Crossing borders.

Last weekend, I had a couple of after work sessions with my mate Ryan. Poor weather conditions had wrecked his fishing plans during the previous week on his days off, so as the weather was nice, off we went. On Saturday, we met up with four other species hunting anglers at St Abbs harbour. Jack, Josh, Cal and Leigh were all up visiting Scotland from down south. Having travelled all around Scotland during their trip, trying to add a few species to their lifelists, they’d done just that, and were visiting St Abbs on their way back south for one last go at adding one or two more. 

When they arrived, I gave them a few pointers on where they could potentially catch butterfish, viviparous blenny, Yarrell’s blenny and tadpole fish. Ryan and I then set about trying to catch a few fish ourselves. Ryan wasn't after anything new, but wanted to add to his tally in a species hunt he's taking part in with some of his other mates. He was after a plaice or a short spined sea scorpion, but the tide was almost fully out and as a result, things were pretty slow. 

A shanny kicked things off for me after a pretty uneventful start.

There were plenty of flounder around, but unfortunately no plaice for Ryan.

A rather chunky long spined sea scorpion I caught. It's short spined cousin evaded capture!

As it got dark, and our headtorches became neccesary, I probably spent more time talking to the visiting species hunters than I spent fishing. Sadly, none of them got any new species, but they'd clearly all had a great time travelling around and fishing various different venues in Scotland. It was good to meet up with Jack again and to meet Cal, Josh and Leigh in person for the first time too, having talked to them all online at various points over the last few years. I'm sure I'll cross paths with them all again in the future, most likely when I head down south for a cross border species raid of my own!

The following evening, Ryan and I went fishing after work again. This time we visited Burntisland Harbour, a venue I've not been to for many years. This mainly due to the installation of an extensive network of fencing, designed to keep the public out. After hearing reports that access to the breakwater and the area near the sailing club was once again possible, and that lots of locals were regularly fishing there, we were pleased to find out that this was indeed the case, via several large holes and missing sections in the security fencing. Our main target for the session was a Yarrell's blenny, but as the tide was fully in, it took us a little time to locate a very specific spot on the bottom, that has for me, produced them more often than not. With several years having passed, I didn't know if the species would still be present, but fish are creatures of habit, and on Ryan's second drop into the deep hole on the bottom, a hungry Yarrell's blenny hit his tiny ragworm bait and was quickly wound up.

Mission accomplished! Ryan was over the moon to catch this Yarrell's blenny.

I may not have been taking part in any competitive species hunts myself, but that didn't mean that I didn't want to catch one too, so I set about plundering the bottom feature myself. After catching a few juvenile cod, poor cod, goldsinny wrasse and corkwing wrasse, something substantially larger picked up my tiny piece of ragworm and pulled my rod tip round as it swam off along the base of the harbour wall, engaging my drag as it realised something wasn't quite right and charged off. Fishing with a tiny hook and very light line, I took my time playing the fish and didn't apply too much pressure. Just enough to slowly raise the fish up through the water column and to steer it away from a set of ladders that could have swam behind to break me off. After a very decent scrap, a large ballan wrasse came to the surface. We had neglected to take a net with us, and I didn't want to risk lifting it up the harbour wall so Ryan scrambled down to the edge of the water to lift it out for me. After it made a few more attempts to swim off, down through the bladderwrack next to where Ryan was waiting, it was finally landed successfully.

What a cracking bonus ballan wrasse! A great fish on very light tackle!

We fished on for a little while longer, to see if I could catch a Yarrell's blenny of my own, but feeling pretty tired, we decided to call it a night and to head off for some tasty fish and chips before driving back to the capital. After a few "last casts" before we did pack up to leave, I caught a small shore rockling.

Not as cool as a Yarrell's blenny, but still pretty cool as far as I'm concerned and a nice species to finish the session with.

So, Ryan and I had a couple of very enjoyable short evening sessions. We really should make more of an effort to do these after work, especially when the weather is nice. This weekend, Ryan and I will be doing a cross border raid of our own, when we head down to Cornwall for five days of species hunting. I'll mainly be focusing my efforts on catching species that I've never caught before in the UK, Ryan will be doing the same and has more potential targets than I do, but he'll also trying to add as many species as he can to his 2026 tally. We'll be meeting up with several other species hunting anglers whilst we are there as well and we're both really looking forward to it!

Tight lines, Scott.

Nothing fishy going on?

I've not been out fishing much this year. On the first few occasions I did venture out I blanked and when I did finally open my account for 2019 it was with a solitary but rather large sand goby that I caught at Burntisland Breakwater.

A fine example of the species with a bold marking on the rear edge of its first dorsal fin.

The main reason for my lack of fishing is simply that I'm working a lot at the moment and also have a fair amount of other things going on too that always seem to get in the way of wetting a line but I did have a week on the Greek island of Kefalonia at the end of May where I enjoyed a bit of species hunting and I'm off to Madeira this afternoon with two of my friends. When I return I'll have a fair amount of blogging to do and I really need to get out more often here as well and have a trip to have a go at pike on the fly to begin to remedy this situation. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Slippery customers.

Butterfish were probably the first fish I ever encountered. As a child I lived next to the sea and remember messing around when the tide was out, turning over stones and occasionally finding one underneath. When I became a speies hunting angler I never thought they'd be a realistic fishing target but over the last few years I've managed to catch a few. Back in July I even managed to catch three of them during the one session at Burntisland Harbour.

One of the three butterfish I caught.

Believe it or not the butterfish is a member of the blenny family and speaking of blennies I also caught a Yarrell's blenny during the session too. Burntisland regularly produces both these rarely caught species so it's definitely the place to visit if you're involved in a species hunt and want a good chance of catching either of them or indeed both!

Tight lines, Scott.

Fancy meeting you here!

I popped over to Burntisland yesterday afternoon. The sun was out, if only briefly, but the wind was blowing down the Forth and the water inside was a little coloured up which meant overall the the fishing was pretty poor. It wasn't a complete waste of time though as I did bump into my mate Col and caught this funky Yarrell's blenny.

I don't know if the mackerel are in yet!

We must have been asked if the mackerel were in about half a dozen times the other day. Fishing down the inside of Burntisland Harbour's eastern breakwater with my mate Col we just weren't that interested if they were or not. There are other fish in the sea after all! Col was after a rock cook wrasse whilst I was hoping to catch a Yarrell's blenny or a Scottish record breaking goldsinny wrasse. I decided to fish small pieces of raw prawn on a one hook paternoster whilst Col decided to fish wacky rigged Gulp and Isome on a drop shot rig. The water was slightly coloured up and things were pretty slow but we started getting the odd tap and I landed a couple of goldsinny wrasse, one of them equalling the current Scottish record of 53g. Things remained pretty slow as the tide rose but Col eventually opened his account with a corkwing wrasse. I then landed a small ballan wrasse followed by bonus butterfish that I mistook for a Yarrell's blenny as it appeared from the rocky harbour bottom. 

My first ballan wrasse of the year. 

A bonus butterfish. Col caught one the day before as well so there is obviously a healthy population of them in the harbour. 

As the tide turned and began to ebb we caught a few more wrasse but neither of us managed to catch our main target for the day or any record breakers before we decided to head off. I think in a few more weeks there will be a few more fish around and might return for another session. Maybe the mackerel will be in too. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Another year comes to an end.

On the 21st and 22nd of December I had a trip down to Anglesey to target three bearded rocklings and conger eels planned but heavy rain and winds gusting to 40mph forced me to reluctantly abandon it. I was pretty disappointed because I was going to fish with two of my mates, Ad and Lee. The weather locally wasn't great either so to make matters worse I ended up not fishing at all on the two days I had taken off work.

On Boxing Day the wind finally dropped to single figures so I headed down to Torness Power Station outflow with my mate Nick to spend a few hours targeting mullet. We arrived to find the water was quite coloured up and a slight swell was breaking over the area we planned to fish. Not ideal but we gave it a go anyway and besides, Nick had a new fishing setup for mullet to hopefully christen. Chucking in plenty of groundbait a few small mullet eventually arrived but bites were few and far between and the small waves breaking in front of us made spotting them very difficult. Nick's float eventually went under though and a little golden grey mullet was soon in the net.

A new species for Nick. Species hunting isn't really his thing but he was chuffed all the same.

His lucky sunglasses made all the difference. A #18 hook I gave him no doubt played its part too. 

We carried on fishing and tried a second spot but didn't catch any more mullet. I dropped a bread flake into a rockpool and pulled out a blenny to avoid a blank. Not satisfied with a tasty appetiser of Warburton's Medium loaf it helped itself to a meaty main course.

It seems even blennies indulge themselves over the festive period. This one held on for about a minute occasionally clamping down which Nick and I both found quite amusing.

Returning our attention to trying to catch mullet we didn't have any joy so after a while called it a day and headed home. It may have been a fairly slow days' fishing but Nick really enjoys fishing for mullet and his nice new float rod will also be put to good use on a few coarse fisheries next year too.

I had two more days off work to go fishing before the end of 2014 and my mate Ross was came up from his family home near Manchester for a spot of blenny hunting. Not the vicious common blenny though, he was after a Yarrell's blenny and a viviparous blenny to add to his UK caught saltwater species list. Being a blenny lover myself I was happy to take him to the marks where I had caught both of these species earlier in the year to hopefully help him catch them.

The day he arrived the weather was OK for the time of year but for some reason Ross decided not to take a coat when we headed across the Forth to Burntisland Harbour late in the morning only choosing to tell me this once we arrived. The sky was clear but the harbour wall cast a shadow over us and a slight breeze blowing with its associated wind chill factor made it rather cold in our static positions as we ledgered small baits down the harbour wall. I suspected a Yarrell's blenny might be a big ask and sure enough it was tough going. We stuck it out for a couple of hours, Ross doing the odd star jump to try and warm up, with only a couple of tiny fish I caught to show for our efforts.

Ross patiently watches his rod tip for signs of interest as hypothermia slowly sets in.

Tiny bites and a switch to smaller hooks produced two sand gobies.

To defrost Ross slightly we decided to move, set the car heater to full and slowly drove along the coast to Kinghorn to see if we could winkle out some long spined sea scorpions from the rockpools there. I managed three from the same crack in a small pier including one with a rather strange face.

A rather large nose and slightly crossed eyes had Ross and I in stitches.

It had a very flat face. Perhaps it had swam into a rock or two?

The hilarity couldn't stop Ross from starting to freeze again so we decided to head back to Edinburgh to get some food and Ross's coat. A tasty roast ham and veg was devoured as we watched a couple of fishing videos filmed in the much warmer climate of Australia then off we went to Dunbar Harbour. Arriving as light was almost gone we fished at my nicely sheltered viviparous blenny hot spot and unsurprisingly Ross soon got his first fish of the day, a small coalfish. To try and avoid them and give any viviparous blennies a chance I used a #6 hook. This seemed to do the trick and after only twenty minutes or so when a larger fish finally had a go and got hooked it was our target for the evening. Ross was quite excited and perhaps a little jealous too but needn't have been as he didn't have to wait long at all to get himself one as well.

Viviparous fish are unusual becuase they give birth to live young that have developed inside their bodies. This one was either a pregnant female or had also enjoyed a hearty lunch.

This was the 84th saltwater species that Ross has caught from UK waters in the last three years. He was quite pleased. Not that you can tell from this photo.

Well chuffed to have caught what we came for we fished on for a while to see if we could catch some more but the resident coalfish became much more active and after a few dozen of them we decided to head up the road for a celebratory drink. This was overdone slightly and the next day we didn't do any fishing at all, electing to have a lie in and then watch a few more fishing videos as we nursed hangovers. Ross headed up to Aberdeen the next day. It had been good to fish with Ross again, help him catch something new whilst having a few laughs. I'm fishing with him in September again as he has booked the charter boat Bite Adventures for three days. We should both have the chance of some new species during that trip so I'm really looking forward to it but hopefully we'll get the chance to fish together before then.

Tight lines, Scott.

With a little help from my friends.

On Monday night I was in two minds about where to go go fishing on Tuesday. It was either a day's fly casting practice with the chance of a tiger or golden trout, or a return to Burntisland for another attempt at catching a Yarrell's blenny. In the end I did what all good anglers do, I asked my mate Lee to decide for me and a session in saltwater was the result. Checking the tides I noted that high water was at about half past three. Perfect for a lazy sod like myself so after a lie in I grabbed my gear and headed over the Forth Road Bridge, arriving at the harbour at about noon.

Walking around to the spot I was going to fish I was surprised to find it already taken, but pleasantly so as it turned out to be Col, the angler who had recently caught a Yarrell's blenny there inspiring my own attempts. Sitting down next to him I quickly rigged up an Angleworm on a drop shot rig. It was nice to have some company but as we chatted away it quickly became apparent that whatever fish that were down below us were not really in the mood, gently nibbling away and proving difficult to hook. We persisted with our lures for a short while but soon both decided to switch to some bait. Col had some worms with him that he had dug in the morning and I had a few raw prawns. This switch didn't seem to produce many more bites but they were a bit more aggressive and I caught a small coalfish. The conversation soon turned to Yarrell's blenny and we were discussing my chances of catching one. Were they a species that live a solitary existence? Was there possibly a small group of them resident in the harbour? Maybe they only moved into the harbour to breed at this time of year? As we exchanged our thoughts Col was next to catch a fish and low and behold it was the one we were talking about. 

Col's second Yarrell's blenny from Burntisland Harbour. 

I was very excited to see this strange looking blenny in the flesh for the first time. It has an odd looking head with interesting structures on top of it as well as on the first two rays of its dorsal fin. I reasoned that Col catching two from the same spot meant that I had a pretty good chance of getting one too. I carried on fishing around the same area and then caught a couple of goldsinny wrasse. The second one had some unusual dark flecks on it. 

I've seen this type of "peppering" on a few long spined sea scorpions before but never on a wrasse. 

Things were still quite slow though and Col decided to try fishing over the back of the harbour wall to see if he could catch a ballan wrasse. I certainly wasn't moving from Yarrell's corner though! Pretty soon Col's rod had a nice bend in it and he was soon catching a few ballans. I wasn't getting many bites but when I finally got a positive one I managed to connect with it and soon had a huge smile on my face after quickly swinging a little pink and brown blenny up the harbour wall and into my hand.

My first Yarrell's blenny. A rather funky little fish.

In case you are wondering why it's called Yarrell's blenny, this is the Victorian naturalist William Yarrell who first identified the blenny and named it after himself.

I was over the moon and shouted over to Col to let him know, popped the fish back and then joined him up on the harbour wall. By now he had caught a few more ballans and landed a corkwing just as I climbed up beside him.

Col really likes corkwings. Who can blame him they are pretty fish.

Corkwing wrasse really like ragworm. Who can blame them they taste amazing!

Pretty soon I caught a few fish too. A ballan wrasse was followed by a couple of long spined sea scorpions and a couple of goldsinny wrasse.

I wish I had visited Burntisland earlier in the year for a few more of these.

A specimen long spined sea scorpion. 

This goldsinny wrasse had a nice golden mark on its flank.

As high tide came and went things went very quiet so we started fishing inside the harbour again. The action was almost non existent though so after a while I called it a day and left Col who kept fishing away. It had been a very enjoyable day in his company and I was very grateful that he had discovered Yarrell's corner and shared that information on his blog.

On the way home I popped into Leith Docks for an hour or so. It's normally a fairly grim place but the area opposite me was brightened up by a ship, a crane and a few other things.

Who said Leith Docks was fairly grim? Oh, I did. 

Keen to see what the murky water might throw up I went with an Angleworm on a drop shot rig. Casting it out and slowly working it back I soon caught a few chunky little coalfish.

Leith Docks are full of these little plump coalfish. 

That was all I caught with no surprises turning up but having caught a new blenny species earlier in the day I couldn't have really cared less! Once again a massive thanks to Col for sharing his original capture, giving me additional info and showing me how to catch one in person. Thanks to Lee too for being decisive when I was dithering. Finally thanks to William for discovering the species and giving it such an imaginative name...

Tight lines, Scott.

Cloudy with a chance of Yarrell's blenny.

With the recent change in the weather seemingly signalling the end of what has been a great summer my mind is starting to think about getting through another winter. Winter is not a season I particularly enjoy. It's obviously not pleasant fishing in the cold but unlike some anglers who down tools and complain about not being able to fish, I do try to make the most of what opportunities are available and fish all year round. This normally means a shift from saltwater to freshwater. Anyway, my mood was buoyed the other day when I took a look at Streamside Diary to find that fellow blogger Col had caught a Yarrell's blenny whilst fishing in Burntisland Harbour. They say chasing fish is usually not a good thing but blennies are territorial and usual where there is one there are more so on Wednesday off I went to try an emulate Col's catch.  

Burntisland Harbour. Like many Scottish harbours it is sadly pretty run down with several areas shut off including an old condemned wooden pier that is slowly rotting away.

Col kindly gave me very specific details about where he had caught the little pink fish so I fished in a fairly small area. A drop shot rig incorporating a #18 hook and a small section of Gulp! Angleworm was lowered down and it didn't take too long for my rod tip to start rattling away as the resident mini species attacked it. First to get hooked was a blenny but not the rarely caught one I was after. This was followed by a second, a goldsinny wrasse and a couple of small coalfish. 

A common blenny. Aptly named as they are very common indeed and loose all control when presented with most things on a hook. I was hopeful his cousin would be around and have a similarly ravenous/aggressive nature. 

My first ever goldsinny wrasse from Scotland's East Coast was quite a chunky one.

This great start to the session had me thinking that whilst the leaves might well be falling off of the trees maybe there was perhaps still some fun to be had with summer species yet. As low water approached however all activity ceased and after over an hour with no bites I decided to have a break, grab some lunch and try another spot before returning to my Yarrell's blenny swim later in the day. 

After a sandwich and a bottle of water I headed along to the far end of the long sea defences that run east from the harbour, clambered over onto the rocks there and cast out. The bottom was mixed and after loosing a few drop shot leads to patches of boulders I found a few cleaner areas to fish over and was soon getting a few tiny bites when I left the lead stationary and kept tension in the line. Hooking the culprits proved tricky but my persistence paid off eventually and I caught three of the tiny bottom dwelling fish that had been nibbling away at my tiny piece of Angleworm. 

The little rattles on my rod tip were caused by sand gobies. An unexpected bonus being a new addition to this year's species tally. 

With not much else happening though I headed back along to the harbour. When I started fishing again the tide was creeping back up the harbour walls and I was soon getting a few bites. Connecting with a few of them I caught a few more common blennies, goldsinny wrasse and coalfish before catching a corkwing wrasse. 

A very darkly coloured little fellow. 

Then a seal pup appeared right in front of me causing another unwanted cessation in action. 

Hello baby seal. How cute. Now bugger off!

After a short while I started getting bites again and a few strong ones at that. Some ballan wrasse had moved in and I caught four of them in a row. I also pulled the hook on a larger fish, also a ballan I think, one of the downsides of using such a small hook I suppose but at the end of the day I wasn't targeting ballan wrasse. 

Good fun on ultra light tackle but I've watched wrasse chase blennies before so I was keen for them to move off again. No doubt my target, if down there, would be hiding in a crevice whilst these were feeding in the area.

By the time light started to fade in the evening the wrasse and blennies had all become inactive and all I was catching was small coalfish. As it got darker they became even more active and I caught more and more of them. A tiny cod added a final species to my tally for the day but not the one I was after.

Oh well, despite failing to get a Yarrell's blenny it had been a fairly enjoyable day fishing somewhere new. It was a bit slow at times but I think that was due to the tidal state more than anything else. I think it probably fishes better on a bigger tide and over high water. The variety of species caught has also given me food for thought regarding the current state of saltwater fishing. Summer might be over but it would seem nobody told the fish so I will go back, perhaps with some bait, for another go before they hear the news.

Tight lines, Scott.