Species hunting adventures in Norway.

At the end of August I flew out to Oslo Gardermoen Airport with two of my mates, Nick and Ryan, for a week long fishing holiday staying in a Hustadnes Fjordhytter wooden cabin. Located right next to Hjørundfjorden, and surrounded by the stunning Sunnmøre Alps, a range of breathtaking mountains rising steeply up to 1700 metres from the fjord on all sides, providing stunning vistas in all directions. Landing in the afternoon, we picked up our hire car and made the seven hour drive north. The last few hours of the drive took us through some stunning scenery. Emerging from a tunnel, we stopped to stretch our legs and took in this stunning view.

A small picturesque village nestled in a Norwegian valley

By the time we arrived at the cabin and met our host Anders, it was dark, so we got our gear into the cabin and were quickly shown the boat we had hired for the duration of our stay. Up early the following morning, the view across the fjord from our cabin window was awe inspiring, even if the weather forecast for the next few days was not.

Imposing mountains surround the fjord.

Grabbing our boat fishing tackle, we headed around to the tiny harbour and motored out into the bay, where we set about catching some mackerel to use as bait. Catching some was fairly straight forward, and we soon had enough to start fishing for other species in the area. Beginning our species hunting in relatively shallow areas, we were soon catching lots of lovely grey gurnard on strips of mackerel fished close to the bottom.

We all caught plenty of nice grey gurnard. They are so spiky!

The real target was megrim, a flatfish with a very large, cavernous mouth, and Nick managed to catch one pretty quickly. The grey gurnard were present in large numbers however, and catching anything else proved quite difficult. After a while, I caught a cuckoo wrasse when we drifted closer to shore over some mixed ground.

A nice female cuckoo wrasse.

In the afternoon, we headed across the fjord to fish in the shadow of a particularly massive and very steep lump of rock that had a waterfall running down it. The ground close in was pretty rocky and our first few drops produced some big whiting and some coalfish that hit our baits as we dropped them to the bottom. These were followed by a few cusk caught from some rougher ground.

My first new species of the trip. All three of us caught a few of them.

We call them cusk or torsk in the UK. They can be caught in the Shetland Islands. The Norwegian for cod is also torsk, so things can become slightly confusing. Its scientific name is Bromse bromse. The Norwegian name for this species is bromse. Hope that's cleared that up?!

Drifting along a little further out in deeper water, we all began catching small Norway haddock. A second new species of the trip for us all.

The Norway Haddock or redfish. Not related to the haddock from the cod family, this fish is a rockfish. By the end of the trip we'd all caught a lot of these brightly coloured bottom dwellers.

The following day, we continued our search for megrim in the bay to the west of the cabin. Fishing close to the clean bottom, in different areas, at various depths, I was quite surprised when I lifted into a bite and pulled up a small hake! I knew they were a potential catch but was expecting to catch them in much deeper water. This was followed shortly afterwards by my first megrim of the trip. A great start to the day's fishing! Four new species in my first two days boat fishing was a fantastic start to my trip.

My third new species of the trip! This long, streamlined member of the cod family possesses a large mouth full of small razor sharp teeth and also has an impressive set of large fins.

My first ever megrim, a flatfish species I was hoping to catch, so I was pleased to get one on day two.

As the day progressed, we carried on exploring the bay out in front of Sæbø. Over some mixed ground we caught a few small ling and our first haddock of the trip. Ryan also caught a blackbelly rosefish, also known as a bluemouth.

My first ling of 2024.

My first haddock of the year too.

I was quite jealous of Ryan's blackbelly rosefish, but at least we knew where we could potentially catch more.

That evening after dinner, we messed about outside the cabin with ultralight tackle and caught tons of wrasse. There was a huge amount present, we caught a few ballan, corkwing and cuckoo wrasse, but the most abundant were definitely goldsinny wrasse, attacking our small pieces of Isome aggressively. Through the crystal clear water, I was positive I could also see a few rock cook wrasse as well. I tried hard to pull one out from amongst the hordes of other wrasse to complete the set, but didn’t manage to get one.

Due to my determination to catch a rock cook wrasse, I probably ended up catching more goldsinny wrasse than any other species during the trip! Slightly ironic, given it's certainly my most caught species back home this year too!

The following two days the weather forecast was pretty poor with lots of rain forecast. Wearing our waterproof clothing, we went out in the boat anyway. There ended up being lots of showers, but we avoided the heavy rain that was predicted. As well as visiting areas we’d already tried, we also spent some time fishing bigger baits in deeper water to see if we could catch long nosed skate. This produced a nice hake for Nick. Ryan and I both caught a black mouthed dogfish. I say caught, but both were merely holding onto our baits all the way up through about a hundred and fifty metres of water, only deciding to let go once we lifted them into the boat.

A nice hake for Nick from deep water.

Black mouthed dogfish. Not the smartest shark in the ocean but a very cool one.

In the evening the worst of the rain fell so we chilled out in the cabin and had a few beers. In between a couple of downpours, Ryan heard some splashing outside and looking out of the cabin window spotted several groups of pilot whales slowly making their way up the fjord. It was an incredible sight, and Nick ran outside with his camera to get some photos.

Pilot whales passing by.

The following day more heavy rain was forecast, so we headed out again suitably dressed. In the morning, we really struggled to get locate any mackerel. Maybe the arrival of the whales had something to do with it, I speculated. After three hours, we had only caught two mackerel between the three of us! Nick decided he fancied a hike in the afternoon, so Ryan and I dropped him off, and we went back out to drift over the spot where he'd caught the blackbelly rosefish two days previously. We didn't get any, but after a while we started catching a few fish out in deeper water, but no species we hadn't caught already.

A nice whiting for Ryan.

Tired of making our own food, in the evening we drove up through the valley to Ørsta for some pizza. We did intend to fish there, but it was very windy, quite cold as a result, and we weren't suitably dressed, so we decided to head back to Sæbø to fish there instead where it was much more sheltered. Dropping scented lures down the harbour walls, the results were quick predictable, wrasse, lots of wrasse. The water was so clear we were able to do a bit of sight fishing, trying to target specific fish, which was fun. All three of us caught plenty of wrasse, and in amongst them, I caught an absolutley stunning male cuckoo wrasse.

Sæbø's Harbour and ferry port. The perfect venue for some ultra light fun.

Possibly the most incredibly brightly coloured male cuckoo wrasse I've ever caught!

After a while, we went for a wander along to the marina in front of the Sagafjord Hotel. More wrasse were caught, and we added a couple of mini species to our trip tally in the shape of a long spined sea scorpion and a black goby. Before too long it got dark and we returned to the ferry port where we spent some time looking for topknot using our headtorches. Sadly, the topknot in Norway proved just as elusive as the Scottish ones!

Ryan fishes in amongst the rocks and bladderwrack.

There were probably lots of black goby around, they were just being beaten to my Angleworm by the resident wrasse.

During our last two days afloat on the fjord, we were treated to some glorious weather. We really struggled to find mackerel though, and once we did, we generally found the fishing to be much more difficult, catching less fish than we had during the first few days of the trip, and nothing new species wise.

Not a cloud in sight.

As we fished away, we were treated to a second, much closer encounter with a pod of pilot whales when they swam by the boat, and we were also visited by a white tailed sea eagle which was also fantastic to see up close. Nick had his camera out on the boat with him and got some great photos.

Pilot whales pass the boat.

Bird of prey.

Flying high.

We spent a reasonable amount of time over the last two days dropping bigger baits in deep water trying to tempt a long nose skate, but this only resulted in a few more very greedy black mouthed dogfish being caught. Our last hour or so of fishing was spent drifting over much shallower areas. Nick and Ryan spent some time fishing jigs, whilst I stuck to fishing strips of mackerel close to the bottom. A few ling, cusk and whiting were caught. While Nick and Ryan declared their fishing was over and tidied up the deck, I had one last drop with the last of the bait and caught the final fish of the trip in the shape of a megrim.

I think I caught five of these big gobbed flatfish over the trip. Nick and Ryan caught some too. I wish topknot back home were so easy to catch!

Light was fading by the time we got back in to the harbour. Our species hunt was over and overall, despite the mixed weather and fishing, it had been a most enjoyable trip. Between the three of us, we’d caught twenty one species. I was slightly disappointed not to catch either a blackbelly rosefish or a long nosed skate, but was happy I’d caught four new species during the trip, highlighted in bold in our trip tally below.

1. Ballan Wrasse
2. Blackbelly Rosefish/Bluemouth*
3. Black Goby
4. Black Mouthed Dogfish
5. Coalfish
6. Corkwing Wrasse
7. Cuckoo Wrasse
8. Cusk/Torsk
   
9. Golsinnny Wrasse
10. Grey Gurnard
11. Haddock
12. Hake
13. Ling
14. Long Spined Sea Scorpion
15. Mackerel
16. Megrim
17. Norway Haddock/Redfish
18. Pollock
19. Poor Cod
20. Pouting
21. Whiting

*would have been a new species for me, but I failed to catch one sadly.

I'd like to return to Hustadnes Fjordhytter, it’s a stunning place and a feel like we’ve barely scratched the surface. Perhaps it would be more apt to say we barely scratched the bottom. The fjord is 400m deep in places, and there are all sorts of unusual species down there that I’d love to have a go at catching. A trip to northern Norway to target wolfish and halibut is on the bucket list too!

Tight lines, Scott.

A day at the dogs.

Earlier this week, my species hunting mate Gordon invited me for a day out afloat aboard his Warrior 165. After a fairly early start we arrived at the slipway of Crinan Harbour over on the west coast of Scotland. It was a nice day weather wise and the sea conditions were pretty good too. We were both hoping to get lucky and perhaps catch black mouthed dogfish and maybe even luckier still and catch cuckoo ray but we both knew that a certain other shark species would no doubt dominate the day, the much maligned lesser spotted dogfish. We were also aware that some skate might pick up our small baits too. Not really what you want to happen in several hundred feet of water when your fishing fairly light tackle! 

Well, things went pretty much as we expected, we had no luck locating any black mouthed dogfish or cuckoo ray, and by the end of the day we'd caught so many lesser spotted dogfish we'd lost count. Gordon caught a solitary spurdog and we both caught one thornback ray each. Thankfully, no skate gobbled our small mackerel and squid baits!

Baby shark, doo-doo, doo-doo, doo-doo!

I love the eyes on thornback rays.

So, no unusual shark species were caught. Still, I enjoyed the fishing, and it was a relaxing day out in good company and weather. I've got a couple more boat trips coming up soon that I'm excited about later this month. A day species hunting around the Mull of Galloway is first up, followed by a day out of Weymouth targeting butterfly blenny, red band fish and other small unusual species. I'm quite looking forward to stretching my sea legs again!

Tight lines, Scott.

How many is that now?

A few days after my sessions with Nick on Belhaven Beach I headed west with a few of the lads from work to have day out with Blue Fin Charters out of Dunstaffnage Marina. The rest of the lads fancied a go for skate but I was after my first black mouthed dogfish. After a morning of catching mackerel for bait and then winding up lots of spurdogs and lesser spotted dogfish from the depths a few black mouth dogfish began being caught by the other lads, much to their amusement. After a few hours had passed and I'd listened to a fair amount of abuse from them all I eventually caught one myself, much to my relief!

I take a look at my first ever black mouthed dogfish, admiring its lovely markings,...

...beautiful eyes, a rather prominent nose covered in sensors,...

...and then showed the inside of its black mouth to the camera. 

I'd made several attempts to catch one of these unusual deep water sharks over the last few years and having also had several trips cancelled due to the weather it was great to get out and tick this one off. Straight after this the gear was swapped out for some heavier outfits and some big baits were sent off to the bottom for skate. Having caught what I came for I was more than happy to let the others take any skate runs as none of them had caught one before. Sadly over the next few hours the conditions began to deteriorate as a storm approached from the south and only one very small skate at 27lb was caught by my mate John before we had to head back in. Still John was chuffed to catch his first one and the other lads are all very keen to go back again next year for another go. I might tag along and try something a little different to see what else is lurking down in the depths. Adding further species to my all time Scottish tally from saltwater is now going to be quite difficult and I may have to think outside of the box. Since the trip I've figured out how many Scottish species I've caught over the years and will be discussing this in my next post.

Tight lines, Scott.

The real deal.

My mate Martin recently put me in touch with his fellow Ayr Sea Angling Club member Willie who very generously invited me out for a day targeting skate aboard his boat "reel deal".On Sunday I set of at 5:00 to get myself down to Ardfern on the Sound of Jura where Willie and Gordon were waiting for me having fished down there the previous day. With no traffic on the road I made the journey in good time and we launched just after 8:30. It was a lovely day as we cruised south towards our first mark.

Conditions were perfect.

It didn't take us long at all to get to the first spot and we were soon tied up on a buoy that had been left in place by the lads the day before. Six large baits were soon prepared for the skate rods and were lowered down over four hundred feet to the sea floor. With the opportunity to also perhaps catch a black mouthed dogfish or a cuckoo ray I fished a second lighter rod, opting for a spreader boom at the business end. Plenty of luminous beads were placed on my snoods and two #2/0 Sakuma Manta hooks were baited with sandeel, a favourite bait of dogfish. The lads assured me that catching a black mouthed dogfish was simply a matter of playing the numbers game and ploughing through the lesser spotted dogfish. Sure enough I was soon catching a few of the much more abundant of the two sharks. While I plugged away there was no action on the skate rods and when the tide increased we did a bait change to find that our the end tackle was picking up lots of weed so we lifted the anchor and moved to a second mark.

Anchored up again more big baits were lowered to the bottom and we waited for signs of skate showing an interest in them but after a while with no movement on any of the rod tips we reeled them up. There was very little left of the baits as they had been ravaged by the small slater like crustaceans that are found in the area so more fresh ones were prepared and dropped down. Gordon then began fishing a lighter rod too and after a couple of lesser spotted dogfish he caught a black mouthed dogfish.

Gordon shows off his black mouthed dogfish. It was a very cool looking shark.

The inside of their mouths is indeed black.

Some species hunters get frustrated when a fellow angler fishing along side them catches a fish they are after. I prefer to see it as an encouraging sign that the target is present and can be caught so I kept fishing away. By that point I had used up all my sandeel so I switched to mackerel strips on my hooks and caught a few more lesser spotted dogfish and a couple of thornback rays. 

A nice change from the procession of lesser spotted dogfish. 

With not much happening on the skate rods I was now pretty focused on catching a black mouthed dogfish but I soon forgot about them when a bit of interest was eventually shown in one of the big baits. Gordon put a butt pad and harness on me, Willie handed me the rod and the battle commenced.

Skate fights can last over an hour and are physically demanding. As the fight had only just started I managed a smile for the camera.

Having played skate before I knew what to expect, including the banter from the lads. In amongst the "Why are you taking so long?" and "It must be a big dogfish!" patter they kindly gave me a few pointers on my stance and my pumping and winding technique. I found this a big help and after getting the fish off the bottom only for it to swim back down again a few times I eventually got it off the bottom and kept it off, slowly gaining line and getting into a nice rhythm. The fish, a large male, eventually appeared from the depths and was quickly brought on board by Willie and Gordon before quickly being measured, photographed and returned. 

Despite taking on board the advice given and improving my technique my muscles were still aching but it was well worth the effort.

I love watching them go back. A few strokes of their wings and they gracefully glide back towards the bottom.

I was a very happy angler and had added another saltwater species to my tally from Scotland this year. No rest for the wicked though and I wanted to add another by catching my first black mouthed dogfish. As a few clouds rolled overhead Willie joined Gordon and I fishing a lighter rod and after a few obligatory lesser spotted dogfish he caught what he suspected was a ray as he retrieved it but it turned out to be a small skate. 

At just over 6lb this was easily the smallest skate I've seen caught by quite a margin.

The tide then really started to pick up and as it got stronger it was harder to hold bottom and the dogfish bites dried up. One of the big baits was picked up by something and Willie had a fish on for a brief period but it dropped the bait. He suspected it might have been a conger just holding on. Soon it was time to wind up the skate baits and head back in. 

Another cracking view as the sun disappears behind some clouds as we headed back to dry land.

It had been a great day and I can't thank Willie enough for the opportunity to spend the day out on his boat. When it comes to anglers who know their stuff the boys from the Ayr Sea Angling Club are certainly the real deal, great guys too who have gone out of their way to help me catch fish on several occasions this year. Without their generosity, experience, knowledge and advice I don't think I'd have reached my target of fifty Scottish saltwater species this year, let alone be approaching sixty and I hope I get the opportunity to fish with them again in the not too distant future.

Tight lines, Scott.

Most Wanted : Black Mouthed Dogfish.

Sharks are cool, fascinating creatures. I don't think anyone would dispute this fact. Some anglers do however have a strong dislike for a particular species of shark, namely the lesser spotted dogfish, commonly referred to as the doggy. In some areas these can reach plague proportions and anglers targeting other fish can have their baits picked up by the resident doggies much to their annoyance. Personally I don't mind catching them and at the end of the day I believe all fish deserve respect, even the humble bait stealing doggy.

My first ever lesser spotted dogfish. I still enjoy catching them even when I'm not targeting them.

A less well known and much less common cousin of the lesser spotted dogfish is the black mouthed dogfish. So named because, you've guessed it, the inside of its mouth is black. It has the same very abrasive skin as its spotted cousin but is darker in colour with rather nice markings down its flanks, has larger eyes and a longer pointed snout, the top of which is covered in highly sensitive prey detecting sensors.

A very nice looking member of the shark family I'm sure you'll agree.

As my "Most Wanted" list didn't have any sharks on it and since I've also set myself the goal of catching ten shark species this year I thought this was something I needed to address. There are other shark species that I'd like to catch for the first time too but this one is just a little unusual and that's why it joins the other species on my list of highly sought after catches. I know that black mouthed dogfish are sometimes caught on the west coast of Scotland and that's where I shall probably head to try and catch one.

Tight lines, Scott.