Skip to content
FishingHQSearch

Portmuck and Browns Bay

Harbour wall · Salt water · in The Causeway and Antrim coast

Two adjoining marks at the northern tip of Islandmagee: a small harbour at Portmuck with rough broken ground and weed off the wall, and the clean sandy sweep of Browns Bay a couple of kilometres round, where the seabed is clear enough that a short lob outfishes a long cast.

Safety: cold water shock — can cause serious injury or death. 2 more points apply here.

What each one does, and what reduces it ↓

FishingHQ describes what this place is, not whether you may fish it. Access, permits and who to ask.

What you can catch here

Documented at this place, grouped by how you would be fishing, with how strongly the sources support each one. This is what has been written down, not a forecast, and being listed is never permission to fish.

From the shore · 7

Spearfishing · 1

What these strengths mean
Established quarry
Fishing sources describe this as a normal local target here, not merely as caught.
Seasonal
Well supported, and concentrated in part of the year rather than spread through it.
Places, accounts and sources are counted separately
A fish documented once at each of six marks is still documented once at each of six marks. Breadth is reported as a place count and never raises the strength, and sources are deduplicated across places so one publisher covering a whole coast counts as one. A fishery account is a source describing the fishing; a recorded catch is a report of a specific catch. They are counted apart because they are not the same evidence.

Also associated with this ground

Recorded as present here without a documented method or strength behind them.

Conger eel

Fish documented nearby, not here

Nothing below has been documented at Portmuck and Browns Bay itself. Each one has been documented at a named place on the same ground, and the places are listed with it. Treat this as what the water around here holds rather than as a catch list for this mark.

Widely documented on this ground

Documented at three or more neighbouring places, fished a way this place is also fished. That is a pattern about the ground rather than about any one mark, and it is the closest this site comes to saying you will probably meet a fish somewhere nothing has been written about.

From the shore

  • Atlantic cod — documented at The Black Arch, Larne; Carnlough; Waterfoot and Red Bay (+2 more)
  • Bull huss — documented at Ballycastle; Cushendun and Torr Head; Carnlough (+1 more)
  • Dab — documented at Ballycastle; Glenarm; Ballygalley
  • Whiting — documented at Glenarm; Ballygalley; Waterfoot and Red Bay

Also documented at neighbouring places

One or two accounts each, on the ground around here. Enough to know the fish is caught in these waters; not enough to say anything about this place.

From the shore

How people fish it

Practised here: Sea fishing.

Methods the sources name for this ground. Each one is explained in full on its own page.

  • Float fishing

    Suspending a bait at a controlled depth beneath a buoyant indicator — the most visual, most controllable and most widely applicable method in angling.

  • Spinning

    Casting an artificial lure and retrieving it so that it moves like something alive — the most direct form of lure fishing.

  • Ledgering

    Fishing a bait on the bottom held by a weight, with no float — the simplest way to fish at distance, in depth, or in wind.

The ground and the water

The ground
Two adjoining marks at the northern tip of Islandmagee: a small harbour at Portmuck with rough broken ground and weed off the wall, and the clean sandy sweep of Browns Bay a couple of kilometres round, where the seabed is clear enough that a short lob outfishes a long cast.
Exposure
Portmuck faces east and north-east into the North Channel; Browns Bay is tucked round the point with high ground behind it and is the sheltered half of the pair.
Depth
Broken rock and weed off the Portmuck wall to fifty metres, then cleaner; shallow clean sand across Browns Bay.
Tide and flow
The Larne approaches run past this point and the ferry channel is close, which puts vessel wash on both marks.

Not to be confused with Islandmagee and the Gobbins, which is a separate record for different ground.

Getting there

What public sources describe, last checked 2026-08-25. Car parks fill, services change and a path existing is not a path anybody may use — none of this is a guarantee of availability and none of it is permission to be anywhere.

Getting to it
The northern tip of the Islandmagee peninsula, reached by the Portmuck and Browns Bay roads from Larne. Portmuck is a small harbour fished from the wall; Browns Bay is a beach with a car park behind it and high ground sheltering it.

Parking

  • Browns Bay car park

    Public car park · Charging not established

    A car park behind the beach with toilets, described by the shore directory as having a chip van. No charging arrangement is established by any source read for this record.

Where this access information comes from
  • Sea Angling in Ireland: the shore marks of Antrim — Sea Angling Ireland (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: That Browns Bay has a car park with toilet facilities and a chip van, that Portmuck is fished from the harbour wall, and that the ground off each is rough and clean respectively.States this directlyPassage read and verified

What is there

  • Public toilets

    Toilet facilities at the Browns Bay car park, named by the shore directory. Nothing equivalent is recorded at Portmuck.

  • Food or shelter

    A chip van is described at Browns Bay. Mobile catering is by nature seasonal and not something this record treats as reliable.

  • Harbour facilities

    Portmuck is a small working harbour and the fishing is from its wall. What may be done on it is the harbour's to decide.

Through the year

Pollack, wrasse and coalfish off the Portmuck rough ground, mackerel on feathers through the summer; dogfish and wrasse over the Browns Bay sand, with bass when there is a surf running into it.

The months the sources attach to each species here. Where a species carries no season it is listed underneath rather than assumed to run through the year.

The months in which each profiled species is recorded as quarry at this location.
SpeciesJFMAMJJASOND
Atlantic mackerel — seasonal, recorded in June, July, August, September.
European sea bass — seasonal, recorded in May, June, July, August, September, October.

Recorded here with no season stated: Ballan wrasse, European flounder, Pollack, Saithe, Small-spotted catshark.

Safety

Cold water shock — Can cause serious injury or death

UK coastal and inland water is cold enough for most of the year to trigger the involuntary gasp and the loss of swimming ability that decides most immersion deaths, and it does so within the first minute, long before hypothermia is relevant.

What reduces it: Wear a buoyancy aid rather than carry one, carry a means of calling for help on the person rather than in a bag, and plan on the assumption that an unplanned entry into the water is survivable only if somebody knows immediately.

Cliffs and rock platforms — Can cause serious injury or death

Anglers are swept from rock platforms by individual large sets rather than by the average sea, which means the conditions that kill people frequently look survivable for the twenty minutes before they arrive. Wet rock, weed and a swell running onto a sloping platform remove any chance of recovery.

What reduces it: Watch the water for a full set cycle before committing to a position, know the escape route and how long it takes, wear a flotation aid rather than carry one, never fish a platform alone, and treat a rising swell forecast as a reason not to go rather than a reason to be careful.

Moving water and currents — Can cause serious injury or death

Tidal streams past the headlands and through the sounds run faster than a kayak can paddle or a small outboard can push against, producing overfalls and standing waves. A craft that enters the acceleration goes where the water goes, and the mistake is made on the approach.

What reduces it: Treat the tidal stream atlas as the primary document and the wind forecast as secondary. Know when the stream turns at the specific place, do not attempt a sound on springs, plan the return as carefully as the outward passage, and give visible overfalls a wide margin.

Worse when:

  • On spring tides, when the streams run hardest and the overfalls are largest.
  • With wind against the stream, which stands the race into steep breaking water.

Rules and access

FishingHQ does not know the current access position here. Sea angling access in Northern Ireland is governed by landowner permission, harbour and council byelaws, and fisheries and conservation measures, all of which change. Check the current position with the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, the harbour or council, and the landowner before going.

Who holds the answer:

  • The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, for sea fisheries and marine conservation in Northern Ireland.
  • The harbour authority or council, for access to the structure or the shore.
  • The Northern Ireland department responsible for agriculture, environment and rural affairs, which administers sea fisheries measures and marine conservation here.
  • The Loughs Agency, the cross-border body administering the Foyle and Carlingford systems, whose licensing arrangements differ from the rest of Northern Ireland.
  • The Northern Ireland Environment Agency and the site management bodies, where a coastal, geological or World Heritage designation affects access or activity.
  • The National Trust or other landowner, where access to the shore crosses land in their ownership.
  • The harbour authority at each port, for access to and fishing from harbour structures.

Nearby fishing

Other publicly documented places within about 40 km, by distance. Positions are approximate public geography and are never exact marks.

Portmuck and Browns BayLarne LoughIslandmagee and the GobbinsThe Black Arch, LarneBallygalleyWhiteheadCarrickfergusBelfast LoughGlenarm
Portmuck and Browns Bay and the publicly documented places around it. Approximate positions, not marks. On a narrow screen the plot is wider than the screen and scrolls sideways inside its frame. Positions are approximate by design — they are capped at about a hundred metres and describe where a named public place is, not where fish are and not a mark. Everything plotted here is also listed below.

Sources for this place

  • JNCC species and habitat conservation advice — Joint Nature Conservation Committee (Conservation authority)Relied on for: Description, designation and habitat characterisation of the named coastal and marine features of the United Kingdom, and the species characteristically associated with them.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
  • Cefas science, advice and data on marine and freshwater environments — Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (Government fisheries body)Relied on for: Marine environmental science for UK shelf seas: sediment characterisation, estuarine process, shellfish bed distribution, tidal range and the monitoring that describes them.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
  • Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Long-running published description of British sea angling practice by region, ground type and named mark.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
  • General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated public descriptions of which places are conventionally fished and how, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as scholarship, and not relied on for access, permission or any current rule.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
  • Sea Angling in Ireland: the shore marks of Antrim — Sea Angling Ireland (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: A shore-mark directory describing this mark's ground, species, methods, baits and the walk in.States this directlyPassage read and verified
  • British Sea Fishing: Northern Ireland shore marks — British Sea Fishing (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: A national shore-mark guide naming this mark, its species, methods, baits and the conditions it fishes in.States this directlyPassage read and verified

How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy. Last reviewed 2026-08-16.

Share this page