Jump to content

Hurds Deep


Recommended Posts

 

Following on from Andy's excellent thread about the French Banks, the Hurds Deep is almost an iconic place to fish, It is the deepest part of the English Channel, a long narrow trench that goes down to 500ft in places.

For me, it is a 65 mile steam, so in my boat that would mean carrying an extra 80L of fuel to maintain the 'thirds' rule, but in the summer it just might be worth the effort. On a nice day with a decent sea that will be a 2.5 hour journey.

I fished it many years ago on a boat from Plymouth and had good sport with double figure Pollock and some seriously big Ling. At that time it was also renowned for some big sharks ............

There are a few wrecks in the Hurd Deeps, so it could be interesting to fish them ............ I shall have to mention it to my mate next time we go out on his Offshore 25 and maybe make some plans.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Andy135 said:

@GPSguru, you have a 160l tank in Bluefin then? What's your fuel economy like? Must be pretty good I'd have thought given there can't be much weight to yours?

 

No, unfortunately  I have a 90L underfloor tank. There was an option of 180L tank which I now wish I had gone for, but at the time I just considered it to be extra weight to carry. However, a couple of times last year I came back in on almost fresh air, the worst case being just 5L left in the tank ................regarding the boat weight I have never put it on the weighbridge, but I would guess about 1300kg. It sits on a 2T trailer and Ribcraft are a heavy layup and renowned for being a bit heavy, which together with the hull design gives them their almost legendary sea keeping.

Fuel wise I use about 0.85L / Nm, so I base all trips on 1L/Nm ..........

 

 

Edited by GPSguru
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, GPSguru said:

Yep, the two hobbits, Frodo and Samwise from middle earth  Hants & Berks ........... but which one will be Samewise Gamgee ?  🤣🤣🤣

10/10 for that one Ian, even if I am one of the butts of the joke 🤣

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 minutes ago, GPSguru said:

 

No, unfortunately  I have a 90L underfloor tank. There was an option of 180L tank which I now wish I have gone for, but at the time I just considered it to be extra weight to carry. However, a couple of times last year I came back in on almost fresh air, the worst case being just 5L left in the tank ................regarding the boat weight I have never put it on the weighbridge, but I would guess about 1300kg. It sits on a 2T trailer and Ribcraft are a heavy layup and renowned for being a bit heavy, which together with the hull design gives them their almost legendary sea keeping.

Fuel wise I use about 0.85L / Nm, so I base all trips on 1L/Nm ..........

 

 

Don't the manufacturers state what weight the hull is ?

Carrying 4 plastic jerry cans isn't to much of an issue.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 minutes ago, JDP said:

Don't the manufacturers state what weight the hull is ?

Carrying 4 plastic jerry cans isn't to much of an issue.

True, carrying 4 x 20L cans is no problem, and then refuel with a jiggle syphon...........

Ribcraft give a weight of circa 1200kg ........... my engine is heavier than the zuk 140, add to that 70kg of fuel (90L) and all the kit (probably at least another 50kg ) ....

Ribcraft_585_Professional-1.pdf

Link to comment
Share on other sites

7 hours ago, GPSguru said:

 

You have probably used that getting out of Marina 🤣

It would be a round trip of 110L (ish) so carrying another 80L will give me a buffer of 60L (ish)

I’m lucky to have big tanks so I could get over to Ireland. Cardiff to Milford Haven uses about 1/2-2/3rds of my tanks abs that  is still carrying reserve fuel. 
 

As a kid I remember reading in sea angler about huge conger and long in hurds deep along with speculation that other beasties could be lurking at the bottom. 
 

I thought I read somewhere that it’s been trawled to death but I’m maybe wrong. I guess small tides, calm day give it a go 

Edited by Odyssey
Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, Odyssey said:

I’m lucky to have big tanks so I could get over to Ireland. Cardiff to Milford Haven uses about 1/2-2/3rds of my tanks abs that  is still carrying reserve fuel. 
 

As a kid I remember reading in sea angler about huge conger and long in hurds deep along with speculation that other beasties could be lurking at the bottom. 
 

I thought I read somewhere that it’s been trawled to death but I’m maybe wrong. I guess small tides, calm day give it a go 

 

I have had some very big Ling from there, but that was 30years ago ..........

Not the place to be tonight though, the Channel lightship is reporting 13ft waves and a wind speed of 39knts

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/20/2021 at 7:43 AM, Odyssey said:

I’m lucky to have big tanks so I could get over to Ireland. Cardiff to Milford Haven uses about 1/2-2/3rds of my tanks abs that  is still carrying reserve fuel. 
 

As a kid I remember reading in sea angler about huge conger and long in hurds deep along with speculation that other beasties could be lurking at the bottom. 
 

I thought I read somewhere that it’s been trawled to death but I’m maybe wrong. I guess small tides, calm day give it a go 

I wonder if you get the odd swordfish, maybe too far up the Channel ? Might get Hake in there tho.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

theres sod all out there these days, we used to do the 4 day alderney trips from weymouth for the turbot, day one steam across channel and stop on wrecks in the 'hurds deeps' the odd decent pollack up to 15lb nothing special, then 2 days on the sandbanks for turbot and stop on the wrecks on the way home. very under average for wrecking. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

42 minutes ago, captin slows old outlaw said:

hobits, highlander, what ever next,

some fish maybe, ive heard of heards deep but was not shore where it is, now i know but the fishing is crap now.???

i will have to stick to the solent then

At least in the solent you can have some great summer sport for the hounds, and get a proper bend in the rod (well proper for here anyway). And you don’t have to travel for hours and hours to get there. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
On 2/13/2021 at 11:20 AM, DINOBOY said:

theres sod all out there these days, we used to do the 4 day alderney trips from weymouth for the turbot, day one steam across channel and stop on wrecks in the 'hurds deeps' the odd decent pollack up to 15lb nothing special, then 2 days on the sandbanks for turbot and stop on the wrecks on the way home. very under average for wrecking. 

Do the commercials target that area ? A couple of my Jersey mates say they don’t bother with it either 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...