Even more species hunting adventures in Japan: Kyoto.

Arriving at Osaka's Itami airport in the afternoon, Ryan's girlfriend Xin Yun's flight arrived at about the same time, so we met up with her at baggage reclaim and headed into the city. After checking into our accommodation, the four of us headed out to spend the evening wandering around Dotonbori, soaking up the atmosphere, snacking throughout the night on Kobe beef skewers, molten hot takoyaki, tasty gyoza, incredibly crispy, yet tender chicken karaage and some super sweet strawberry mochi and ice cream.

You can't visit Osaka and not spend an evening strolling around Dotonbori.

Ryan and Xin Yun splash some cash on some premium Kobe beef skewers.

The restaurants all try to outdo each other with huge 3D signage.

Before calling it a night, the four of us rode the unusually shaped Don Quijote Ferris "Wheel".

The next day, we headed south to explore the vibrant area of Shinsekai. After walking through Tennoji Park, we had some tasty yakisoba for lunch and then went up Tsutenkaku Tower, also known as Hitachi Tower.

Tsutenkaku Tower from the pond in Tennoji Park.

Tennoji Park from the top of Tsutenkaku Tower.

Don’t look down! Ryan and Xin Yun stand out on a glass floored platform at the end of a walkway that juts out near the top of the tower. 

Exiting Tsutenkaku Tower, we wandered south down Shinsekai's main shopping street, where we passed some dog owners who had dressed up their pets for some reason and were pushing them around in prams. One was wearing a clown costume that I’d later discover was that of Kuidaore Tarō, an iconic clown and the unofficial mascot of Osaka's vibrant Dotonbori district.

You see some strange things in Japan! The dog didn't seem to mind.

Next, we visited the Shinsekai Magic Café & Bar, where we enjoyed a few drinks and an hour of close up magic performed by three different magicians. Tricks involving playing cards, coins, rope and Rubik's Cubes had us all scratching our heads and if you're ever in Osaka I'd highly recommend the experience. By this point, we were quite hungry, and a restaurant where you can fish for your dinner was too good an opportunity to miss!

In this restaurant you can try to catch various different types of fish and then have them prepared in several different ways. 

There were plenty of fish swimming around in the water surrounding the boat shaped dining areas.

Most of the other diners seemed to be struggling to catch their dinner. Being experienced anglers, Ryan and I both caught a red bream almost straight away! Good bait presentation gave us an edge I think! We decided we wouldn't add the species to our trip's tally! 

Handing our catch to the restaurant staff, we were soon enjoying the two fish we caught four different ways. My favourite was the sashimi. 

After our delicious meal, we spent the remainder of the evening wandering around, admiring all the colourful signs around Shinsekai before heading back to the apartment via Nipponbashi Denden Town, where we checked out some of its interesting shops, including one that sold Pokémon cards.

This illuminated lantern style display above a kushikatsu restaurant in Shinsekai was very impressive.

The next day, we caught a train north to spend the day in Kyoto. Ryan and I took minimal fishing tackle with us, just in case an opportunity to do some fishing could be slotted into our busy schedule. With way more places to see than we could possibly have done in one day, we had to choose which places we visited and which we did not. The first place on our itinerary was Kiyomizu-dera, a Buddhist temple located up in the hills to the east of the city. From Kyoto Station we decided to walk there as taking public transport wasn't going to save us that much time, and it was a lovely day.

With the leaves turning red, the views of the temple and Kyoto beyond were stunning

Heading back down the hill, we walked down the picturesque narrow streets of Sannenzaka, passing the Hōkan-ji Temple and its impressive Yasaka Pagoda, before wandering through the grounds of the much quieter Kenninji Temple.

The imposing Yasaka Pagoda of Hōkan-ji Temple.

In stark contrast to the rest of our morning walk, Kenninji Temple had hardly any tourists visiting it, which was nice.

We did intend to visit Nishiki Market to get some street food style snacks for lunch, but when we reached the eastern bank of the Kamo River, we stopped underneath a bridge crossing it to get out of the sun and a plan was formulated for how we would spend the afternoon. We'd already eaten some onigiri in the morning, so in order to fit what we wanted to do in, we opted to skip lunch in favour of a short fishing session instead. In no time at all, Ryan and I were freelining bread flake to see if we could tempt the resident fish.

What a beautiful place to fish!

The Kamo River contains a good head of common carp, but I was hoping to locate and catch my first ever Japanese barbel if I'm being honest. All we saw as we moved up and down the concrete blocks at the water's edge were groups of common carp moving around the pool. With no sign of any Japanese barbel, when a large common carp slowly swam up and took my bait from just below the surface, I was glad it did. The battle that ensued on my Nebula Rock Rover was something else! Being patient, and letting the fish take line when it made surging runs, it was at least ten minutes before I had the fish's head on the surface and beaten. Lillian was by my side, ready with my net, and a cracking fish was carefully drawn into it.

What a beauty! Easily the biggest fish I've caught on such light tackle.

Ryan hooked a couple of fish too, but sadly both threw the hook. Before we left, I tied on a tanago hook and caught a tiny dark chub from the small pools of water in amongst the concrete blocks we had been fishing from.

Every species counts, and this tiny fish had added another species to our tally!

Packing up, we caught a train and then a bus to visit the Golden Pavilion in northern Kyoto. For some reason, Lillian and I failed to visit it the last time we were in Kyoto, and we were there for several days back in 2018! Lillian really wanted to make sure we got there this time, and when we walked through the grounds and the Golden Pavilion came into view, it didn't disappoint.

Set in beautiful gardens, next to a pond, the top two levels of the Golden Pavilion are covered in actual gold leaf!

The next stop on our mini tour of Kyoto was the Monkey Park in Arashiyama. Due to the time and the relative locations, we decided to get a taxi to make sure we had ample time to arrive, climb the hill to the park and spend a reasonable amount of time at the top. The hike up into the hills is a bit of a slog, but when you get up there and see all the Japanese macaque there, it's well worth it.

This was about as close as I got to one out in the open. You're not supposed to get within two metres of them or look directly in their eyes.

In the centre of the open area at the top of the hill, you can enter a small building where you can buy some fruit and nuts. These can be fed to the monkeys through a caged opening.

Making our way back down the hill, we headed over the wooden bridge that crosses over the Katsura River and headed through the town of Arashiyama to visit the famous bamboo grove there. By this point the light was beginning to fade, and just as we reached the middle of the incredibly popular attraction, it started raining, so we hastily turned around, headed to the station and caught a train to Gion, Kyoto's geisha district. There we strolled south, enjoying the beautiful traditional architecture, and then headed for something to eat before returning to the station to take a train back to Osaka.

Having skipped lunch, we settled for some filling, and very tasty, Osaka style okonomiyaki.

We'd made quite a hectic start to our stay in Osaka, and our day trip to Kyoto had been pretty full on too. A generous portion of house special okonomiyaki washed down with a few beers was what we all needed I think! The next day, we had a bit more of a relaxing itinerary planned, including a little spot of fishing.

Tight lines, Scott.

Click here for the next part…

Species hunting adventures in Florida: Part 2.

On the morning of our second day, I wasn't feeling too great. I put it down to all the travelling, a full day out fishing in the glorious Florida sunshine, and probably not drinking as much water as I should have. In the back of my mind however was the fact that a couple of my workmates had been ill the week before we flew out, and I was hoping that I hadn't picked up whatever virus they had been suffering with, as what they had was quite nasty.

Anyway, keen to open my freshwater account, we visited a Walmart Supercenter to grab a large sandwich sub to share for lunch and a tub of redworms from the fishing section. We then drove to the first spot, a large pond surrounded by various office and business buildings. The target species here was a member of the sunfish family, the warmouth. After struggling to find a parking spot that didn't risk the hire car being towed away, we walked around the pond and found a gap in the trees where we could access the water.

A fairly nondescript, reasonably sized, semicircular pond. Florida has hundreds, if not thousands, of water features like this!

Fishing a small section of redworm on a small hook, and casting my helicopter rig just out beyond the lily pads, I got lots of bites straight away and had soon caught a few small bluegill.

My first bluegill from its native range. I've caught them before in Japan.

After a while, Lillian pointed out some small groups of diminutive, but colourful fish, swimming around in the submerged lily stalks a few feet out. I wound in and quickly tied on a smaller hook and squeezed a small split shot a few inches above it. Lowering a tiny piece of redworm into their midst proved irresistible, and I quickly caught a few of them. 

This, I believe, is an African jewelfish. Although there is some controversy around exactly what species of these are present in the water systems of Florida.

This specimen with the deep red markings is the same species I think. Possibly a male in breeding colouration?

After catching a dozen or so, I switched back to my original rig and fished out past the lily pads and also in the gaps between them, to try and catch a warmouth. Sadly, all I managed to catch were more small bluegill. After a while, we decided to have a break for a few hours and headed to the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens. The gardens were beautiful and there were lots of interesting birds, insects, lizards and fish to see as we enjoyed a relaxing stroll.

We weren't the only people chilling out in the gardens. 

It may look like this Iguana was also relaxing, but being cold-blooded, it was no doubt warming itself up on this rock!

Having seen a few of Mayan cichlid in the various ponds as we had strolled around the Japanese gardens, I was keen to get back to fishing again. Our next stop to do just that was a small pond next to a retail park. The target species there was an oddly named and very colourful cichlid, the Eastern happy. Another species that has been released into the freshwater bodies of Florida by the State’s aquarium owners. Whilst trying to locate one of these, I caught two other species, one of which has only recently been recognised as a species in its own right.

At first glance I thought this was a bluegill, but actually it's the bluegill's cousin, the redear sunfish.

Freelining my worm down in amongst some vegetation whilst searching for an Eastern happy, letting it sink slowly, my rod was pulled over quite abruptly by what turned out to be a small bass. It managed to swim through, and get itself tangled up in some lily stems, but applying gentle force I managed to eventually pull it free.

This is a Florida bass. Only recently recognised as a distinct species. Beforehand, it was considered a subspecies of largemouth bass. They grow much faster than the largemouth and much bigger too. Obviously, this one has some growing still to do!

We spent a bit of time exploring the pond but couldn't locate any Eastern Happy, so we decided to drive to another spot in search of one. The third and final spot for the day’s fishing was a small, relatively shallow ditch by the side of a small road. To look at it, you would not imagine it held many fish if any, but the amount of fish in there and the variety was incredible, taking me somewhat by surprise. 

From this small roadside ditch, my freelined worms caught a ridiculous amount of fish.

As well as bluegill and redear sunfish, I caught lots of super aggressive Mayan cichlids,..

...spotted tilapia,...

...some very cool looking jaguar cichlid,...

...and a nile tilapia too.

In addition, I also managed to catch a couple of Eastern mosquitofish. Dropping my whole worm into the margins, where there were a lot of them, they immeadiately started eagerly attacking it. Two of them biting onto the end of it and holding on while I lifted them out!

An Eastern mosquitofish. Turns out they are ravenous little swines and not too clever either!

By now, some grey clouds had started to roll overhead. Rain was on the way and thunderstorms were forecast the following evening. Whilst I was having lots of fun raiding the roadside ditch and catching lots of new species in the process, I was also aware that I was feeling a little under the weather myself. My nose was beginning to turn into a water feature, my eyes were itchy, and a headache was developing. At that point, I was pretty certain the lads at work had given me a parting gift. We called it a day on the fishing front and headed to a pharmacy to get something that would hopefully alleviate my steadily worsening symptoms.

Tight lines, Scott.

Click here for the next part.

The end of the rainbow?

Last month, the day before I flew out to Singapore, my luggage was all packed, so I headed out for a couple of hours to fish the Biel Water. Many years ago I caught some small rainbow trout there, escapees from a fish farm that used to sit next to the small East Lothian river. I wasn’t sure if the farm was still operational but thought I’d try my luck anyway. When I arrived, I slowly crept down to the water's edge and quickly set about freelining single maggots. I soon discovered there were lots of minnow and the odd three spined stickleback in the first pool I tried.

I've caught quite a lot of minnows this year,...

...and a fair amount of three spined stickleback too!

As I fished away, there were lots of insects hatching and a kingfisher flew upstream in a streak of electric blue. At one point a mayfly landed on my rod a couple of times. Raising my rod up towards myself, I carefully cupped my hand over it and then picked it up for closer inspection. 

I'd never seen a mayfly so close before. Insects are strange looking things!

Suddenly I realised that I was having so much fun catching lots of diminutive fish that I'd forgotten the reason for my visit! Refocussing, I headed upstream to try another pool. Almost immediately, I caught a small trout from under some overhanging tree branches, but it wasn't the species I was after.

Not the trout I was after.

I fished on for a couple of hours, catching more minnows and another two small brown trout. I didn’t catch any rainbow trout, as I've already said, I’m not even sure the fish farm is still operating and if not any escapees might be long gone. I'll just have to visit a trout fishery later in the year to catch a rainbow trout I suppose. Not my favourite places to frequent but at least there’s also the chance to catch a brook trout too while I'm there.

Tight lines, Scott.

Mystery fish?

I was told recently by a workmate that there were strange fish swimming about in big shoals in the Water of Leith. He’d seen them a few times and assured me they were “Definitely not minnows! 100%!”. So, after work on Wednesday evening, I went down to the spot where he’d seen them and freelined small maggots on a size 18 hook. You’ll never guess what I caught! Dozens of minnow!

Mystery solved!

I also caught a three spined stickleback. 

I wasn’t really that surprised to be honest. I mean, what else could it have been? Anyway, it was a fun way to spend an hour, so I can’t complain about the lack of strange fish too much! 

Tight lines, Scott.

Going with the flow.

I had a couple of sessions last month down at the artificially warm waters that have been through the reactor cores of Torness Nuclear Power Station before being pumped back out to sea. The sessions couldn't have contrasted more. My main target species were thick lipped and golden grey mullet, but I also tried to catch a bass and a common blenny too whilst there. My first trip was very productive, I landed six golden grey mullet on freelined bread flake and lost a few more that managed to throw the hook.

Another species ticked off. Three down, only one hundred and ninety seven to go!

The second trip didn't produce any fish at all. Which was strange as I thought the conditions were actually much better than when I was there for my first session. The lack of blennies was also a real surprise. Normally there are lots of them around, but I couldn't catch a single one. It's not my favourite place to fish, and I've probably stated this several times already in previous posts, but needs must, so I'll be back to try and tick off a few more of the species mentioned above later in the year.

Tight lines, Scott.

In before the lock?

I popped down the A1 a couple of times a fortnight ago with two of my workmates. The first trip to St Abbs Head with Callum was all about catching some ballan wrasse and Callum had his heart set on catching "A big one." having already caught a few smaller ballan wrasse on previous outings he'd had. After walking up to the cliffs from the village we started the session by trying a new mark that proved to be a little tricky to access due to the slightly damp underfoot conditions. Clambering about on damp rocks isn't a great idea down there and the new spot turned out to be fairly shallow and hellishly snaggy, so we headed back up to the path and I took Callum to another mark where I've caught a few decent ballan wrasse in the past. After making our way down a grassy slope and hopping down a few rocks, we found a fairly flat ledge, got comfortable and set up our gear. Fishing light tackle was the approach taken with plan A being dropping blow lug down the side at close range on one hook paternoster rigs. I had my bait in the water first and before Callum had even finished getting setting up I was asking him to net the first ballan wrasse of the day, a nice fish just over a couple of pounds.

As well as their colourful markings and eyes, I love their big juicy lips.

I've never really fished for ballan wrasse on the east coast so late in the year so catching one straight away was a most welcome and pleasant surprise, and made me reasonably confident that we'd catch more. About twenty minutes later Callum got an aggressive bite and hooked the culprit. A big fish quickly had his rod bent over, his drag clicker screaming and his heart pounding. After a few spirited runs towards the kelp the fish was beaten and when it came to the surface I was in position with the net to help Callum land a new personal best ballan wrasse. 

"A big one!" We didn't have scales with us but at 46.5 cm Callum's new PB ballan wrasse was probably just over 4lb.

A cracking fish with some beautiful markings. A fantastic capture on a light rod rated 3-18g as well!

Having accomplished my guiding objective for the day I left Callum to target wrasse and turned my attention to scratching around on the bottom using small hooks baited with chunks of raw prawn to see if I could pick up something unusual. All I managed were about a dozen small coalfish however before a pod of dolphins swam by and after that all action, unsurprisingly, ground to a halt. After a couple of hours with nothing further being caught we headed back to the car. On our way back up the road we decided to pop into Torness Power Station's outflow to target bass and mullet, species Callum had never caught before. The water was pretty coloured up however, and sadly we didn't have any joy ledgering lug worm for bass or free lining bread flake for mullet.

The following day I headed to Coldingham Bay, St Abbs Harbour and then Torness Power Station's outflow with another workmate, Ruaridh. To begin with we scratched around using light gear and small hooks baited with raw prawn but at the first two venues things were pretty slow. At Coldingham Bay we didn't catch anything at all but when we visited St Abbs Harbour we did eventually manage to catch a few fish in the shape of some coalfish, a small cod and also Ruaridh's first ever blenny.

Ruaridh patiently fishing away.

Ruaridh's first ever blenny! I remember catching mine and whilst I've caught hundreds since it still seems like it was yesterday.

After trying a few different areas around the various parts of the harbour we switched to working lures along the bottom in an attempt to catch some flounders but this didn't produce any bites. I then decided to scale down and catch some sand gobies using tanago hooks and after catching a few I also caught a couple of tiny plaice as well on the tiny baits I was slowly twitching along the harbour's sandy floor.

The distinctive orange markings of an adult were absent on this tiny juvenile plaice but the bony nodules running along the head were not.

To finish the day we visited Torness Power Station's outflow. The water clarity had improved a lot over the previous twenty-four hours, and we decided to focus our efforts on catching mullet on freelined bread flake. This method was new to Ruaridh along with the frustrations of using it to try to catch our target. Things were made more difficult by the fact that neither of us had a pair of polarized sunglasses with us but eventually I managed to catch two thick lipped mullet that took my bread and pulled my rod tip over as they felt my hook and swam off into the current.

Frustrating and full of fight. Mullet are great fun.

Sadly, despite his perseverance Ruaridh didn't manage to catch one before it started to get dark, so we called it a day. To his credit he took the constant baiting up only for the fish to steal his bread pretty well and is keen to go back again for another attempt at catching his first mullet so a return trip will be made. Last week the weather wasn’t great for that but the mullet are there all year round so hopefully we'll get back down there at some point. That being said I'm not sure what fishing I'll be doing in the weeks ahead. I’ll have to do any fishing "locally" until the end of October due to the recent travel restrictions introduced in Scotland’s central belt but I have a horrible feeling that before too long some stricter travel restrictions may be put in place that will really  limit my opportunities. I really, really hope I’m wrong.

Tight lines, Scott.