Last year I had a couple of action packed trips to the Exe Estuary catching small bass – the kind of trip where the rod tip is rattling as soon as the baits hit the water. Coupled with digging our own lugworm right where we were fishing made for a fun few hours each time. With a weekend free looming I suggested revisiting the Exe and to my surprise one of my daughters agreed to join me.
We arrived just before low tide, and with glorious weather I felt supremely confident. We crossed the railway and walked along the foreshore to the spot where we’d cross out to the sandbank at low tide. There we aimed to dig our bait and start fishing – all hopefully with a couple of hours before the tide turned and forced us to retreat off the sandbank.
Half hour before low water and there still seemed to be a lot of water between us and the sand bank. We waited it out and low tide came and went with no chance of us being able to get out to the sandbank. Frustrated we headed back to the car and call it off. I double checked the tide times when we got home and confirmed that we’d got the time of low water correct. Where we had gone wrong was that it was a neap tide so the low water wasn’t as low as the other times I’d obviously fished the mark previously. It wasn’t something I’d considered before but we chalked it up as a learning experience…
The following weekend was a bigger tide, with a corresponding lower low-water. The weather looked ok if a bit windy. I was feeling lazy and decided to buy some bait rather than rely on digging it and popped into the local tackle shop on the way. They didn’t have any fresh worm so I picked up a wrap of frozen black lugworm and resigned myself to digging at least some fresh whilst there.
Parking up, crossing the railway line and walking down to the mark, felt a little like deja vu but this time the difference in water level was apparent. On top of that whilst the weather was sunny the wind was pretty savage! Cold and not very enjoyable! We made our way out to the sand bank, set up, got the rods out in the water with the frozen lug for baits. Whilst Rhianna watched the rods I dug some bait – or rather tried to dig some bait… Pickings were slim and I only managed to dig half a dozen fresh worm. We had had no bites by the time I had finished digging worms which really wasn’t looking promising.
From this point we fished one of the rods with the fresh worm and kept frozen on the other. We had a couple of bites on the fresh lug and managed to land a small bass to save us from blanking but the frozen lug didn’t get a sniff. Half a dozen fresh worm didn’t last long and given how few and far between they were, I wasn’t inclined to exert myself digging for more. With the wind making fishing uncomfortable and the tide now pushing back up we retreated off the sand bank.
It goes to show the value of knowing the effect of tides on a venue. The value of fresh bait was really demonstrated as well quite starkly on this occasion too.
A Fledgling Fly Fisher 