Forums Forums Enthusiast Forums A - Z Fishing Most memorable fishing experiences

Hi all, I just thought id inject some fun into this forum. So as the title poses, what is or what are your most memorable fishing experiences. We can start this topic off about experiences made in the waters of the Wirral and surrounding areas such as Cheshire, North Wales. If you think you have too many to mention then start the ball rolling an we can go through as many as you like.

I was born NOT to fish ?

Way back when i was a school lad we all had fishing rods and spinners attached for the mackerel season on the sea pier. Those were the days.

On this summers day there was 8 - 12 of us all casting off the pier into the sea and pulling in mackerel pretty much every other cast bar me lol.

I swapped places with a few of the lads thinking it was just they were getting them all before me. Nope nothing. I even went as far as swapping rods and nothing, but to rub it in they caught fish on my rod n spinner when we did swap.

I knew from that day the only way i would enjoy fish would be from the dam chippy lol


lol

There are a number of reasons as to why you weren't catching so go easy on yourself.

I recall fishing with my best mate Paul and a few others down the pump dock. The channel that joins the 2 docks together was amazing for eels. It sad around the time that the white boat "Sarsia" was afloat.

Well, we used to bait up our rods and cast out then go and have a game of manhunt on the boat. This one time we were on the boat I saw my rod slowly being dragged towards the edge and almost in, the rod I ha at the time was an old boat rod coupled with an old red Daiwa Millionaire. I legged it off the boat and grabbed the rod, struck into it and it was solid like it was snagged. All of a sudden the "snag" started to pull back but slowly move up against the flow, it wa a fish without question. It even put a decent bend in this 30lb class boat rod. I played it for around a minute before I lost it. On bringing the rig back in and composing myself, I looked at the hook length and it had definitely been bitten through. To this day we can only assume as to what it was but if love to of got it in 🐋

The lads that fished out of the docks in the hire boats used to bring back the odd Tope and let it go in the Dock. Maybe it was one of those you hooked or a Conger? I too hooked a monster in the Basin. I was waiting to "Lock out" in a fishing hire boat and decided to dangle a bait over the side while I waited. I hooked a fish which took off across the Dock and snapped 20lb line. I never saw it. It was the best bite of the day lol.

I've been out on a friends boat a few times,just off the old Speak control tower we used to catch one or two, mostly Flat fish, that's going back ten years or so.

There were conger in the dock.Many years ago they used to Moor the Isle of Man boats in Morpeth dock for the Winter.Anglers used to cast under the hulls with a whole side of mackerel and sit and wait.The pump dock was like an aquarium.The mullet in the summer were monsters and it would produce sole as well as flounder and eel.I once saw a pouting and a school bass taken out of it on a waggler float set up.Happy days!
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Let me start a list of the fish types that used to be in Pump Dock, please add to it if you have caught anything else in there.

Codling
Whiting
Pouting
Poor Cod
Mullet
Eel
Dab
Flounder
Plaice
Brill
Herring
Mackerel
Pipe Fish

Not the Pump dock, but years ago I caught a Red Gurnard by Duke street bridge on the side where the cafe is now.

Not exactly Birkenhead fishing but when I was on the Fishery Protection Squadron off Iceland we used to lob a depth bomb and then get the sea boats crew to pick up the fish from the surface. The fish were sold from the galley and the proceeds went to charity. Still the best fish I ever tasted even if we did cheat a bit. The trawlers used to send us stuff across as well on occasion when we were amongst them. Very, very tasty.

I remember that madman in the white overalls that worked in the Pump house at the end of the Pump Dock. He used to come out screaming at us to move. He swung one of the post chains at us once.
I'd been playing a Blue Whale on 10lb line and a size 12 hook for about three days, I'd just got it to the net when it rolled over and smashed the line. I might have landed it if that loony hadn't interrupted me.
Gutted.

Uhm. Coded messages?

I remember a kid fishing the pump dock with a woollies fishing rod and reel hauling a flounder up the wall like a bin lid.The chap in the pump house weighed it for him at 2lb 7oz.It was like an aquarium the pump dock, all kinds would come out!