Yesterday saw me out enjoying the sunshine on arguably the best skipper/boat combination on the south coast - Steve Porter and his "True Blue" out of Poole. It was planned as a Bream trip but the cool sea temperatures meant that Bream were likely to be few and far between.
Despite this Steve had a full boat of regulars and we were happy to go out hunting the elusive Bream but do a bit of scratching too for anything that may appear, the intended mark off the Purbecks being one that can turn up just about anything 
On the flood tide there was little action, just a couple of Dogfish, a small Spotted Ray and the odd small Wrasse so as the tide dropped off we moved location to have a drift over the ledge at St Aldhelm's Head as Steve had a tank full of live sandeel (he'd been out on the Shambles Bank the day before with a charter and they'd not only caught a dozen or so of very nice Turbot but had also got a net full to bursting with sandeel)
We were hoping for a few Pollack by drifting with live sandeel but surprisingly got hit by biggish Ballan Wrasse, this one being about the biggest at around 3lb (and it was caught by me) 
I've never heard of wrasse being caught on live sandeel before so this was a first for me
Whilst drifting we kept seeing big shoals of fish at mid-depth which I hoped were Mackerel but after a few of us switched to feathers we soon discovered were Herring - Yum! Grilled Herring in Oatmeal for tea
On the ebb tide we headed back to the Bream mark and started getting classic Bream bites but frustratingly kept missing them until Eric (one of we regulars) landed a couple of plump male keeper-size Bream. We knew that the Bream were there now so Steve decided to keep us out in the sunshine for a bit longer in the hope that the Bream now were more active. Sadly we only had a couple more tentative rattles, no real bites so decided to head for home.
It was a great day's fishing though Glorious sunshine, good company, enough fish being caught to keep us interested and some of the best scenery in Dorset to view on the way to and from the mark - can't fault it....
P.S. I'm back out after the Bream in a couple of weeks when hopefully the sea temperature will have risen enough to bring lots of Bream in rather than the odd one or two we've been seeing.
