Even more species hunting on Madeira.

After getting back from Kefalonia I didn't do any fishing locally but luckily I also didn't have to wait too long before I was packing my fishing gear into my suitcase again. Less than five weeks later, at the beginning of July, I drove down south to fly down to Madeira for a spot of species hunting with two of my good friends and fellow anglers, Lee and Ross. Having myself already visited the beautiful Portuguese island twice before I had a pretty good knowledge of marks for us to fish both visited previously and also some new ones for us to investigate. Lee had been with me the first time I went to Madeira, for Ross it was his first time, but we were all looking forward to seeing each other again after about eighteen months apart, having a great time and were hopeful that us visiting later in the year than any of my previous visits would mean better fishing. Well, Madeira did not disappoint!

Madeira is a beautiful place.

With lots of interesting wildlife.

It's famous for flowers and the town streets get decorated with them during festivals.

The locals don't mess about when it comes to cooking large quantities of well seasoned meat on large skewers.

They also make a tasty beverage called Poncha that should be enjoyed responsibly.

If you're really lucky you'll bump into friendly locals who'll show you incredible hospitality and generously offer to take you out fishing on their boat where you'll have an epic time catching pink dentex!

Wait a minute! Perhaps I should rewind a bit and explain how on earth Lee, Ross and I found ourselves out in a boat catching pink dentex with Team Portugal member and world championship winning shore angler Nuno Barradas and his partner Fabyy. 

Ross with our hosts Nuno and Fabyy. Two of the friendliest people I've ever met and very good anglers too.

So, after an enjoyable but fairly uneventful fishing wise start to our week we were out on the second evening of the trip looking at a couple of new marks that I thought might produce barracuda, a species we were all keen to catch. Driving past the first mark we could see from the motorway above it that it was already very busy so we went to the second. Unfortunately we couldn't find an access point, so we decided to head back to the first mark and see if there was in fact enough room. When we got down it was still very busy with local anglers, and it turned out most of them were fishing jigs for squid. Amongst them all Ross instantly recognised Nuno as he had been over in North Wales for the world shore fishing championships last year and had visited the tackle shop that Ross had been working in at the time. It's a small world, after all! We all got talking and Nuno very generously invited the three of us out in his boat the next morning with himself and his partner Fabyy, an offer simply too good to turn down, so of course we accepted. Early next morning we all met down at Funchal Marina, headed out to sea and along the coast where we had an epic couple of hours fishing for pink dentex using live squid as bait. It was a great experience, and we knew afterwards that unless something truly incredible happened, it would probably end up be the fishing highlight of the week.

As the week continued, we fished various marks all over the island and were racking up the species as we did. Some places we'd fished before, but we also explored some new spots that on the whole fished really well too, and between the three of us we caught some nice fish using a variety of methods.

Lee's fished exclusively with light game jigs most of the week and was rewarded with some nice fish like this pink dentex with its funky fins.

A nice parrotfish for Ross. If memory serves it took a chunk of raw prawn ledgered on the bottom down the inside of the harbour wall.

In the same harbour this cracking derbio took a freelined bread flake. It went off like a rocket, stripping line from my reel multiple times. Awesome sport on my ultra light tackle!

After seeing a huge stingray swim past a breakwater we were fishing on a deadbait was rigged up and cast out on Ross's heavy lure rod. This produced two small stingrays in quick succession, one each for Ross and Lee. Sadly, a third run didn't materialise, so I never got the chance to catch one myself.

An early morning session fishing metal jigs into fairly deep water from a rock mark produced a few nice white trevally and this cracking striped seabream for Ross.

Night time sessions after dark were quite productive too. Lee's not usually a fan of fishing a drop shot rig but this white seabream was caught on a Gulp Fish Fry rigged on one.

A very happy species hunter with his first ever African striped grunt! Caught on the last after dark session of the holiday just before we were about to call it a night. Lee and Ross had both caught a few of these earlier in the trip and I took a fair amount of abuse for failing to do likewise, so I was over the moon to catch my second new species of the trip.

Just for good measure I caught a second African striped grunt a few casts later. A nice looking fish that seem to only feed after dark.

By the end of the week, we had racked up a very respectable thirty six species between the three of us.

Here's what I caught with new species in bold...

1. African Striped Grunt
2. Atlantic Lizardfish
3. Axillary Seabream
4. Bastard Grunt
5. Black Goby
6. Black Seabream
7. Canary Damsel
8. Cardinalfish
9. Chub Mackerel
10. Common Two Banded Seabream
11. Couch's Seabream
12. Diamond Lizardfish
13. Emerald Wrasse
14. Guinean Puffer
15. Lesser Weever
16. Macronesian Sharpnose Puffer
17. Madeira Goby
18. Madeira Rockfish
19. Mediterranean Rainbow Wrasse
20. Ornate Wrasse
21. Pandora Seabream
22. Pink Dentex
    
23. Rock Goby
24. Rockpool Blenny
25. Salema
26. Thick Lipped Grey Mullet
27. Thin Lipped Grey Mullet
28. White Seabream

Lee and Ross also added these to our group tally...

29. Blue Runner
30. Bogue
31. European Stingray
32. Gilthead Seabream
33. Golden Grey Mullet
34. Saddled Seabream
35. Striped Seabream
36. White Trevally

As always it had been superb spending time with my two great friends, and also it was nice to make two new friends in Nuno and Fabyy. After our initial chance encounter and the subsequent early morning boat adventure, we'd met up with them again a few more times during the holiday. We did some lure fishing for bluefish and barracuda at sunrise one morning from the shore, but sadly this didn't produce the target species and all we caught was some crazy lizardfish that attacked lures almost as big as themselves. We also met up with them a couple of times in the afternoon and had a great time in their company, eating some traditional island food. I was really taken aback by their incredibly warm hospitality and generosity.  They are both really lovely people and when we return we'll certainly be meeting up with them again for sure. Over lunch, we even talked about catching the ferry to Porto Santo together for a couple of days to do some fishing there. Madeira is an amazing place and I can't wait to get back down there again!

Tight lines, Scott.

Gilty as charged.

On the final day of my trip I had planned to head to Dorset to spent the day fishing Swanage Pier before making the drive back up the road. However, after hearing that small gilthead seabream were being caught in Weymouth Harbour I changed my plan so I could fish there first thing in the morning and then head along to Swanage. I got up early and drove down, arriving in Weymouth just after 08:00 I got my gear out of the car and began fishing angleworm on a dropshot rig. A few hours went by and I had worked my way around the harbour covering a fairly large amount of ground with no success locating my target. After having a break to pester some gobies I decided to concentrate my efforts in one area and switched to fishing with bait. I set up a scaled down three hook flapper rig with #10 hooks and baited them up with small sections of Dynabait ragworm. This produced a few small bass and then I hooked a small gilthead which fell off as I lifted it up the harbour wall. Another hour or so soon passed and having not hooked another one I was feeling a little frustrated so I adjourned for lunch and decided to head to the Weymouth Angling Centre to buy some fresh ragworm. Sandwich eaten and armed with a small amount of great quality bait I headed back to the spot where I'd hooked and lost my target. Baiting up my rig with small pieces of the fresh ragworm I cast it out, started getting bites straight away and I was soon reeling in a small gilthead seabream. I managed to land it this time, the first one I've caught in the UK.

What I visited Weymouth for and caught fairly easily once I changed my approach.

I was one species closer to my long term goal of catching one hundred saltwater species from around the UK so I was pleased to catch it but I was quite annoyed with myself for persisting with the same ineffective approach all morning. It was well into the afternoon and driving along to Swanage Pier when I would have to leave again less than two hours after getting there was just not worth it so I stayed in Weymouth and caught a few more gilthead seabream and bass. I was pretty sure that if I'd bought and used the fresh ragworm when I had arrived in the morning I probably would have had my target pretty quickly and been on my way to Swanage. Fishing lures can be fun but really if you want to catch fish quickly then in most scenarios good quality bait is hard to beat. As a species hunter and someone who just enjoys catching fish the method used isn't that important to me, it just needs to be the most effective one that's available on the day. This is something I know and my choice of approach had in all likelihood cost me a session at Swanage Pier, one of my favourite venues on the south coast. It's not the first time I've been guilty of fishing with lures when quality bait was available and proved to be the better choice of approach. A bit of an annoying way to end my trip but with several potential targets available on the south coast I'll be able to visit Swanage the next time I'm down.

Tight lines, Scott.

Four!

St Andrews might be known as the home of golf but for those of us who prefer fishes to birdies it also offers some good fishing opportunities. I had a great light game session in it's harbour recently catching lots of small coalfish and a few nice hard fighting flounders.

Light game fun in Croatia : Split.

Arriving in Split in the evening we were pretty tired so we ate a huge takeaway pizza in the apartment, drank a few beers and had an early night. With the hire car at our disposal for the duration of our stay in Split I got up early and went fishing in the mornings. Split is surrounded by the sea on its northern, western and southern sides so I wasn't sure where to go but with a fairly strong wind coming from the north on the first morning I headed to a couple of small rocky breakwaters on the south coast of the city. I was hoping to find some predatory species feeding but the sea was pretty calm and there was no sign of any activity on the surface. I tried some small hard lures and metals to see if there were any larger fish hunting deeper down but didn't get any interest at all sadly. Switching to soft plastics on a drop shot rig immeadiately had me catching rainbow wrasse, painted combers, a few types of seabream and some greater weever. 

A saddled seabream. They have quite a strong pungent smell to them. 

The light of the morning sun shimmered nicely on this annular seabream's scales.  

A greater weever. These can be tricky to unhook and I'm probably pushing my luck with the thumb grip. My mate Nick was stung by one when we were on Fuertaventura back in February and months later his finger still hasn't recovered fully. 

In the afternoon on our first full day we headed to Vranjic, a small peninsula to the north of Split, to visit an aquarium there. It was pretty cool and as well as a lot of tanks full of fish it also had some pretty awesome artwork on its walls including a rather wonderful John Dory.

I'd love to catch one of those.

Afterwards, before we had lunch, I had a few casts over a sandy area on the north side of Vranjic and caught lots of juvenile gilthead seabream, black gobies, a couple of peacock blennies and also my second new species of the trip.  

There were large shoals of these juvenile gilthead seabream. Cool little fish.

Peacock blennies are pretty funky. There were lots of them in the spot where I fished and they were very aggressive, fighting with each other over my lure.

My first ever brown comber. The smallest of the comber species found in the Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea.

Later in the afternoon we visited the Fortress of Klis that sits up in the hills above Split and then headed west to Kaštela, a region made up of seven small towns on the coast to the north of Split. We had a look around a museum telling the story of the region whose southern wall backs directly onto a small harbour. Before heading back to Split I had a few casts from the end of the harbour's breakwater and caught a few combers. 

The approach to the Fortress of Klis.

The fortress is long and narrow, perched on a long piece of isolated rock in the middle of a pass that runs up into the mountains and is inaccessible on three sides.

The view towards Split from the Fortress of Klis. 

At one time this museum in Kaštel Lukšić was surrounded by the sea with a moat at the front. Now only one side faces into the harbour.

Painted comber don't put up much of a fight but I don't think I'll ever tire of admiring their colourful markings. 

By comparison brown comber are pretty drab. These were much lighter than the others I'd caught perhaps because they were from a much shallower mark. 

For my second early morning session I headed south again but fished from the large boulders at the back of a big marina. The water was pretty deep and I had high hopes but sadly the fishing was pretty poor on the whole. Just before I headed back for breakfast I did catch a rather large and brilliantly coloured male rainbow wrasse but unfortunately it slipped out of my hand and fell back into the water as I got my camera out to take a photo of it. 

In the afternoon we headed west to spend a couple of hours wandering around the Ivan Meštrović Gallery and its lovely gardens to look at some of the work of the late Croatian sculptor.

This was Lillian's favourite sculpture.

This one was pretty impressive too.

In the evening before heading out for dinner I tried a spot at the eastern end of a long rocky sea defence as light began to fade. Surprisingly the fishing was pretty poor though and I only managed a couple of small common pandora. 

The red edge at the top of the rear edge of the gill plate is a good way to identify common pandora.

For my final morning session I headed to a small rocky outcrop to the east of Vranjic. It was a beautiful calm start to the day and the fishing was very good. I caught lots of smaller fish close in and there were also some nice mullet patrolling the shoreline but as I didn't have any bread with me I chose to ignore them. Casting a piece of Angleworm on a drop shot rig into some deeper water further out and slowly working it back towards me I caught some nice gilthead seabream which put up an awesome fight.

These beautiful fish were fantastic sport on light game tackle. 

In the afternoon we went for a walk around Split's old town. We spent several hours wandering about Diocletian's Palace and climbed up to the top of the bell tower. At noon in the main square actors in Roman costumes put on a bit of a show, re-enacting the changing of the guard. To end a pleasant afternoon we had lunch in Buffet Fife, a very popular restaurant that serves traditional Croatian food. We both had meatballs and mashed potatoes which were superb. 

When in Rome...

You can climb up to the very top of the bell tower.

The view from the top of the bell tower to the west.

Very tasty indeed. Very filling too.

Walking around in the sun was pretty tiring so Lillian had a nap when we returned to our apartment. I jumped in the car and headed back to the same spot I'd fished in the morning armed with a small 2.5g float, some bread and a small bucket I borrowed from our apartment to see if I could catch a mullet. Making up some groundbait I soon had them feeding with smaller ones showing up first. Larger fish soon appeared though from deeper down and bullied the little ones away. A patient approach, constant feeding and changing the size of my hookbait to achieve a nice slow sink rate eventually paid off. Most of the fish were nosing the bread on my hook around but when a couple of fish arrived at the same time one of them swallowed it whole and I quickly struck to set my hook. With no net with me I took my time playing the fish out before climbing down the rubble in front of me to lift it out by hand.

It turned out to be a golden grey mullet. The biggest I've ever caught.

After releasing the fish I headed back and in the evening we headed to the old town again for dinner. The following day we had a long drive to reach our final destination of the holiday so we got up early to leave. On the way north we made two stops so I could stretch my legs. Firstly we visited the lovely small town of Novigrad.

Novigrad was in a beautiful location. I'd love to return and spend more time there. 

While I stretched my legs I spotted large shoals of small fish and decided to find out what they were. They were soon attacking a small piece of Angleworm and turned out to be juvenile ocellated wrasse. I've never seen wrasse shoaled up before. When my split shot rig occasionally managed to reach the bottom I caught some peacock blennies too and a solitary five spotted wrasse.

Male peacock blennies have a large crest on their heads and elongated fins. 

This tiny five spotted wrasse managed to beat all the ocellated wrasse to my little piece of Angleworm. 

Back on the road again we stopped further up the coast in Senj for another break and some lunch. Before getting back in the car to complete the day's driving I had a few casts at the end of the harbour's outer breakwater. After a few wrasse and combers I switched to a smaller hook and added an incognito goby and a damselfish to my trip species tally.

A type of sand goby, the incognito goby has fairly distinctive rows of spots along its body. 

Small hooks are required to catch damselfish. I used a #18 to catch this one.  

The second part of our holiday had come to an end, and we'd enjoyed our time in Split. Whilst the fishing had been hit and miss, I'd caught a new species and enjoyed some great light game action with the gilthead seabream. The last destination on our itinerary was Pula in the Istrian region of the country. We were both looking forward to spending the remainder of our time exploring the area. 

Tight lines, Scott.

 

Click here for the final part.

Light game fun in Croatia : Cavtat.

My girlfriend Lillian and I fancied heading somewhere new for a two week holiday this year and I suggested we visit Croatia. Rather than book a package holiday we did our own thing and sorted flights, accommodation and a hire car so that we would travel up the coast staying in three different locations on the way. We flew into Dubrovnik airport at the end of last month and soon arrived at the first stop on our journey, the lovely port town of Cavtat. Over the next five days we had a fairly chilled out start to our holiday as we acclimatised to the thirty degrees plus heat, exploring the area on foot and enjoying cold drinks and tasty seafood in the shade. Our apartment was right at the top of a rather big hill above the town centre though and being a lazy bugger in full holiday mode the potential of early morning sessions wasn't quite a big enough draw to get me out of bed. I instead made do with squeezing in a spot of light game fishing here and there as we wandered around the rocky peninsulas either side of the town's main harbour. The crystal clear blue water wasn't particularly deep and I wasn't too surprised that rainbow wrasse and painted combers were the predominant species I caught. A few other species also took a liking to my lures which I fished mainly on a drop shot rig changing occasionally to a Carolina rig just to mix it up a bit.

Cavtat harbour from the eastern side of the bay. 

Finding a quiet spot from the first cast I caught fish.

A painted comber was my first catch of the trip. Aggressive ambush predators that hide amongst rocks close in.

Quite small for a male. Normally rainbow wrasse this size are female. Stunning colours anyway.

Amongst the rainbow wrasse I caught this solitary ocellated wrasse. I've only caught them in the Black Sea before. 

After a couple of days I found a flat rock To fish from that was down below a spot where Lillian could relax in the shade under some trees. Perfect. 

I added a few more species to my tally including this annular seabream. 

This was my only scorpionfish of the trip rather strangely. It's a Madeira rockfish.

Fishing in the sun makes an angler very thirsty. 

Whist staying in Cavtat we took a ferry north to the walled city of Dubrovnik. It was a lovely place but if I'm honest it was a bit too busy for my liking. It was also incredibly hot! Walking all the way around the city's outer wall was the best part for me. It offered an escape from the crowds and great views over the city and beyond.

Dubrovnik from the mountains to the south. 

The rooftops of the city from the top of the wall. 

The wall runs right along the clifftop on the western sea facing side of the city.  

More fortifications to the north.

Exploring the narrow streets of Dubrovnik under the blazing sun and going up and down its narrow alleys off the main streets was a tiring affair. Back in Cavtat in the evening Lillian had a nap so I did a spot of fishing as light faded. Surprisingly it was pretty poor until after dark. Then I caught a few axillary seabream and a few nice saddled seabream which gave a very good account of themselves.

The sun sets on the Adriatic. 

The biggest axillary seabream I've ever caught. This species seems to be much more active after dark. 

These saddled seabream were great fun on my light game gear. 

The day before we left Cavtat we caught another ferry to nearby Plat. It was an extremely hot day and after a walk around and a some lunch Lillian wisely got out of the sun in a shady spot next to the town's small stone pier. While we waited on the boat returning to take us back to Cavtat I braved the afternoon heat and caught a few more rainbow wrasse, painted combers and some East Atlantic peacock wrasse. I also caught a surprise wide eyed flounder and sight fished a rusty blenny from the shallows too before the boat arrived.

Nice colours on this East Atlantic peacock wrasse. They have quite big rubbery mouths for their size. 

Wide eyed flounders are a cool fish. One of my favourite flatfish and I particularly love their beautiful, almost floral markings. 

My first blenny of the trip played hard to get but eventually I tempted it with a tiny piece of good old Angleworm on a simple split shot rig. 

The first leg of our Croatian adventure had soon come to an end and after picking up our hire car we drove north to our next destination. It was an incredible drive along the mountainside coastal route with the blue Adriatic and some of Croatia's many lush islands to our left. On the way we passed through Bosnia and Herzegovina and then once back into Croatian territory we made a brief stop for lunch near Drvenik where the road got down close to the sea. As I'd spotted some small mullet on the way to the restaurant where we ate I was given clearance to fish briefly while Lillian had another ice cold lemonade. 

Right at the end of the small breakwater where I went to fish stood the nice statue. I think it was a fountain but sadly there was no water flowing from it. 

Knowing how finicky mullet can be and with time being limited I resorted to the incredibly crude Mediterranean method of free lining a piece of bread with a few hooks wrapped around it. I opted for only four hooks spaced a couple of centimetres apart but it was still deadly. The first mullet that went near my piece of hot dog roll was almost immediately hooked. It turned out to be my first new species of the trip, a boxlip mullet.

Boxlip mullet have a very odd protrusible mouth and a split bottom lip. They also seem to swim around a lot more frantically than other mullet species but maybe that was just the midday heat!

A nice looking fish and instead of having dark stripes like other mullet species I've caught theirs look almost metallic. 

I was happy to catch something new but the method didn't sit well with me despite it obviously being very effective. It's just not a great approach for a catch and release angler but luckily the fish I had caught had somehow got itself hooked on the end hook. It's not an approach I think I would employ again if I'm honest. Multiple hooks could possibly cause a lot of damage to a mullet's delicate mouth especially if you tied up a hooklength with the amount of hooks I've seen local anglers use. Then again the locals usually don't return their fish. Anyway, the fish was released and we hit the road again. Late that afternoon we arrived at our second stop, the city of Split, for the next part of our holiday. With a hire car at my disposal I was keen to get up early and drive to the coast to see what species I could add to my tally. 

Tight lines, Scott.

 

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