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Fishing for sharks
A FISHERMAN is hoping to get plenty of bites for his planned new venture – fishing for sharks off Whitby.
Rich Ward, of Queens Drive, wants to offer anglers the chance to hook their very own Jaws next summer from his charter boat Shy-Torque.
But the sharks he will be going after are not man-eating great whites but porbeagles, otherwise known as the mackerel or bonito shark.
Nevertheless these denizens of the deep still have an impressive array of teeth and can grow up to 12ft although normally average around six feet in British waters.
Mr Ward hooked his first porbeagle in the July fishing festival.
He said: "I had one cruising around on the surface close to the boat so I primed this fish up with a couple of mackerel and within seconds this fish had gobbled them up."
Mr Ward said he then put a mackerel on the end of a 150lb monofilament trace and within a minute the shark had taken the bait but bit through the line.
He added: "After half an hour we lost him but he put up a good fight, it was very exciting.
"When you're going big game fishing you have to use wire traces as porbeagle have a vicious set of teeth."
One of the Shy-Torque's crew then told a friend – Rupert Drury – about the shark and Mr Drury called Mr Ward asking if he could go out on a trip specifically to catch a porbeagle.
They went back to where they caught the first one – 20 miles off Whitby – and threw mashed up mackerel into the water to give a scent trail out.
It was then a waiting game –- for seven hours.
Mr Ward said: "I was beginning to think we weren't going to get a sight of anything.
"Then one of the reels started screaming off and we just looked at each other in awe.
"Its first run took about 300 yards of line. We managed to calm it down a bit and Rupert struggled like hell for the next 45 minutes."
It took four of them to heave it over the side where it was measured at 6ft 10in with a 45in girth.
Mr Ward said: "We could not believe what we had got."
After measuring it the porbeagle was released back into the sea.
Mr Ward then contacted the UK Shark Tagging Project and spoke to Dr Ken Collins who estimated the fish would have weighed around 248lb.
The crew of the Shy-Torque will now be tagging any fish they catch with information stating when and where it was caught and what it measured – none of the fish will be killed.
Another shark fishing trip is planned for a few weeks time but from next year Mr Ward will be offering shark fishing trips as the norm as soon as the mackerel start running.
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Weather for Whitby
Thursday 24 May 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: 9 C to 18 C
Wind Speed: 9 mph
Wind direction: North
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 11 C to 17 C
Wind Speed: 17 mph
Wind direction: South east
