The weather forecast is a load of carp!

After being soaked twice whilst fishing over the last few days on Monday night I checked the weather forecast for Tuesday, my first day off work for over a week. It didn't look good with rain forecast all day so I decided just to have a lie in. When I got up though just before noon and looked out of the window the weather looked quite nice so I thought I'd go and take a look at a small burn I plan to fish at some point in the future.

A short drive later and I was enjoying the sunshine, had a nice walk along the burn and with just a solitary very light shower I thought sod it, I'm going fishing! I headed home, grabbed my gear and headed to Orchill Coarse Fishery in Perthshire. My target for the evening was crucian carp. It took me just over a hour to get there. Upon arrival just after 16:00 I got my permit, a pint of maggots, a can of sweetcorn and drove up to one of the ponds I was told contained my target and picked a peg. Being able to park right next to my peg was unexpected but great as it meant that if the rain was going to appear I could jump in it and keep dry. In the pond there were lots of fish cruising around and there was plenty of surface activity going on with fish splashing around feeding. As a result I started fishing fairly shallow and was soon catching plenty of small chub a rod length out in front of me. Whilst I fished away I fed up a swim in the margin to my left. I switched to that after about ten chub, plumbed up and started fishing on the bottom. This saw me catch a few fiesty little F1 carp.

F1 carp are pretty cool little fish. Little scappers too. They look a bit like small commons but an easy way to tell they aren't is a lack of barbules.

After three or four of these I hooked a bigger carp which tore off to my right. I took my time playing it, letting it take line when it wanted and it was on for about five minutes when the hook suddenly pulled. I was quite dissapointed but at the same time hopeful I could get another. I carried on fishing catching a few more F1 carp in the process. After a quiet spell I decided to switch from a standard waggler setup to a float ledger rig. This saw me catch even more F1 carp and then my float shot under, the fish hooking itself against my rod tip as it swung around to my left, I quickly picked up the rod and I had another nice fish on. It didn't feel as big as the one I lost earlier and after a few minutes and a few short runs I brought it to the surface. I could see it was a common carp and after a few nervous moments it was safely in my net. The angler along from me very kindly came along and took a photo for me with the fish which was in very good condition.

Chuffed to bits. My first common carp. It gave a good account of itself on my float rod.

I got chatting to the angler who told me he had been fishing a method feeder and asked me what I was using so I showed him my set up. I cast it back in and tightened down until my float was just under the surface. As I told him a little more about the technique, explained how I'd just started experimenting with it and so far was very pleased with the results my float shot off again and I quickly lifted my rod which by that point already had a nice bend in it. A nice mirror carp was the culprit and after a short fight and with a bit of assistance from the angler who netted it for me it was soon being photographed before being returned.

Float ledgered double maggot takes another carp in nice condition.

I then switched to sweetcorn on the hook and caught a few more F1 carp and a very small mirror carp. The owner of the venue then came around walking his dogs and asked me how I was getting on. I told him what I'd caught and what I was after at which point he chuckled and told me there were no crucian carp in the pond I was fishing! Oops! Oh well, I had forgotten about trying to catch them to be honest, I was just enjoying the session so much. Anyway, the capture of my first common carp was my tenth new freshwater species this year which was the target I set myself so all in all a successful evenings fishing and it hadn't rained once either! Besides my mistake means that I'll have to visit a nice venue again to try for crucian carp in a pond that actually holds them which isn't a bad thing!

Tight lines, Scott.

Most Wanted : Crete.

Having recently booked a holiday to Crete in October I am rather excited by the prospect of a bit of ultra light fun in the sun and hopefully I can catch some weird and wonderful mini species in the process. Having done some research into what fish can be commonly found around the island from the rocks and around harbours I've picked out a few I'd really like to catch. No doubt those who know me won't be surprised to see the inclusion of a wrasse and a blenny in my Greek island hit list of most wanted holiday species but what can I say, they are probably my favourite two families of fish. Obviously I am spoilt for choice with a multitude of colourful mini species to choose from, it was very hard to narrow it down but I've ended up with a total of six "Most Wanted Mediterranean Mini Species" so here goes and in no particular order.

Ornate Wrasse.

As I've said above I love wrasse and whilst there are quite a few new wrasse species I can potentially encounter, this one, as its name suggests, is perhaps the most ornate. Beautifully resplendent in shades of deep reddish brown, electric blue, lime green and yellow these wrasse are simple stunning.

Tentacled Blenny.

Creatures with tentacles are cool. Blennies are cool. Therefore simple logic dictates that this fish is cool.

Black Scorpionfish.

Hopefully they'll be just as obliging as the sea scorpions I catch here. Unlike our resident sea scorpions however these are covered in poisonous spines. Danger is my middle name though so I will seek them out and if I catch one I'll totally crap myself whilst handling them very carefully indeed! Alternatively I'll get Lilly the Ghillie to deal with them.

Painted Comber.

Another rather colourful fish this one is aptly named as it looks rather like some rubbish graffiti artist spray painted a light blue spot on it. They also rather bizarrely look to me like a little bit of a weird cross between a perch and a pike which is quite odd because as everyone knows a cross between a perch and a pike is actually a zander! It's not really. Unless you are Dutch.

Wide Eyed Flounder.

If you had loads of lovely regular flounders at home throwing themselves at your Isome would you try and have a fling with a squint eyed flatfish whilst on holiday? Of course you would! What's caught on tour is released on tour after all.

Flying Gurnard.

With those huge wings you'd think they probably could fly but this gurnard uses them to confuse and scare off predators.

Well, I've set myself an ambitious goal of catching fifteen species during my two week holiday and I'd really like it if I caught some of the fish featured here whilst I'm away regardless of what my final tally is. I may have a few other little species hunting trips to enjoy closer to home before heading to Crete but I really can't wait to have my first taste of ultra light fishing in the Mediterranean!

Tight lines, Scott.

My annual viviparous blenny hunt begins.

When I woke up this morning I looked out of the window to find it was a nice sunny day contrary to most of the weather forecasts I'd looked at last night. Perfect I though for a couple of hours down at Granton Breakwater before work to begin my hunt for a viviparous blenny, a species that has eluded capture despite me having several goes over the last couple of years at catching one. My plan was to fish small baits on a #6 hook close in on a simple running ledger rig. When I got to the tackle shop though they were out of ragworm, my first choice bait, so I popped along the road to a supermarket and got a bag of frozen raw prawns instead. Parking the car and heading right to the end of the breakwater I was soon fishing in about six feet of water between the rock I was standing on and the remains of the wooden pier that many years ago was at the end of the breakwater. Bites came from the start and a string of small coalfish were caught and quickly released. 

One of the bigger specimens. Quite a fat little coalfish too! 

Just when I thought a move was in order I caught a long spined sea scorpion so I decided to stay put to see what else I could catch. 

Perhaps there were other species down there who could battle through the coalfish hordes to my bait?

After a few more coalfish I felt the distinctive taps of a wrasse and managed to hook the culprit, a nice little dark brown ballan wrasse with subtle gun metal grey spots.

My first wrasse from the venue. 

You can see the gun metal grey markings on the fishes gill covers too. 

Quite pleased with this I then caught another wrasse, this time a rather large battle scarred corkwing that had a chunk missing from his dorsal fin. 

An old warrior. 

As the tide started to flood I caught a second corkwing that I thought might be the same fish but a quick check of his dorsal fin told me he was a different wrasse. A second ballan wrasse soon followed before I had to get back onto the main breakwater as the tide was about to cut me off on the large rock I was fishing from. 

Before leaving I had a few casts to see if I could hold bottom out in front of the breakwater but my 1oz lead was quickly being pulled sideways so if I want to try there on future viviparous blenny hunts I will require heavier tackle I think. 

On the way back to the shore the heavens opened as predicted by the Met Office, finally getting it right for a change! I got a soaking but I still had a big smile on my face after a very enjoyable short session. So, no sign of my target species but with plenty of prawns left over and with reports of them being caught there recently I will be back and the hunt will continue...

Tight lines, Scott.

Feeling tense? See the doctor.

After a fish free visit to Loch Skeen above the Grey Mare's Tail waterfall near Moffat in the Scottish Borders with Lillian at the weekend, I began working eight days straight on Monday. Fortunately this isn't normally something I have to do very often, but combined with a change in the weather I thought these circumstances might limit my fishing opportunities so I was feeling a little stressed out at the prospect of little to no fishing until midway through next week!

The Grey Mare's Tail water fall. The walk up the right hand side to Loch Skeen above is quite steep.

This little fellow hopped across our path on the way up.

Loch Skeen, a beautiful little water. Despite seeing a few small wild brown trout rising I couldn't get any takes on my #0 Mepps. Next time I visit I may take a fly rod and some small dry flies.

With a break in the recent thunderstorms and rain forecast for this morning and early afternoon I wanted to squeeze in a short session before the weekend. Also with a few days off booked next month but no solid plans yet I wanted to meet up with my mate Naz to discuss us potentially going on a short fishing trip. I had to be at work for 16:00 so I picked up Naz at 8:00 and we headed to Eliburn Reservoir in Livingston for some stress free maggot drowning and a chance to chat about potentially going for a short trip in August.

Fishing was quite slow at the first peg we picked so after an hour or so we decided to move. This paid off quite quickly with us both soon catching a few roach, Naz's first ever roach in fact, I also caught a couple of small perch and what we both agreed was the nicest fish of the short session, a lovely little tench.

One of Naz's roach.

A lovely if grumpy looking little tench. Always a nice surprise to see "the doctor fish".

As we watched the puddle chucker we chatted about various fishing destinations we would like to visit on the west coast of Scotland but it soon became clear that perhaps Naz wouldn't be able to make it on a short trip next month after all. This is a pity as that would have been good but I have no doubt that at some point, in the not too distant future hopefully, we'll manage to get a short trip organised and visit some of the places we talked about.

Tight lines, Scott.

A quick perch pick me up.

Work has been pretty dull since I returned from my ten day trip down south and whilst I've certainly been enjoying the hot weather during the day when I'm not there the last few nights it's been awfully hard trying to get to sleep. This meant I was in two minds about going fishing yesterday evening with my mate Jake as I had a few things to do as well as feeling pretty tired. Despite this I decided to go anyway and after picking up Jake and driving west we were soon on the shore of Loch Lubnaig, our favourite perch venue and perhaps one of my favourite places to fish due to the stunning surroundings. We fished for a few hours and had a great time as usual catching lots of beautiful perch in the process.

I had a couple of perch from the weeds in front of these rocks on my go to Lake Fork Live Baby Shad in Golden Shiner fished on a 3.5g #4 jighead.

Jake was fishing a bigger Lunker City Swimmin Ribster on a 10g #2/0 football jighead in the hope of singling out some larger specimens. He also brought an unhooking mat. We talked about using them more often, even for saltwater species, as we believe fish care is important if you practice catch and release.

With the unhooking mat beneath me I figured out a good way to present my catch to the camera safe in the knowledge that should the fish fall it wasn't landing on rocks. Another good reason to use one.

Jake admires another beautiful Loch Lubnaig perch.

I prepare to land another feisty fish.

I figure out a one handed way to hold a perch to show it off in all its glory.

We released a few of our fish via a small stream that ran into the loch. This gave us the opportunity to take some cool "Jaws" shots. This one shows the power of the fish as with one swish of its tail it creates a wake and heads at speed back towards the loch.

Jake managed to resist the temptation to go smaller and lighter for a change.

No need really as the perch were loving his Lunker City Swimmin Ribster.

When he wasn't looking I stole a Fish Arrow Flash J lure in Black Gold out of Jake's bag. Cool lures that look like minnows and sit horizontally when fished on a drop shot rig due to an air pocket inside. That's exactly how I caught this perch.

Drop shotting a Lake Fork Live Baby Shad in Sun Perch also proved irresistable. You can just about see it in the back of this perch's mouth!

Catching a load of these pristine perch is hard to beat and to be honest we weren't even really trying that hard!

Jake got the heaviest catch of the night after bullying this lump up from the depths.

I caught this little chap on a Live Baby Shad in Pink & Pearl, again stolen from Jake, and whilst experimenting with a retrieve twitching pattern I'm calling "The Pink Panther". He bought these pink ones due to all the fish he's had with his Jackson Cymo in pink. The success of my new twitching pattern caused me to go a bit "Kenneth Williams".

As darkness fell and the moon shone in the sky we reluctantly headed home rather pleased with the evenings exploits.

It was really good to fish with Jake again as apart from briefly meeting up for an hour or two down in Cornwall it's been a over a month since we have fished together and I must say I had a nice relaxing time fishing, enjoyed a good chat about what we'd both been up to recently and it was just what I needed really. I was glad I'd made the choice to go.

Tight lines, Scott.