Continuing rough seas have kept any mackerel well offshore with none reported from any of the regions piers at the time of writing. On the plus side, increasing numbers of smaller cod are moving inshore looking to feed on freshly peeled crab. In addition there are quality dabs showing from all the clean ground areas and night time sessions have produced some big summer whiting from several of the regions piers. At Hartlepool, Colin Gordon and an angling friend had an all night session and reported cod up to 2lb taking crab baits together with some big dabs and good conditioned whiting on worm. They also had a rare species for the area, a small smoothound around the 2lb mark.
Flounders are the mainstay of match anglers and the Cumbrian shoreline continues to be a popular location for travel matches. Seaton Sluice had a match at Port Carlisle and found plenty of flounders feeding. Martin Pygall won with twenty-one for 694cm, Chris Guthrie had nineteen for 646cm, including the heaviest fish at 2lb 2oz, Mal McIntyre had sixteen for 530cm and Andrew Stanford had ten for 308cm.
Ryhope A.C. fished a club match at the Copthorne Hotel on the Tyne and struggled a little with lots of fresh rain water in the river but still managed a few bigger flounders. Stu Bland won zone A with ten fish for 259cm, including a fine flounder of 44cm. Second in the zone John Lovett had six for 223cm ahead of Alan Marsh with five for 195cm and Andy Rutherford who had five for 192cm. In zone B Paul Richardson had twelve for 420cm to take top spot ahead of runner-up Bill Bell with fifteen for 366cm. Third place went to Joe Wilton with eight for 177cm and Derek Ross had five measuring 163cm. The longest fish was a flounder of 42cm taken by John Robson and top junior was Mason Burton with five for 125cm.
S.B.R.A.A.C. also fished at the Copthorne Hotel where Kevin Moffat won with nine fish for 236cm, Steve Alexander had seven for 194cm and Phil Smithson had three for 73cm.
Tynemouth retired members fished Tynemouth pier for mixed bags of dabs and plaice. Tony Taylor had four dabs and one plaice for 2¾lb while second placed Dave Bentley had three dabs and a plaice for 2½lb, best 1lb 5oz and Neil Garner had a dab and a plaice for 1lb 7oz to take third.
Heavy seas forced the last Saltburn A.C. match into the Tees estuary where Nick Westgarth had a run away victory with twenty-three coalfish, four flounders and a bass for 653cm. Runner-up Bernard Westgarth had eighteen coalfish, two flounders and two bass for 431cm ahead of third placed Dave Thompson who measured eight coalfish, two bass and a flounder for 238cm. Steve Aldred took the longest fish with a bass of 35cm.
The St. Mary’s rover match saw thirteen out of seventeen find fish. Darren Lister won with two cod, two flounders, two eels and a single pouting for 5lb. Craig Dalton had four eels, best 1¾lb, for a 3lb 10oz total and second place and in third Mick Smith had two flounders for 2lb 1oz.
