The Pembroke Haven Motor Boat Angling Club held their fourth annual open flounder fishing competition on Sunday on Amroth Beach, and blessed with a beautiful early autumn day, 147 anglers turned out to fish.
With just a very light northwesterly breeze and surf no greater than that raised in a bath, catching fish was going to prove very difficult.
However, in the anglers favour, the water was coloured so there was some hope. With almost three-quarters of the match over, the weigh in looked like being over in minutes with only a handful of flounder in size safely in anglers buckets. In fact other species were more prevalent with dogfish, starry smooth hounds, silver eels and the odd bass being caught, unfortunately counting for nothing on the day.
Come the weigh in at the Amroth Arms, 16 anglers returned fish to the scales, so fishing had picked up a little in the last hour.
Although this was a heaviest bag competition most of the prizes went to single fish bags and the winner, with a fine early season flounder of 660 grams, was M. Young who collected the match salver, £250 and the pool of £73.50 (he wouldn't get that for the fish at Milford Market). In second place was a junior, J. Pike, who took the junior salver and £75 with a fish of 630 grams followed by F. Thornsburrow who won £50. Fourth was another junior angler, a young lady club member, Kaylee Gammer, winning £40 plus the top club member prize of £20 and carrying Dad Paul to the doubles prize of £100 with a combined weight of 940 grams. Fifth prize of £30 went to P. Palethorpe, sixth and £20 to G. James with the seventh prize of £10 going to R. Beynon.
The club would like to thank their sponsors who helped to make the day so successful, namely the Shipwright, Pembroke and Tenby Angling, Bouchier Industrial Services, Mainport Engineering, Merry-Go-Round, Pembrokeshire Stonework, Paul Pearce Aerials, Davies Decorators, Pater Jewellers, Pembroke Fruiters and the Amroth Arms. A special thanks go to Roger and his staff at the Amroth Arms for their help on the day.
Finally, the club would like to thank all those anglers who turned out on the day to make it so successful, and they look forward to seeing them all next year, tight lines.