Essex-based skipper of the Galloper, Scott Belbin, is looking forward to another run of codling in the outer Thames Estuary this winter when, hopefully, they will have packed on a few pounds and are on the feed!
Running a busy charter boat means I meet lots of different people. They ask me all sorts of questions. One thing I am often asked is what my favourite fish is. To be honest, I enjoy all sorts of angling for all sorts of fish. However, if I had to choose a favourite fish it would be the cod. I can’t provide any single reason why, but the return of a run of codling to the Essex coast last winter reminded me what we had been missing since they all but disappeared completely from the southern North Sea eight years ago.
THE FIGHT
Firstly, they bite and fight very well, perhaps not the best pound for pound but they really do put a bend in the rod the way they make it bounce as they shake their heads, twist and roll all the way to the boat. With every head shake or twist they could spit the hook and be gone. Each pull travels up the line, through the rod, down your arm and straight into your heart! Even the small ones are so dogged that they are unmistakable in their fight. When playing a decent cod in the tide they stay deep rather than kiting in the tide like other fish. The largest ones stay deepest, often 10ft or more below the rod tip, and hold there for a few moments before coming to the surface. It’s easy to lose patience, and the fish at that point, as it nears the net with that cavernous white mouth open catching the tide even more.
These fish were our traditional winter quarry here in the Thames Estuary, and they gave many of us cause to not only brave a cold winter’s day but actually look forward to them! So when they all but disappeared amid a succession of mild winters our winter quarry had to change. As did many of our anglers who had to change tack and target other species, or change location if they still wanted to catch cod.
MYTHICAL CREATURES
The last good cod fishing year for us in the Thames was the winter of 2014-15 when there were some fantastic numbers to be caught. Some of the best fishing could be had in the Blackwater Estuary on the Essex side of the Thames.
I remember talking to one of my godparents who used to be a charter skipper from West Mersea in the 1970s. He thought the numbers we were seeing were better than they had been in the estuary back then! Unfortunately, just two years later and there was hardly a cod to be seen, which came as a bit of a shock to many considering the numbers they had been seeing only a few years before. After a couple more poor seasons we gave up expecting any great numbers, and codling began to be referred to as ‘unicorns’ due to their rarity and mythical status – now existing only in anglers’ imagin
