothly, but just in case it all goes horribly wrong and the site crashes, then just bare with me and I will get it back up as soon as I can.  The new site will still have almost daily forecasts, but I will be focusing a lot more on putting in information of marks, techniques, lures, bait and reviews.

I am looking to extend the area that I currently cover (Cogden to Kimmeridge) I am hoping to go further West past Lyme Regis and East covering at least the Poole and Bournemouth area and into the Solent if possible. If anyone would like to help me provide a similar coverage to the areas that you live or fish, no matter how localised, then please get in touch.

Water Temperature: 16.2*c             Weymouth High Tide: 12.27am, 1.71m

Wind: E 28mph gusting to 38mph

Sea Conditions:

Chesil Beach: Small waves with a swell of around 1.8m with clear water

Portland: Rough around the Bill and on the East side. The West side has a fairly large swell sometimes exceeding 2m.

Portland Harbour: Small waves increasing into early afternoon with slightly coloured water.

Weymouth Bay: Rough with a large Surf running on Preston beach, the water is colouring up quite quickly. Weed could be a problem

Chesil Beach forecast: The beach will remain fishable despite the high winds this afternoon. It may push the mackerel further off, but it should have very little effect on the Bream and Plaice fishing. Night tides at Cogden and Bexington have produced some very good catches of Sole, some exceeding 3lb. Most have been caught on fresh Black Lug. This is not the normal blow or yellow tail lug that we can dig from the local beaches. Black Lug is normally longer and sticky. It is normally sold in wraps from the tackle shops. It is quite a popular frozen bait, but my opinion of it as a frozen bait is similar to that of frozen Peeler, don’t waste your money.

Portland: The Wrasse fishing wont be too good on the Island today. The Wrasse don’t like to be battered about by the swell amongst the rocks, so they seem to move into deeper water, normally out of casting range. The Pollock will be less effected and the Bass positively like rough conditions. If it is safe then it would be worth having a go with a dark red or pink lure in the white water for a Bass.

Portland Harbour: Whilst I have been writing this I suddenly remembered fishing a mark in the harbour in similar conditions last year. I was using a surface lure and lost a huge Bass and hooked another of around 4lb, so I might just give Castletown a go and drag myself out into the rain.

Weymouth Bay: Lots of Mullet in the harbour and some of them are huge. They seem to be feeding quite aggressively before they move off to open water. Lots of different species coming from both piers, with sizeable Wrasse and Pollock on the Stone Pier..

Boat & Kayak fishing: Not a day to be out on the Kayak that’s for sure. However those that can launch a boat from Portland harbour can take advantage of the sheltered offered by the breakwater arms. Thornback Ray, Bass, Pollock and Garfish are the main target species A few Black Bream might also be on the cards.

I went out on a boat guiding session yesterday with Richard, his girlfriend Sarah and his Dad John. Richard has a lovely 8m Aluminium boat that he has done a lot of work on to create a wonderful fishing boat. The idea of the session yesterday was to get a feel of what was around and how to fish a number of local marks. We ended up with 8 different species including Sarah catching a Cuttlefish. Despite joining the Charter Fleet out at lights in one near the Bill for Bream and Plaice, the most successful mark was around the Hood entrance and Balaclava Bay. Sarah managed the Cuttlefish on a Squid jig.

I have very limited slots available in September for guiding and one to one sessions., but I still have quite a few for October. Don’t miss out on the best months fishing. These can be tailored to your requirements including mixed days of bait and lure fishing. Drop me an email for more details [email protected]