02/08/2026 - Metal magic

A combined birthday and anniversary celebration involving several pints of Wye Valley Brewey’s excellent "Butty Bach" put paid to any ideas of a morning session yesterday. I was a knackered after the previous two early mornings anyway, so enjoyed the lie in instead. The plan had been to go wrasse fishing up at Fishguard and I very nearly headed there this morning, but having woken up shortly before 0500 hrs for some reason and not able to go back to sleep I decided to head to the estuary at Lawrenny for a bass session. Got there just after first light, the sun just starting to illuminate the mudflats, and drove down to the quay. The tide was already a couple of hours into the flood and I had therefore intended to bump soft plastics in the flow in mouth of the side channel. However, as I got togged up I could see a lot of bird activity out in the main estuary, so walked up to the breakwater for a look. A flock of gulls were diving on a shoal of bait fish and there was also the…