Not very lady like?

Two sessions trotting maggots for grayling on the River Annan last Sunday and the River Clyde today have sadly only produced a blank and a couple of out of season brown trout respectively. The lady of the stream is proving elusive.

On the way back to the car today I had to pass this lump. I was glad there was a fence to separate me from perhaps the biggest highland cow I've ever seen with an impressive set of horns to match. Males and females both have horns so I'm not sure if the hairy beast was a lady or a gent. Anyway, my search for lovely ladies will continue over the coming months.

Tiding me over.

Well the weather continues to be fairly rotten but despite this I've been out several times over the last week. With winds forecast to gust at over 40mph last Tuesday I headed down the coast to try and find a few sheltered spots. Firstly I headed over the back of Eyemouth Golf Course where I soon spotted a nice looking platform and after a while figured out how to safely get down to it. The water in front of it was incredibly deep and I started off fishing a paddletail on a cheburashka lead to try and tempt any resident pollock. This didn't produce any fish though so I then tried Gulp! Sandworm on a drop shot rig but this didn't draw any bites either. I was quite disappointed but I think later in the year the fishing at this spot will be productive so happy to have found a new spot to return to I decided to head up the coast to St Abbs.

Once there I sought shelter on the rocks at the back of the harbour, stuck with a drop shot rig and began casting it into gaps in the kelp. Eventually this produced a few sharp taps that made me think I had located a small wrasse but when I hooked the culprit it turned out instead to be a small long spined sea scorpion. Continuing to work my way around the rocks I had no further luck so decided to try inside the harbour before leaving. The tide was almost half way in by this point, normally a good time to catch flounders as they enter the harbour to hunt. Methodically working my way around and slowly covering as much of the bottom as I could I finally caught one.

This flounder seemed to have the whole harbour to himself.

Just after popping it back the wind picked up again making fishing virtually impossible so I decided to call it a day.

Last Wednesday there was a slight break in the weather and feeling frustrated by the previous day's fishing I opted to head to the River Forth to see if there were any dace around, to relax watching a float and practice casting using my centrepin reel. I certainly got plenty of casting practice as the river was a little higher than I expected, was flowing by quite quickly and as a result meant there didn't seem to be any dace around. I did run my float a little closer in though and holding it up I caught a little brown trout and a trio of rather plump minnows which brought a smile to my face.

Minnows are really pretty little fish. Pretty greedy as well.

In the afternoon I headed up to Orchill Coarse Fishery to try my luck there. Fishing maggots on the waggler things were quite slow and I only managed a few chub. Another frustrating day's fishing really and in future I must check the Forth's water level on the SEPA website before I visit it again to target dace.

On Sunday evening I met up with my mate Nick and we headed down to Torness Power Station outflow area to try for bass. Despite a promising start with a couple of them following my lure in on my first cast we had no luck tempting them. As is customary when visiting Scotland's premier blenny mark I dangled a piece of Angleworm into a few rockpools before we left and caught a couple of them, although they weren't as obliging as they normally are.

Even the resident blenny population seemed to not be in the mood.

Yesterday I headed back down the coast and went to St Abbs Head. It was a nice sunny day although still quite windy but the swell below wasn't too bad and I decided to climb down to a new mark. I know fine well that it's not the type of place to go exploring on your own but truth be told I find it quite exciting. Anyway, when I managed to get myself down to water I noticed it was absolutely teeming with millions of small jellyfish. The arrival of jellyfish is normally a good sign as it means the water temperatures are slowly creeping up and summer species should start appearing but I've never seen so many of them. It looked like a great mark but after a couple of hours with no action I decided to climb back up to the top of the cliffs and walk back to St Abbs Harbour to try my luck there. It too was full of jellyfish but unlike the rock mark I'd fished in the morning it also had a few fish in it and I caught several dozen coalfish, a couple of flounders and a little cod before heading back up the road. I also bumped into a mate who came down to fish for an hour after his work which was nice. 

I bought myself a packet of Marukyu Isome during the week. I used to fish with it a lot but whilst it's a superb ragworm imitation and its effectiveness isn't in question, it's not the most durable lure and is also quite expensive. Not a great combination.

This little cod took an Aquawave Straight on a drop shot rig. Another excellent worm shaped product, a packet of these lures cost about the same as a packet of Isome and are almost as effective but they are super durable making them much better value.

Well quite a nice end to a frustrating week really with the persistent strong wind becoming rather annoying if I'm brutally honest. It almost feels like it has been like this all year. The fishing is still tough at times and really by the middle of May I'd expected it to be better than it is. Never mind, in just over a week I'm off on holiday to Nessebar, it can't come soon enough and surely the weather there will be better? I hope so and when I get back from the Black Sea maybe the summer will have arrived here and some better fishing with it? Fingers crossed.

Tight lines, Scott.

Three men and a lady.

After several emails asking if I could tag along with them I finally had the pleasure on Sunday of meeting up and fishing with Brian and Col, co-writers of the rather good "Streamside Diary" blog. After driving west and picking them both up we headed west further still to a stretch on one of the rivers they fish for grayling where they've had some success recently. After a short walk to the spot we'd be fishing we were soon tackled up and ready to get into the river. I had decided to try a centrepin reel for the first time and the latest addition to my fishing tackle arsenal was spooled up with 3.2lb Bayer Perlon. I paired it up with a 13ft float rod. An Avon float was employed and I was soon trotting a single maggot on a barbless #18 Kasaman B911 hook about four feet beneath it. I immediately found it a real pleasure to use especially as it only took three trots to hook a fish!

My first "lady of the stream" was in fact a male.

Obviously I was quite pleased and with the pressure off we could all relax and enjoy the rest of the day. Brian soon caught a few grayling, some of them right at his feet which goes to show that feeding maggots regularly can draw the shoal in rather close.

This nice grayling certainly put a smile on Brian's face.

Col had soon caught a few too and it was turning into a rather wonderful mild winter morning's fishing. At this point I noted that Brian's float seemed to be trotting downstream at a much slower speed than mine even though he didn't seem to be slowing it using his centrepin. I figured this was perhaps due to him either fishing a lighter float than mine or fishing his maggot slightly deeper than I was and this acting as a break. I quickly increased the length of the drop I was fishing and this seemed to have the desired effect and also saw me hook a few more fish almost straight away with three more grayling caught in quick succession. After a couple of hours I had to take a break on the bank as my leaking waders meant my left foot was absolutely freezing.

Whilst I enjoyed a warming cup of soup and thawed out my foot Col plays another grayling.

After a while we decided to split up and went for a wander fishing different swims. The clouds had disappeared by this point and this seemed to slow things down a bit. I found that fish were taking my bait a lot further downstream from me. Perhaps the extra sunlight made my presence easier for them to spot and they kept their distance as a result. In the afternoon I only managed a small out of season brown trout and three more grayling but to be honest it was nice just to enjoy the scenery and practice using the centrepin.

We all caught a brownie or two.

My final grayling of the day was probably in the nicest condition.

I admire a really lovely fish. I like their yellow teardrop shaped eyes too.

Beautiful deep red colouration on the dorsal fin.

It was soon time to go and on the way back we had a good chat about fishing. It was great meeting up with Brian and Col and I can't thank them enough for helping me catch my first grayling. Hopefully we can meet up again in the future. They've been dabbling with lures in saltwater this year so maybe I can return the favour and help them catch something new. They both mentioned that they'd tried to catch a corkwing wrasse and had no luck so perhaps a day hunting some down next summer will be a good way to repay them.

Tight lines, Scott.