Fishing forecast for Chesil Beach, Weymouth, Portland & Kimmeridge Bay. 7th April 2012

Looks like it will be another fine if not dull day today, but a fairly breezy day could be in store for us tomorrow, especialy later on in the afternoon. Very big tides this weekend will herald quite a lot of changes to the species that we will start to see around the local marks.

Wind forecast: Mainly NE 10mph. Current wind: NE 5mph

Sea conditions:  Calm with very little swell, with very clear water on all marks , 9.6*c Weymouth HW 8.25pm  2.4m high.

Shore fish forecast: With a very big tide today and tomorrow the marks such as West Bexington, Abbotsbury and Cogden that have been fishing well, will not do anywhere near as well as they have been. Basically the tide flow is too fast for the fish to feed. They keep tight to the bottom and wait for the slack water periods over high and low water, and looking at the tidal flow charts, those periods are going to be short. Certainly not worth driving for 2 hours to end up sitting on the beach having your bait stripped by spider crabs in minutes and not even getting a knock. The best days for fishing these marks are a couple of days after the big tides.

Night time fishing all along the beach is producing nice Smoothound with lots of Dogfish and Pout. Mackerel are in abundance.

Portland and the rock marks along the Purbecks have come alive this week, with lots of Bass and Pollock being caught on lures

Bass on a Rapture lure

The large tides mean that the rafts of weed along the rock marks will get lifted into the water. The maggots and other larvae that live amongst the weed get deposited into the water. The Mullet and Bass gorge themselves on this free feast. Try using a lure that is a very shallow or sub surface lure.

Boat forecast: Big tides normally mean that Plaice and Turbot fishing is a bit limited on the Shambles, However catch the tides when they are not running as hard and you will have some great results. It just means moving to different parts of the bank and maybe other marks in the vicinity. You can buy an Admiralty tidal strength and direction book for Portland Bill. It is worth every penny as it shows you the tidal strength and direction for every hour of the flood and ebb.

Those getting out to the offshore wrecks will see some nice Pollock as well as some early Cod.