[crazyplums]

i dunno if this is the same around the country or not (it wasn't on the IOW two weeks back) but,

this time of year, around eastbourne / pevensey, with the start of the 'may-rot' algae bloom, comes big pout, often caught on baits intended for bigger fish, say... whole fillet on 4/0 pennel ! but, they're as skanky as hell, look near to death, bags of bones kinda thing, very skinny and generally in poor health,

i had one last night, first since about last may/june, which looked awful, ordinarily it would be a 1lb 8oz+ fish (a good shore pout for our beach), but i bet this thing struggled to reach a pound,

does anyone know why we have this at this time of year ? is there a bad lack of food out there ? reduced oxygen levels due to the algae in the water ?

anyone ?

 

[Pelamid]

Like a lot of the cod family pout will probably have just finished spawning.
Not much left of their body reserves after that. Guess that's why they get so greedy.

 

[big guy]

yeah lack of food, hence why they gorge on our baits. it will be interesting to see if we get better numbers of pout than last year.

 

[crazyplums]

thank you, just remembered this post and mentioned to the mrs that it may be due to spawning, seems that may be the case ! thanks for the replies.

 

[Bagstar]

When I saw the title to the thread, I thought it was about Posh Spice!!