Driving back up to Scotland, I had some pinkies left to use up and decided to make another fishing “pit stop”. Whilst out on Flamer IV, Jack had told me about fishery when I mentioned I’d like to catch some pumpkinseed. The fishery he told me about is located in Berkshire, so it did require a bit of a detour, but I left Cornwall early enough to allow a three hour session there and still be back in Edinburgh at a reasonable time. Upon arrival, I spoke to the owner, got a small amount of tackle out of the car and picked a peg that was out of the wind.
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| Amazingly, these pinkies had been in the boot of my car for a week and were still going strong! |
Setting up an ultralight rod and a reel loaded with 2lb mainline and an insert waggler and a #20 hook at the business end, I was fishing in the margins in no time. It didn’t take too long before a few pinkies being fed into the swim attracted some roach.
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| The first species to show interest in my fluoro pinkies. |
After catching about a dozen small roach and some small perch, a shoal of pumpkinseed arrived and after that I caught quite a few of the pretty little member of the sunfish family. Mission accomplished!
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| Pumpkinseed are so cool! I always think they’re like a freshwater wrasse! |
After a while, my float went under and slowly slid away from me. Lifting into the fish, I immediately knew it was something bigger. After about ten minutes of putting the drag on my Legalis LT 2000 reel through its paces and pushing my 1.5lb hooklength to its limit, a nice common carp was on the surface and drawn over my net.
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| It was bound to happen when I was fishing with such light tackle! |
As you'd expect, all the commotion the carp had made had spooked the smaller fish from my swim, and I didn’t catch anything for a while. It was almost time to hit the road again when my float registered the return of some fish and after a couple more pumpkinseed I got a pleasant surprise when I hooked something slightly larger and a goldfish came to the surface.
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| A nice bonus and the last fish of the trip. |
So, my adventure was over, at least the fishing anyway, and it had been both very enjoyable and productive too. I’d added seventeen species to my 2023 tally. In the order I caught them, and with new species in bold, here’s what they were …
- Greater sandeel/Launce
- Tub gurnard
- Tompot blenny
- Black seabream
- Butterfly blenny
- Starry smoothhound
- Baillon’s wrasse
- Gilthead seabream
- Common goby
- Shore clingfish/Cornish sucker
- Lesser weever
- Giant goby
- Montagu’s blenny*
- Atlantic horse mackerel/Scad
- Blackspot seabream/Red seabream*
- Pumpkinseed
- Goldfish
*the first time I've caught this species in the UK.
I've already decided I want to head back down to the south coast next year. There are a few species I've never caught before that I'd like to target down there. I might see if some of my mates want to join me next time. It would be good to share out the driving!
Tight lines, Scott.
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