Well spotted.

Whilst waiting for the tide to drop, so I could access an Atlantic horse mackerel mark on Monday evening, I spent an hour or so searching some rockpools with my headtorch to see what I might find. Nothing unusual turned up, but I did locate one rockpool that had a couple of leopard spotted goby just sitting motionless out in the open on the bottom, their markings ensuring that they stood out like a pair of sore thumbs! Pretty unusual behaviour for this species, during daylight hours they’re normally hiding in shady areas, but perhaps unlike me, they regularly venture out at night? Dropping a small bait in front of them resulted in the smaller one gobbling it up. 

A fine example of the colourful little fish. 

Sadly, I didn’t enjoy any success fishing for scad, so after a couple of hours I headed back up the A1. I’ll definitely be out hunting in rockpoools with my headtorch after dark again. Seeing fish that would normally be too shy to come into the open was food for thought. I also caught a few blenny and spotted a butterfish as it snaked its way through some small rocks before disappearing out of sight. There were also lots of very colourful squat lobsters out sitting on rocks too. Hopefully if I visit often enough I'll get lucky and something rare will turn up. Something I’ve never caught in Scotland before would be even better!

Tight lines, Scott.

A numbers game.

I only had one day off this week and with nine spined stickleback in mind I headed down to Dumfries and Galloway with my mate Ryan, where there are populations of this lesser known species. We arrived early in the afternoon and explored a couple of spots looking for likely stickleback holding bodies of water. Armed with my tanago rod, I fished a few pools in a small stream to begin with, but there was no sign of any fish at all in any of them, so we headed to a second spot a short drive away. This area had several marshes and ditches, but we quickly discovered that most of them were pretty inaccessible. After walking around for a while, Ryan spotted a path through some long grass that lead towards a drainage ditch and after a few minutes of trudging through some soggy ground we found a spot next to the ditch and began fishing. 

Overgrown and full of dirty water, but this drainage ditch looked ideal!

Baiting up with just the tiniest piece of maggot on my tanago hook, it took a little while for my Chianti pole float to register any interest. Eventually, the scent of my bait seemed to draw some fish in and we were soon both catching three spined stickleback, taking turns to catch them and carefully checking each one.

Only three spines. Not the stickleback I was after!

After about half an hour or so we were well into double figures of three spined stickleback, and I was just explaining to Ryan the less obvious differences between the three spined and the nine spined stickleback when I swung a fish to hand. Upon inspection, I realised had actually caught the latter! Mission accomplished! Eagerly popping the diminutive fish into my photography tank, I headed up from the ditch to take some photos in better light. 

The nine spined stickleback is a longer fish and not so deep in the body either relative to its three spined cousin. As its name suggests, it most often has nine spines. I counted ten on mine. They can have only eight though and as many as twelve. In the water in my tank was a funky little bonus aquatic insect. These tiny invertebrates are no doubt part of a stickleback’s diet.

I took another quick photo for scale before I popped it back into the ditch. Tanago hooks really are a game changer when it comes to fishing for the smallest species, and they don’t get much smaller than nine spined stickleback, they are after all the smallest freshwater species in the UK. 

Well, I was over the moon and yet another step closer to my goal of catching one hundred Scottish fish species. I think a barbel is now the only "straight forward" species I can catch in Scotland, and catching one has proved tricky so far. After that, things are going to get tough. I believe there are two species of sturgeon stocked in Drumtassie Coarse Fishery, so those are perhaps also viable targets, so I'll maybe pay that a visit soon.

Tight lines, Scott.

Tough fishing and ruffe fishing.

Earlier this week I visited Parkview Coarse Fishery for yet another attempt at catching my first Scottish barbel. The fishing was incredibly tough and after over eight hours of staring at the tip of my float all I was rewarded with were six tiny perch and a solitary roach. A very frustrating day’s fishing. I think I’ll take a break from fishing for barbel until the autumn.

Staring at a float can be both relaxing or infuriating. I guess which depends on how many times it moves!

The next day, I headed to Balmaha on the eastern shore of Loch Lomond, a place I haven’t visited for many years. After parking the car and unloading my gear, I made my way along to the old pier, where I spent what remained of the morning and the best part of the afternoon feeder fishing. With my 2023 species hunt in mind, I was hoping to catch ruffe or maybe even powan. To begin with, all I caught were roach, but they were lovely fish, and it was a pleasure to briefly admire each one before slipping them back and watching them swim off.

Out in front of the old pier lies Inchcailloch, the Isle of the old woman.

All the roach I caught were in wonderful condition.

After a short break to eat my lunch, things slowed down a bit, but every now and then the tip of my rod would pull round and I’d lift into another roach or a perch. Eventually I hooked something very small and was over the moon when a ruffe came up to the surface.

If you ask me these little unwanted invaders are quite adorable, cheeky little fish.

The area behind me was very busy with tourists waiting for the ferry to arrive. Thankfully, almost all the ferries operating on the loch now use this new pontoon to the right of the old pier.

I carried on fishing until about 16:30 by which point I had almost run out of maggots. I'd caught a few more roach, but sadly no powan had been tempted by my colourful choice of presentation!

Red, white and blue. How very British!

With only a few dozen maggots left I headed back around to the car park and dropped off most of my tackle. I then grabbed my tanago gear and headed down to the boatyard where I spent an hour or so trying to locate nine spined stickleback, a species that is supposed to be found in Loch Lomond. There were certainly lots of small fish around but upon catching a few I discovered they were perch, roach and ruffe! After catching about half a dozen small ruffe I also caught a few larger specimens.

The smallest ruffe ever caught on hook and line? Possibly!

This one put a little bend in my tanago rod!

The micro fishing was good fun, and on a positive note I've now got a much more reliable spot to catch ruffe for future species hunts! The downside though, was that there was no sign of any stickleback at all, so I may have to try different venues for those. Before leaving, I visited the Tom Weir statue near the boatyard. I’m not sure if it was there the last time I visited. I remember watching “Weir’s Way” when I was young, the TV series where he explored Scotland, speaking to locals wherever he went. 

A very good likeness of Tom, wearing his trademark woolly bobble hat. 

So, over the two days I had managed to add one species to my 2023 species hunt tally taking it to one hundred and seventy. I think for my next session I’ll head down to Dumfries and Galloway to have another attempt at catching my first Scottish nine spined stickleback.

Tight lines, Scott.

The grass is always greener...

I visited Parkview Coarse Fishery again earlier this week to have another attempt at catching my first Scottish barbel. Maggots, hard on the deck, under a waggler float was the approach taken, fished over some halibut and hot tuna ground bait. 

My bait of choice for the session. 

The fishing was very slow. To be fair, I was prewarned it would be when I paid for my day ticket. The only fish that seemed interested in my wriggling hookbait were tiny perch and the odd blue orfe. After several hours I finally hooked something a bit bigger in the shape of a small common carp. It may have been relatively small, but it actually put up a decent little scrap on my 10ft float rod.

Another nice looking carp from the venue. 

Just after returning the carp, the owner of the venue came around and asked me how the fishing had been. I told him it had been tough going and that I was after a barbel. He quickly checked some records on his phone and told me that eighty seven had been stocked into the pond in total, of various different sizes. He also happened to mentioned that some grass carp had also been stocked into the venue as well. I thought he might have been somehow mistaken about that, but didn’t say anything. A few hours later I was pleasantly surprised when I caught, you guessed it, a juvenile grass carp! 

Small but perfectly formed. My first ever grass carp!

Not the fish I was after but a most unexpected and welcome addition to my Scottish species list nevertheless, edging me one closer to my target of one hundred! Also, it was my 100th new species of 2023 so that target, set at the start of the year, has successfully been reached with several months to spare! I ended the session not long after catching the grass carp. The fishing might have been difficult, but I’ll be no doubt be back again soon for yet another session targeting barbel. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Instagrammable!

I’ve actually had an Instagram account for quite a long time, but just never got around to posting anything on it. I'm not sure why really! So, I decided recently to make an effort to post some of my fishy photos on there.

I'm @sfgo_fishy_photos on Instagram.

I’ve taken thousands of photos over the years, and some are actually pretty good, even if I do say so myself! Trawling through over ten years of posts on this blog, I’ve picked out some of my favourite photos and going forward will keep adding more. Check them out here, hit like or follow me if you want to see more of my photos on Instagram on a regular basis.

Tight lines, Scott.