Author: Neville Merritt (Page 1 of 45)

A heatwave inland but a pleasant evening on the coast. What better than a beer in the cool shade and a meeting with fishing mates? 13 of us met at the Marina Bar on Tuesday 7^th July for our regular monthly SMAC meeting.

The current Club Standings are reproduced below, and the latest version can always be found on our club notice board outside the marina office. Many thanks Steve Kelly for keeping it up to date!

Fish of the Month was a vote-off between Sam Cofie’s two 2lb Gilthead Bream (100% of specimen) against Peter Churchill’s plaice of 1lb 15oz which although less than half specimen weight, a plaice of that size is a rare thing these days. Sam won, so congratulations!

The Summer BBQ last month was another enjoyable social, and thanks again to all those who helped make it happen.

Our next Open Competition is the Open Bass Competition on 18^th (or 19^th) July. We have some great prizes to add to the table, with new sponsors including Decathlon, Rapala and Portsmouth Distillery to add to our regular supporters.

The Open Species Competition follows soon after on the 8^th (or 9^th) August, and promotions for that will be going out very soon.

The SMAC/SMDAC Pier Social doesn’t have a date yet, our club representatives are trying to get a time extension from the pier management. More details to follow.

Our next meeting will be Tuesday 4^th August at 7pm in the Marina Bar as usual.

Blazing sun and a gentle breeze – if you have to be on land, where better than to spend the afternoon in the company of friends, with plenty of free food plus drink at supermarket prices (because that’s where you probably bought it). It was a smaller crowd than usual which was a shame. I guess some people were fishing, which is the only allowable excuse. The raffle had great prizes, the burgers from Bransbury Butchers are legendary and Jim and Eleanor again produced a batch of awesome scones, this time with a bonus of home-made cherry jam!

Huge thanks as usual to our organising team on the ground: Jim, Eleanor, Steve, Dan, Dave, Tim plus all those that helped on the day, supported the event and those that bought their excuses with raffle tickets. Will our run of good weather for the BBQ continue next year? Maybe Premier marinas can be persuaded to invest in some corporate-branded sunshade umbrellas!

Neville Merritt
Chairman and Cook

We had a strong cold breeze, the Marina Bar kitchen was closed and so was the chippy but that did not deter 11 loyal members from attending our monthly meeting. Steve Kelly probably spent most of his night shift sorting out our competition standings now there are five categories each with five places. Thank you Steve! These are listed below. Mark Banks is currently leading the Club Champion points but there are a lot of ways in which that can change!

Next up was the Fish Of The Month competition. This was a stark contrast to the months where no fish were logged, because we had 23 entries (6 from the Bream Competition) of which 5 were specimens. However, there were two monsters among those: a John Dory of 7lb 7oz (247.9%) for Mark Banks and a Gilthead Bream of 5lb exactly (250%) for Andy Bird. As per Club Rules, we had to vote on the Best Fish which was extremely difficult because they were both exceptional. However the members voted for the largest specimen, Andy Bird’s Gilthead Bream so it was fair play whichever way you looked at it.

Eleanor presented the Treasurer’s Report which involved very little cash movement but the significant news for the club is that we are proceeding to open a bank account with Nat West. This will make subscription and competition entry fees for members much easier. We will stick with Eventbrite for visiting competitors who will also pay the transaction fees.

The SMAC Annual BBQ will be on Saturday 27^th June with free food (bring your own drink) and an excellent cash raffle. It will be held in the Southsea BBQ area above the utilities block at the West end of the marina.

The Bass Competition will be held on 18^th or 19^th July, weather dependent. We have sponsorship agreed with Rapala, and others are under discussion.

There will be a SMDAC/SMAC Pier Competition in the summer, date to be confirmed by SMDAC.

A night sole trip is proposed, probably to coincide with the Cowes fireworks on Friday 7^th August. This will be confirmed nearer the date.

In Any Other Business, Pete Churchill requested that entries into the Catch Register in the Marina Office to be made in pounds and ounces to avoid confusion with pounds decimal! Thank you.

Next meeting will be on Tuesday 7^th July, 7pm in the Marina Bar.

It was another sunny evening and the Fish Book shows a lot more entries so things are definitely looking up. A couple of good bass were added to the book today which threw Steve’s carefully crafted, complex calculations of our Competition Standings completely haywire.  At the moment, Andy Bird and Pete Churchill are neck and neck with 8 points for Club Champion but that will probably all change tomorrow. A Leaderboard App would be good but I don’t think any programmer could have anticipated our rules.  

Although there were a number of good fish logged, the stand-out specimen Fish Of The Month was Pete Churchill’s Ballan Wrasse of 4lb 10oz which is 92.5% of Specimen Weight.

Our subterfuge to get the Bill Arnold Trophy to Steve Kelly on Presentation Night without him knowing missed one important element – the engraved glass. We remedied that today with an engraved tankard which we presented to Steve.

Our member list stands at 54 with a few more to renew and some new boats welcomed to the marina, including Lawrence Seagrove returning with a new Bob The Magnificent.

The Bream Competition was held on Sunday, you can read the full report here. Best-Placed Members were Richard Pack and Steve Tamblin who tied for second place.

Our next event will be the Annual BBQ on Saturday 27^th June, fingers crossed for good weather.

The Bass Competition will be on 18^th or 19^th July and we have sponsorship confirmed from Rapala, which is great news. We are looking for more new sponsors from local businesses.

SMDAC have challenged us to a Pier Competition which is always good fun. It will be an afternoon and evening event in July, with Afternoon Tea included. Date to be confirmed after we have tried to get a closing time extension.

There is interest in a night sole trip in convoy, and if it is timed to coincide with the Cowes Week Firework finale on Friday 7^th August we could have a bit of extra entertainment.

Date of next meeting is Tuesday 2^nd June at 7pm in the Marina Bar.

Our Open Bream Competition is always popular because it marks the turning point from a rather barren spring season (these days)  and the arrival of larger breeding fish and the summer season. We have grown very tired of catching dogfish and small conger so the chance of bream is very welcome.

On Sunday 3^rd May the forecast was favourable so we had the green light. 45 anglers registered to fish including Ladies and Juniors so it was very competitive. The target was a single largest black bream, and as the fish came in to be weighed we were seeing a lot of fish in the 2lb plus range. When all were back, we ranked the fish and moved onto the prize giving ceremony, held in the evening sunshine outside the Marina Bar.

First and Second places included a cash prize plus additional vouchers from our sponsors. Runners-up received tackle and voucher prizes according to place. We are very grateful to Premier Marinas, British Big Game Charter, Andy’s Baits, Newnham Builders, Southsea Marina Disabled Angling Club, the Marina Bar and Portsmouth Distillery for their generous donations of prizes.

Here are the winners:

First: Mark Jackson (Harvest Moon) 3.58lb

Second: Richard Pack (Full Throttle) 2.78lb (tie breaker dice throw)

Third: Steve Tamblin (Sea Jay) 2.78lb (tie breaker dice throw)

Fourth: Dan Lumsden (Sea Jay) 2.76lb

Fifth: Stuart Newell (Harvest Moon) 2.53lb

Sixth: Dan Shipman (Harvest Moon) 2.50lb

Top Ladies Entry: Penny Arthur (Full Throttle) 2.36lb

Top Junior: Luca Budd (Cavalier) 1.54lb

We also had a surprise additional prize. Donated by Newnham Builders, this was a £100 fuel contribution drawn in a raffle by boat name and awarded only to the skipper present at the prizegiving. The winner was – yes, Harvest Moon! Definitely a day of skill and luck for Stuart Newell and his crew on Harvest Moon.

Our thanks as always to the organisers, sponsors and competitors who together made another enjoyable and memorable day.

Thank you to our loyal Club Members who turned out despite the warnings of traffic chaos around the Portsmouth game! It was a great excuse to get down here early and chat for a bit.

Anyway… on with the meeting report! Standings are as below, early days yet and lots of blank spaces. Pete Churchill is racing off on the Species Hunt but there’s plenty of time for a chase.

Fish Of The Month was very easy this month because NO fish were entered in March and I didn’t have to do any complicated specimen percentage calculations. Instead, we changed it to Fishless Of The Month which by precedent is awarded to whoever we like, so we awarded it to Dave Newnham for being a great help in organising the Open Comps and being an all round good chap. Dave donated his cash prize to the RNLI/GAFIR fund.

Membership Update isn’t such happy news, 24 members have not paid their renewal yet which means we are £480 down on club funds. Members won’t be able to enter ANY fish that they catch in our competitions if they aren’t paid up – you can’t backdate the payment, so please make sure you have dropped off your £20 before your next trip. It would be a shame to miss out on a decent prize because of that. You can put the cash in an envelope with your name/SMAC Membership 2026, and drop it into the office. You can message Steve, Eleanor or any committee member to confirm.

Members may recall a recent debate on Fisheries Regulations. We took this opportunity to remind members that SMAC takes both legislation and guidance on minimum take sizes and catch limits very seriously. No abuse of these rules will be tolerated.

Our next Open Competition is nearly upon us: the Open Bream Competition with a date of Sunday 3^rd May and following Sundays as reserve dates. Details on the Link. This is a popular competition because everyone is in with a good chance of catching a bream big enough to secure a place on our extensive Prize Table! The Committee will be looking for new additional sponsors for our Open Competitions over the next few weeks.

Our next monthly meeting will again be on a different date from usual due to the May Bank Holiday. It will be on Thursday 7^th May, 7pm in the Marina Bar.