Even more species hunting adventures in Japan: Tokyo.

The following morning, we caught our last shinkansen of the trip and headed back to Tokyo, where we'd spend the last couple of days before flying home. On the way there, we passed the magnificent Mount Fuji. Taking dozens of photos as we sped by, I managed to capture one or two that did not have a blurred object in the foreground. No mean feat when you're travelling at such incredible speed!

Ryan said he’d love to climb Mount Fuji one day. I'm not sure if it's something I'm as keen to do. Better to admire the mountain from a distance!

For the last part of our trip we were staying in the “lively” Kabukicho area, near Shinjuku, so when we arrived in Tokyo we caught a train to Shinjuku Station, the busiest station in the world. Navigating around it can be challenging, even for locals, but eventually we found our way to the exit we wanted and made our way to our accommodation. Dropping our luggage off at our apartment, we weren’t allowed to actually check in for a few more hours, so we went for a big bowl of ramen, and then spent a couple of hours exploring some shops around Shinjuku.

I had spicy tonkotsu ramen with extra charred pork. It was so good!

Heading back to the apartment, we checked in and had an afternoon nap. It turns out that combining a massive bowl of ramen with shopping can be quite tiring! In the evening, we walked to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, where we lay on some artificial turf in front of it and watched the impressive TOKYO Night & Light show being projected onto the front of the building. Afterwards, we went up to the free observation deck at the top of the building to enjoy some nighttime views of the megacity.

There were several different light shows, including this Pac-Man themed one. I remember playing the game on my Atari 2600 back in the early eighties!

Tokyo after dark.

Next, we headed off to enjoy some sushi and washed it down with a few beers in preparation for a late night karaoke session. The sushi was excellent, but it was a dish that was suggested to us by Xin Yun that took me by surprise.

Chawanmushi is a savoury egg custard dish. This one was topped with salmon roe and an egg yolk. It was so rich and creamy!

Ryan, Lillian and I ended up drinking way too much and murdering various songs until the early hours of the morning. Xin Yun was much more sensible with her alcohol consumption and was a much better singer.

The next morning, Lillian and I felt a little bit rough and had a lie in. Ryan and Xin Yun got up early and headed out to visit the teamLab Planets digital museum. When Lillian and I did finally get up and left the apartment, we visited a rooftop garden and then the huge Don Quijote in Shinjuku where we did some shopping. Afterwards, we jumped on a train and headed to the Ichigaya Fishing Centre to see if I could add a species or two to my tally for the trip.

Located right next to Ichigaya Station, the centre offers fun fishing for carp as well as a few other species.

All tackle is provided, although it is pretty basic and designed to easily land fish rather than catch them in the first place. The lines are heavy, the hooks are big, and the pellets provided were breaking up very easily, making getting one on the hook very tricky. I started off targeting goldfish in an indoor pond. Luckily, there were a couple of kernels of corn in my pot of pellets, so I used a small piece of one on the point of my hook to successfully catch a few.

Catching goldfish in the centre's indoor pond was a little trickier than I thought it would be.

Next, I spend a short time targeting whitespotted char in one of the centre's outdoor ponds. The rod supplied for this was a bit heavier and a small bobber was attached to the line. Feeding in some pellets, I quickly noticed that the fish were much more comfortable taking them as they fell through the water. Carefully putting a pellet on my hook and lowering it slowly down through the water, trying to match the sink rate of the free offerings, did the trick, and a fish charged up and snatched it almost straight away. All fish had to be retained, so I gave mine to a local angler who hadn’t caught one.

The whitespotted char was a nice looking fish. Would this be my final fish and new species of the trip?

After treating ourselves to a late lunch in Mos Burger, Lillian and I jumped on the train and headed back to the apartment. Still feeling a little bit rough, we had a nap. In the evening, feeling refreshed, the four of us visited an offal hotpot restaurant nearby. As if eating various organs wasn't adventurous enough, Ryan ordered some pig's ears and feet as a starter. I tried both, but much preferred the tasty hotpot!

The next day, Ryan and Xin Yun went to do some last minute shopping for gifts to take home. Lillian and I headed north by train, so I could try fishing in the Kanda River, but the section we explored turned out to be more of a concrete drainage ditch and there was no sign of any fish in it. In the afternoon, after making our way to Yoyogi Park and walking through it, we met up with Ryan and Xin Yun again at Meiji Jingu Shrine, and then we headed to nearby Takeshita Street.

The beautiful wooden Ichino Torii Gate at Meiji Jingu Shrine stands twelve meters tall!

Over a hundred consecrated sake barrels near the entrance to Meiji Jingu Shrine make for an interesting and colourful photo opportunity.

Takeshita Street had some cool shops, but it was absolutely rammed!

Moving along in the dense crowd, we had a look in a few shops before stumbling across a capybara café. We were surprised to find out that a booking wasn’t required, so we decided to go in. Capybara are Xin Yun’s favourite animal, so she was very excited to get up close to them.

Capybara are the largest rodent in the world. It was pretty cool to see one up close and be able to feed and pet one.

Just a little further along Takeshita Street we arrived at an otter café. Otters are one of my favourite animals, so we decided to visit that as well. The capybara experience had been was very peaceful, and relaxing. The otter experience, was by comparison, pretty chaotic! About twenty otters in a room with about a dozen people and a staff member giving them treats was absolute carnage. They were clambering all over everyone to get their snacks!

Even cuter than the capybara in my opinion, they looked very innocent, but went slightly crazy when they were about to be given a few treats.

As it started to get dark, we left the crowded Takeshita Street and slowly made our way south to visit Shibuya Scramble Crossing. Not satisfied with petting a capybara and having otters climbing all over her, Lillian wanted to see a famous dog as well.

Being the busiest crossing in the world, Shibuya Crossing is visited by millions of tourists, which helps make it the busiest crossing in the world!

This statue is Hachiko, a famously loyal Japanese Akita dog who, after his owner's death, continued to wait for him at Shibuya Station every day for nearly ten years until his own life ended. Basically, the Japanese Greyfriar's Bobby!

Before heading back to the apartment to pack our cases, we enjoyed some delicious sushi in Shibuya. Heading back to Kabukicho, we happened to be passing the famous Godzilla statue just as he was doing his hourly light and smoke show.

Godzilla on the rampage. Again!

So, the end of our trip had pretty much arrived, and early the next day we'd be leaving Japan again. We’d all had a great time, but the end of such a fantastic adventure is always tinged with a little bit of sadness. No more heated toilet seats. No more shinkansen. No more train station jingles. No more famichiki! Japan is an amazing place, and it's strange what you miss when you leave it.

Lillian and I enjoyed travelling with Ryan, he was great company and was open-minded about trying new things. We loved seeing his reactions as he experienced some of the weird and wonderful things that Japan has to offer for the very first time. It had also been lovely to meet Xin Yun as well. 

Early in the morning, we began our journeys home. Ryan, Lillian and I said goodbye to Xin Yun as the monorail reached Haneda Airport, as her flight back to Singapore was leaving from a different terminal to ours. Our fourteen-hour flight back to Heathrow was followed by an eight-hour drive back up the road to Edinburgh. I'm not sure that I would do that again, I really struggled doing the driving as I was so tired, but a few breaks to stretch my legs, and a few cans of highly caffeinated drinks kept me awake! Being back in cold, wet and miserable Scotland has been quite tough, but writing this series of posts has helped enormously with my post Japan trip depression! Lillian and I love visiting Japan, and I’m pretty sure we will return again in the future.

On the species hunting front, Ryan and I had been quite successful. The fishing in major cities on the mainland and on Okinawa was quite a contrast, with the majority of the one hundred and two species Ryan and I caught between us, coming during our five days on the tropical island.

Here's a list of the species I caught, with new ones in bold...

1. Anchor Tuskfish
2. Barhead Spinefoot
3. Batu Rainbow Wrasse
4. Bignose Unicornfish
5. Black and Gold Chromis
6. Black Damselfish
7. Black Seabream
8. Blackbelly Triggerfish
9. Blackspot Sergeant
10. Blackstripe Cardinalfish
11. Bluegill
12. Blunt Snout Gregory
13. Brown Dottyback
14. Brown-lined Puffer
15. Campbell’s Goby
16. Common Carp
17. Crested Grunter
18. Cupid Wrasse
19. Cylindrical Sandperch
20. Dark Chub
21. Dory Snapper
22. Dusky Farmerfish
23. Finepatterned Puffer
24. Fire-tail Dottyback
25. Five-lined Cardinalfish
26. Fork-tongued Goby
27. Goldfish
28. Grass Carp
29. Grass Puffer
30. Half-barred Cardinalfish
31. Halfmoon Triggerfish
32. Honey-head Damsel
33. Honeycomb Filefish
34. Honeycomb Grouper
35. Indo-Pacific Sergeant
36. Iridescent Cardinalfish
37. Japanese Horse Mackerel
38. Japanese Sardinella
39. Japanese Seabass
40. Japanese Whiting
41. Kupang Cardinalfish
42. Lemon Damsel
43. Manybar Goatfish
44. Marbled Rockfish
45. Monogrammed Monocle Bream
46. Multicolorfin Rainbowfish
47. Narrowstripe Cardinalfish
48. Nile Tilapia
49. Oblong Rockfish
50. Okinawa Sergeant
51. Orange-lined Triggerfish
52. Oriental Butterflyfish
53. Pacific Dusky Wrasse
54. Pastel Ringwrasse
55. Pennant Coralfish
56. Pinecone Soldierfish
57. Pink-belly Wrasse
58. Red Naped Wrasse
59. Red Seabream
60. Redbellied Yellowtail Fusilier
61. Redcoat
62. Sapphire Devil
63. Saw-jawed Monocle Bream
64. Scissortail Seargant
65. Scrawled Filefish
66. Sixbar Wrasse
67. Staghorn Damselfish
68. Streamlined Spinefoot
69. Striped Large-eye Bream
70. Striped Monocle Bream
71. Threadfin Butterflyfish
72. Threespot Wrasse
73. Thumbprint Emperor
74. Titan Triggerfish
75. Tomato Clownfish
76. Undescribed Damselfish
77. Vagabond Butterflyfish
78. Valentin’s Sharpnose Puffer
79. Variegated Lizardfish
80. Vermiculate Angelfish
81. Whitebanded Triggerfish
82. Whitespotted Char
83. Whitespotted Devil
84. Whitetail Damselfish
85. Yellowfin Surgeonfish
86. Yellowtail Emperor

Ryan also caught these species...

87. Barred Thicklip
88. Blackeye Thicklip
89. Cigar Wrasse
90. Common Ponyfish
91. Freshwater Demoiselle
92. Ochre-striped Cardinalfish
93. Red-Eyed Puffer
94. Reef Triggerfish
95. Samurai Squirrelfish
96. Shorthead Sabertooth Blenny
97. Stocky Hawkfish
98. Sunset Wrasse
99. Undescribed Damselfish
100. Whitesaddle Goatfish
101. Yellowtail Clownfish
102. Yellowtail Sergeant

All in all, the time we spent species hunting had been very productive, despite some challenging weather on Okinawa. Of the species I caught, forty-one of them were new to me, which was great.

I need to get out fishing back here, but Storm Bram is currently battering large parts of the UK with heavy rain and strong winds. I've not been fishing since I got back from Japan, hopefully the weather calms down soon, so that I can maybe get out after dark to try and catch some rockling! Being honest, once the winter kicks in properly, I don't think I'll be fishing that much locally. I think another foreign adventure might be on the cards before the arrival of spring!

Tight lines, Scott.

Acknowledgments:

I'd like to thank the species hunting community on Instagram for their advice on fishing various venues around Japan before the trip. It was very useful!

In particular, I'd like to thank fellow species hunter Daiki for his invaluable help. He offered advice on the best places to try for certain species, and also helped me to identify some of the fish I'd caught. Maybe, in the future, I'll be able to reciprocate if he ever comes to Scotland!

Black and gold.

I visited the west coast last month to see if could get myself onto the pontoons in a large marina. Inspired by a series of Instagram posts from Scandinavia and the east coast of the US, I wanted to see if I could see any juvenile lumpsucker lurking close to the weed growing around the edge of the floating platforms and their ropes and chains. Upon arrival, it soon became obvious that all access was controlled via a single keycard operated security gate, and there were lots of boat owners around, so I ended up aborting my reconnaissance mission before it had even got underway! I decided instead to fish around the edge of the marina for a while. Perhaps in the weed around that I might spot something unusual? The water was crystal clear, but I couldn’t see any fish at all in close and casting out onto the marina’s silty bottom, it quickly became apparent that one species in particular was totally dominant.

After catching one black goby after another for about an hour, I decided it was time for a total change of scenery and target. 

A fairly short drive later, I was soon trying to spot a completely different species. Whilst there was absolutely no possibility of seeing a lumpsucker, there were also no access difficulties either, despite the small body of water being in front of a public building. The long, narrow pond in Greenock I was standing in front of contains goldfish. No doubt one time family pets that had been irresponsibly released. Walking along the edge of it, I soon spotted one slowly working its way through the weeds in the pond. As it reached some lily pads, I lowered a small piece of bread through a gap in them into its path and, after a brief pause, it turned towards it, swam forward and lazily gobbled it up. If only finding and catching a lumpsucker was so straightforward!

Only my second every goldfish from a Scottish venue. 

Popping the fish back, I carried on working my way along the side of the pond, looking for another colourful fish to catch. The weed was pretty dense, but eventually I spotted a second, much bigger goldfish methodically nudging it’s way through it. This one didn’t show any interest in my baked bait, so I decided to try something completely different, an isome worm. Somewhat to my surprise, the fish aggressively attacked the heavily scented lure straight away, darting over and inhaling the entire thing in one go. Striking quickly to set the hook before the fish could reject and eject my artificial worm, I quickly pulled it up through the vegetation and lifted the fish out onto the grass by the side of the pond. 

About the size of my hand, I believe this rather plump goldfish is an example of the shubunkin variety, due to its scattering of beautiful pearlescent scales.

Popping the fish back, I decided to call it a day. I was reasonably confident I’d just caught the nicest looking goldfish in the pond, and besides, people passing by asking me what I was fishing for had become mildly irritating. The photo I took of the first goldfish I caught in Scotland a few years ago wasn’t the best, so I was happy to get some better ones. As far as locating lumpsucker goes, I might need to rethink my marina fishing plans. I’ll either need to seek permission, sneak in behind someone or find a different marina that has less or no accessibility restrictions. With more horrible weather on the way at the end of this week, I might also have left this project a little too late in the year and might have to revisit it next summer instead.

Tight lines, Scott.

Species hunting advetures on Sardinia: Part 2.

For our third evening session fishing around Isola Rossa's marina, I turned my attention, initially, to fishing for small species straight down the inner wall of the breakwater. This produced a few damselfish and some small annular seabream. After a while, I caught a mystery blenny.

The mystery blenny is very similar to the ringneck blenny. Examining the cirri is the easiest way to tell them apart. Luckily, I had a new photo tank with me, which makes this task much easier!

As the sun was about to fade, I tied on a heavier leader and clipped on a small lipless sinking pencil lure. Lee was already targeting barracuda, so I joined him and did likewise near the end of the breakwater. The rocks there seemed like a perfect ambush point, and there were plenty of tiny baitfish around, so our hopes were high. Giving the lure a good jerk and then pausing briefly before winding up the slack line and repeating was my chosen approach, and much to my delight, it only took about half a dozen casts to tempt the target species. After a short scrap, a small barracuda was successfully landed.

This small European barracuda was great fun on my ultralight setup!

Seeing me get one, Lee was even more determined to catch one too, so he carried on trying. Having ticked it off, I decided to switch my attention back to fishing straight down the harbour walls again, hoping to catch some nocturnal species like cardinalfish or black scorpionfish. Once it got dark, I shone my headtorch over towards Lee to see his rod was bent over. He'd hooked a barracuda, on a Halco twisty of all things, so I went along to help him land it and take a photo for him.

Target acquired. Another nice fish for Lee.

Us both catching a barracuda felt well deserved given the difficult time we'd had over the first few days of the trip. Fairly pleased about how the session had gone, we headed back to the apartment. 

In the morning we drove up to Santa Teresa Gallura, where we fished around the headland where the Torre di Longonsaro is located. The views up and down the from around the tower of the coastline were spectacular.

The impressive Torre di Longonsardo lookout tower is over five hundred years old.

The beach to the west of the tower looked amazing, but we weren’t there to swim. 

Following the path around the headland, we tried fishing at a couple of spots. The ground was fairly shallow and very rocky, so it didn’t come as a great surprise when all we caught was a few wrasse. 

A nice example of a male Mediterrranean rainbow wrasse. 

After a while, we decided to try another spot and headed back to the car. On the way up from the rocks, we spotted a lizard sunbathing on a wall. Usually, they run off when you get too close, but this one happily posed for a few photos. 

This Tyrrhenian wall lizard wasn’t too bothered by me, or my iPhone. 

A short drive later, we arrived at a small pier in the middle of the town’s port. Again, it looked promising but for some reason there weren’t too many fish around.  Casting over towards a few rocks at the opposite side of the port, I did manage to catch a few small white seabream. 

Another species added to my tally. 

The following day, we returned to Castelsardo to have a wander around the town’s narrow streets and to climb the steep hill to explore the walled fortress at its top. 

The picturesque town of Castelsardo.

We had a casual stroll around its steep narrow streets. 

Before we left, we had a quick session fishing from some rocks to the east of the town. Tucked away in a bay out of the wind, it was fairly shallow rocky ground and didn’t look very promising. Yet again, the fishing was pretty slow and all we caught were a few juvenile Mediterranean rainbow wrasse and a couple of small white seabream. 

Our effort certainly couldn’t be faulted. 

The following day, we decided to head to the north east coast again. We visited a few potential fishing spots, but the strong wind either made them unfishable or fishing simply wasn’t allowed. In short, beautiful scenery aside, the morning had been a bit of a waste of time. In the end, we ended up revisiting the black goby infested area in Olbia again!

At least we were out of the wind, but would we catch anything other than black goby?!

Almost as soon as we began fishing, Lee hooked into a nice fish that definitely wasn't a black goby. It shot off under a nearby yacht, but he managed to get it away from the mooring ropes, and a nice salema soon came into view. Sadly, we'd left the net in the boot of the car, and it threw the hook on the surface. We were hopeful there would be more of them around, but all we caught at that spot after that was black goby. Moving to an area with some rocks at the water’s edge, I tied on a tanago hook and targeted some small silver fish. They turned out to be big scale sand smelt. 

A lateral line scale count was used to positively identify this species. 

Switching to a split shot rig and dropping my bait into gaps in the rocks, I caught a few more black goby. After a while, I eventually caught something slightly different in the shape of a rock goby. 

A third goby species added to my tally!

Working my way along the rocks, I spotted what I was confident was a peacock blenny. The second I put my rig in its vicinity however, it swam off under a large flat rock. Despite my best efforts, I could not tempt it out again, so I moved slowly along the rocks, speculatively putting my bait into likely looking holding spots. Eventually, this paid off when I caught a rather large peacock blenny from down behind a large rock.

Probably the biggest peacock blenny I’ve ever caught. 

On the way back to Isola Rossa, we stopped briefly at a park up in the mountains. In the park, a small river has been dammed to create a series of ponds. As well as ducks, geese and terrapins, the largest pond also contains a few carp and lots of goldfish. No one else was around, so…

Hundreds of goldfish swimming around waiting to be fed was an opportunity too good to miss. 

A piece of line, a split shot and a hook baited with a piece of bread, immediately produced a few  of the colourful fish. 

The following day, our last full day of the trip, it was very windy again. We were pretty much resigned to the fact that fishing in the sea was either going to be very challenging, pretty unproductive, or both! Regardless, we decided to visit a few places on the north coast. Our first stop was Costa Paradiso. Whilst having an espresso in the morning, a local spearfisherman had told Lee that the sea surrounding it contained more fish, so we went to check it out. 

Costa Paradiso. A stunning location, but a fair swell was crashing over the rocks, so we had a quick stroll and then headed further up the coast. 

Portobello di Gallura was our next stop. Another beautiful stretch of coastline.

It also had a small harbour. We decided to fish at the outside of its inner breakwater.

We gave it a go, but all we caught before throwing in the towel were a few juvenile wrasse and seabream.

After enjoying some lunch, we decided to get away from the coast. Opting to be a little bit naughty and visiting a freshwater venue again. This time we headed to a stretch of the Coghinas river, which has lots of hot springs. As a result, there were lots of people around enjoying the warm water, but we found a quiet spot downstream from them and quietly wet a line. 

The rivers of Sardinia contain several species. I was hoping to catch a Mediterranean trout, but spotting some pumpkinseed in the margin, I quickly caught some using a small piece of worm. 

Such a nice looking fish. I love catching pumpkinseed!

Lee quickly caught one too, his first ever, in fact. Shortly afterwards, he caught a couple of juvenile largemouth bass on soft plastics. I spent ten minutes trying to get one myself, but as we didn't have the required licences to fish in freshwater, we didn't want to push our luck and left. 

In the evening, we had one last session in Isola Rossa marina. Lee spent his time trying to catch another barracuda, whilst I focused on fishing down the side again. This produced a few damselfish, small seabream and an East Atlantic peacock wrasse before the sun set. After dark, the bites dried up until I caught a small dusky grouper.

My biggest East Atlantic peacock wrasse of the trip. 

This juvenile dusky grouper brought a smile to my face. Even the small ones are fiesty!

Our last day on Sardinia had arrived. As we had a few hours spare in the morning before our flight back to the UK, we had one last go fishing around Olbia. Revisiting the rocky areas, Lee quickly spotted a few small salema in amongst some other seabream in a corner. Dropping a small section of ragworm in amongst them, I managed to catch one fairly quickly.

This small salema was my last species of the trip, taking our joint tally to twenty five.

In amongst some rocks slightly further along from where I caught the salema, I spotted a small peacock blenny. It couldn't resist a piece of ragworm either!

Male peacock blenny have a rather impressive forehead!

We carried on walking along the boardwalk, ending up underneath in the shade of a road bridge crossing the estuary. There we found a shoal of annular seabream, and having used up my ragworm, I caught a few more on Gulp! Angleworm before it was time to head to the airport.

My last fish of the trip was an annular seabream.

My third trip in three months had come to an end. It was nice to go away on holiday with Lillian again, and it was nice for us both to catch up with Lee again. The wind had been blowing strongly most of the time, and the fishing had been hard going, but we still caught a few fish. Here's a summary of what I caught with my only new species of the trip in bold...

1. Annular Seabream
2. Big Scale Sand Smelt
3. Black Goby
4. Common Two Banded Seabream
5. Damselfish 
6. Dusky Grouper 
7. East Atlantic Peacock Wrasse
8. European Barracuda
9. Five Spotted Wrasse
10. Goldfish
11. Mediterranean Rainbow Wrasse
12. Mystery Blenny
13. Ornate Wrasse
14. Painted Comber
15. Peacock Blenny
16. Pumpkinseed
17. Red-Mouthed Goby
18. Rock Goby
19. Rusty Blenny 
20. Saddled Seabream
21. Salema
22. Sharpsnout Seabream 
23. White Seabream

Lee also caught...

24. Black Scorpionfish
25. Largemouth Bass 

Sardinia was a beautiful place, lush and green with wild flowers everywhere and some incredible breathtaking scenery. The fishing was very dissapointing though. Perhaps it would be better in less windy conditions or later in the year? Perhaps the fishing around Cagliari and the southern end of the island is better. Will I return to Sardinia at some point in the future to find out? You never know!

Tight lines, Scott.

Species hunting road trip: Northbound pit stop.

Driving back up to Scotland, I had some pinkies left to use up and decided to make another fishing “pit stop”. Whilst out on Flamer IV, Jack had told me about fishery when I mentioned I’d like to catch some pumpkinseed. The fishery he told me about is located in Berkshire, so it did require a bit of a detour, but I left Cornwall early enough to allow a three hour session there and still be back in Edinburgh at a reasonable time. Upon arrival, I spoke to the owner, got a small amount of tackle out of the car and picked a peg that was out of the wind. 

Amazingly, these pinkies had been in the boot of my car for a week and were still going strong!

Setting up an ultralight rod and a reel loaded with 2lb mainline and an insert waggler and a #20 hook at the business end, I was fishing in the margins in no time. It didn’t take too long before a few pinkies being fed into the swim attracted some roach. 

The first species to show interest in my fluoro pinkies. 

After catching about a dozen small roach and some small perch, a shoal of pumpkinseed arrived and after that I caught quite a few of the pretty little member of the sunfish family. Mission accomplished!

Pumpkinseed are so cool! I always think they’re like a freshwater wrasse!

After a while, my float went under and slowly slid away from me. Lifting into the fish, I immediately knew it was something bigger. After about ten minutes of putting the drag on my Legalis LT 2000 reel through its paces and pushing my 1.5lb hooklength to its limit, a nice common carp was on the surface and drawn over my net. 

It was bound to happen when I was fishing with such light tackle!

As you'd expect, all the commotion the carp had made had spooked the smaller fish from my swim, and I didn’t catch anything for a while. It was almost time to hit the road again when my float registered the return of some fish and after a couple more pumpkinseed I got a pleasant surprise when I hooked something slightly larger and a goldfish came to the surface. 

A nice bonus and the last fish of the trip. 

So, my adventure was over, at least the fishing anyway, and it had been both very enjoyable and productive too. I’d added seventeen species to my 2023 tally. In the order I caught them, and with new species in bold, here’s what they were …

1. Greater sandeel/Launce
   
2. Tub gurnard
3. Tompot blenny
4. Black seabream
5. Butterfly blenny
6. Starry smoothhound
7. Baillon’s wrasse
8. Gilthead seabream
9. Common goby
10. Shore clingfish/Cornish sucker
    
11. Lesser weever
12. Giant goby
13. Montagu’s blenny*
14. Atlantic horse mackerel/Scad
15. Blackspot seabream/Red seabream*
16. Pumpkinseed
17. Goldfish

*the first time I've caught this species in the UK.

I've already decided I want to head back down to the south coast next year. There are a few species I've never caught before that I'd like to target down there. I might see if some of my mates want to join me next time. It would be good to share out the driving!

Tight lines, Scott.