Most Wanted : Tenerife.

Way back in January, feeling quite fed up with the particularly miserable Scottish winter weather, I booked a week long holiday to the Canary Island of Tenerife in December. It's a family holiday with my parter Lillian, my sister Sharon and her partner Julie but as usual my light game travel rod will be going into the case and I will be doing as much fishing as I can get away with. Having fished the Eastern Atlantic before on both Lanzarote and Madeira I now have a reasonable idea what species I'm likely to encounter. Nevertheless the islands in the western half of the Canary Island group do seem to hold a few different species to the ones in its Eastern half.  I had a look through my recently acquired and rather excellent "100 peces de Canarias" pocket guide by Sergio Hanquet to pick out a few species that I'd like to catch. Three have caught my eye. 

Atlantic Trumpetfish.

The Atlantic trumpetfish is a very strange looking fish indeed. I know that other anglers have caught these from deep water close in from both rocks and harbour breakwaters so I think there is a good chance of catching one. Small paddletail lures fished on jigheads seem to be a good choice. 

Glasseye.

A pretty little fish that is found world wide in tropical waters. According to my research they are a shy species that like hiding in amongst rocks and around caves and are most active at night. My headtorch will be going into the case then for some fishing after dark. 

Starry Weever.

Weevers are cool. They taste amazing too. Having sight fished for lesser weevers I know they like lures jigged on the bottom. The disturbance the lure creates when it hits the sand they hide in draws them out and when you lift the lure up they swim up and attack. Metal jigs fitted with an assist hook might be the best approach for these.

Tenerife will be my final holiday abroad this year. As with previous trips I'm setting myself a little species hunting challenge again and this time I've decided on a target of twenty species during the trip including three new ones. I'm really looking forward to returning to the Canary Islands again and getting away from the cold, wet and windy Scottish winter!

Tight lines, Scott.