Crystal Sea Trawling Blog

We arrived back into Newlyn yesterday evening after a three day trip, we had good fishing for the time that we were at sea. The lemon fishing has started to come on and we are still seeing a nice few of monks on the ground.

The good news is that the haddocks after an abscense of three mounths have started to turn up again, not a huge  amount but it's a good sign

I had a visitor in the wheelhouse with me on wednesday night, the mist came down and a swallow came down out of the mist and spent the night sleeping in the wheelhouse above the barometer. They usually show this time of year and quite often if it turns foggy they stop aboard to recover and try to regain there bearings.

We are due to sail this afternoon and we are hoping to get a few more days in before another batch of weather arrives on tuesday, so lets hope we can get a bit of fish for the easrer markets. 

A few weeks back we took Tom a student from Falmouth school of photography to sea with us for three days.

He  spent the few days at sea taking pictures of the crew and I at work and  what life was like onboard a trawling at sea.

The pictures turned out really good and what is different is, that they are shot on black and white film which gives a earthy feel to the shots.

I am also delighted to hear from Tom today that he has won an award for his work and he has been given a prize of a scholarship, which is fantastic for him.[video:http://vimeo.com/9480784(300x300] click on title for link

The boat sailed on monday and they are hoping to push through until sunday evening. Alec has the boat away this trip, the weather was good at the start of the trip but it has turned unsettled from the west. The wind has been up and down with sixes and sevens at time's but the fishing isn't to bad, so that helps when its an ucomfortable week at sea.

They have been all over the grounds this week moving around with the tide and they are currently to the south of the scillies, they are seeing a nice bit of monk,lemons,megs, whittens and a few more haddocks are starting to show.

We have been working in amongst the beamers quite a bit recently as they are chasing the monk and sole which swim closer to the coast this time of year, we are also seeing quite a few visiting beamers from Brixham and they have been landing their catches into Newlyn and trucking it to Plymouth for sale.

The netters have been picking away on the wrecks, but the hake netters have had the best of it, with some good catches of hake and lings out to the west.

 The newest arrival to the fleet (Govenek Of Ladram) skipered by Phil mitchel had a really good trip with 240boxes of hake for a seven day trip. We landed into Bryan hoskins lorry with them last sunday, and Phil and the crew were delighted with how the vessel performed and that they had got off to a good start with a prosperous maiden trip.

The Govenek of Ladram was the Regent bird ex fruitful bough and she was up until last year trawling from Fraserbrough, when she was bought by Robin Carter from Exmouth and she underwent a really big refit and conversion into a netter by Macduff shipyards.

She looks a fine ship and Macduff as usuall have done a really good job in converting her and I am sure she will prove to be a good earner for Robin, Phil and the crew.

She is also a sister ship to the Crystal sea being built a few years earlier by macduff, and she is a couple of meters longer, but looks very simalar to the Tranquility.

The fish will be for sale on mndays market, the weather is looking unsettled next week so we may have some broken trips as we try to work in between the exspected gales, at least they are coming from the west.

We have just arrived back in from a five day trip, We have had some good fishing this week, with plenty of lemon sole and dover soles to be had.

We have been working all over this week following the fish as they moved around with the tide and I am glad to see the back of the winter and I am looking foreward to the spring, when the fishing is usually far better for us.

The fresh east

We got back in yestrday evening after a couple of days fishing, this was our secound trip this week, as we landed our catch last friday so we could take advantage of the good prices at the end of last week.

We have been working out to the southered again off the lizard, in the beginning of the trip we were seeing a nice bit of squid and cytlle with some whitings, haddocks brills, sole and