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.