The sun rises early in May, and I drove east and directly into it for almost an hour before reaching Thortonloch. I was out searching for pollack and codling off Dunbar and this is nice little beach to launch from. I very much prefer the quiet of the early morning before the world awakes as my launches are always smoother without an audience 🙂
Once afloat, I nosed my Longliner out of the shallow bay before opening the throttle. Conditions were smooth and it took only minutes to reach my target, a well known and well broken inshore wreck.
Initial drifts with bait produced little interest but established that the drift was glacially slow. Switching over to spinning gear encouraged some activity and I started pulling a few codling aboard.
A little later, my rhubarb and custard shad was nobbled by something larger which fought back hard. A few deep dives and anxious moments later I netted a lovely pollack and lifted it aboard.
This was a cracking pollack by Dunbar standards, and not as beat up looking as many are this early in the season.
Without decent scales aboard I just measured the length at 77cm, which equates to around the 10lb mark. Probably a bit less at this time of year, post spawning, but still my best pollack from Dunbar.
Popping the fish back to meet my filleting knife another day, I carried on fishing. Bait remained useless, but leadhead shads and minnows continued to take a steady toll. Good fun on light gear too!
The sea remained flat and the drift very slow, so I just had a relaxed time and enjoyed the morning. As is often the case, the fish were really a bonus.
Codling greatly outnumbered the pollack but I did manage three in total.
And no east coast trip would be complete without a few coalfish!
Back ashore, I retrieved without incident despite the soft sand at the top of the beach. I do thorough recommend the use of boards under your wheels though – particularly under the trailer wheels. You don’t need ones as large as this, and just little kitchen chopping boards will really help prevent bogging down.
nice fishing is it easy to park thinking of a sib setting it up on beach never been there its amazing after often shore fishing torness only 80 miles from where i live
Lots of people launch sibs at Torness/Thortonloch and parking is OK (may get busy in summer, and I can’t remember if you have to pay or not). A 4WD should manage to get on the beach OK using the slipway, but otherwise it can be a real slog to get from your car to the waterside – even my smallish sib is hard going on soft sand.
going to have a drive up for low tide on the next big tides thanks for the info im just going for a look might take a beach or spinning rod
Wow, what a North sea pollack – beauty! Great footage and storyline as ever.
Anawesome pollack for this bit of North Sea Doug – a real beauty.