Bellavista Shark Season!

Kevin Murphy of the Bellavista Hotel in Cobh, Co.Cork outlines the best of the shark fishing action of the summer….

In the early part of the year were were catching sharks but the mackerel situation was causing us problems. The consistency of catching bait was the issue. The mackerel would be around in numbers ine day and would be very scarce the next day. Once we had bait we caught fish.

As the season wore on I sourced blocks of ground up fish that would be perfect for the rubby dubby mix. These frozen blocks took the guess work out of the bait. Now all we had to do was to catch some mackerel for hook baits while letting the rubby dubby mix to do its work.

“You will catch sharks close in, but I like to head out to my favourite grounds if the weather is right” says Kevin. One out here it is a matter of setting the boat up on the drift and the waiting game begins. Many times during the season there was not much waiting at all.  Catch rates were astounding – Is this down to the rubby dubby or the perfect weather? It was normal to be catching well over a dozen sharks in a session.

“The customers love the idea of the block of dubby. They have less work to do going out and therefore they are more inclined to fish for other species while waiting for shark.  Sometimes they did not even get the garfish rods out because we were more or less straight into sharks”.

The Bellavista launched a new self-drive boat last season. The Admiral Tuna 660 is bigger than the usual Warrior 175’s of the Bellavista fleet and is the perfect vessel for shark fishing with a party of four. The vessel, known as the “BIG 1”, has a handy turn of pace so time to and from the fishing grounds passes quickly.