Alternating current.

Torness Power Station is coming towards the end of its lifespan. In the next few years it will be decommissioned. I’ve caught a good variety of species from both the area where water is drawn in to cool the reactors and where it returns to the sea in a much hotter condition. The fishing can however be very mixed. Like the water around the station it can be hot or cold! I’ve had a few amazing sessions there, but also some very tough ones! Last month I visited twice and unfortunately the fishing was quite poor. Fortunately I did still manage to catch a few fish!

Long spined sea scorpion can usually be caught as they are usually present all year round and are very easy to tempt with a piece of ragworm.

More of summer species, leopard spotted goby can be caught in good numbers if the conditions are right and you know where to find them.

In kelpy areas, there are plenty of wrasse too, from late spring through summer into early autumn. 

Localised pockets hold small populations of goldsinny wrasse. 

Poor cod numbers seem to be on the increase over recent years. 

Bigger corkwing wrasse, like this darkly coloured male, can also turn up at certain spots. 

The action may be hit or miss down at Torness Power Station, but it’s still a good venue to visit for a quick session. It’ll be interesting to see how the fishing around it changes when it ceases to operate. The species found around the warm water outflow may well disappear, but I’m sure many of the others around the area will still be present. 

Tight lines, Scott.

In sickness and in health.

Despite not feeling great, I took a short trip over to the Isle of Bute recently. Two of Lillian’s friends were getting married in a short ceremony at the island’s registry office in Rothesay, and had asked her to attend as one of the witnesses. It was to be a quick, informal ceremony, but as I didn’t really know them, it somehow didn’t really feel quite appropriate that I attend, so I went fishing in the afternoon and met up with them in the evening for a meal. I wanted a nice easy venue to fish, so after having a look on Google Maps, I decided to head to Port Bannatyne’s marina, to fish from the outside of its breakwater. 

My spot for the day. 

Starting off fishing close in, I quickly discovered there were quite a lot of poor cod just out from the base of the breakwater’s rocks. Dropping in tight on the rocks themselves produced a few goldsinny wrasse, followed by a ballan wrasse that tried its best to get down into the rocks. 

I’m not a big fan of poor cod if I’m honest. 

Goldsinny wrasse can be a bit of a pain too. Often present in large numbers, they’re very aggressive, making catching other species more difficult. 

Even small ballan wrasse are great fun on ultra light gear. 

After a while, I decided to try fishing further out and switched to a three hook flapper equipped with very small hooks, in the hope of catching some interesting mini species, or perhaps even something new! This change of tactics produced fewer fish, but the variety was good which kept things interesting as I didn’t know what I would catch next!

I caught my first common dragonet of the year,..

…a small dab,..

..a tiny haddock, again my first of the year,… 

…and quite a few juvenile grey gurnard.  

Before the end of the session, I had a few casts with a 10g metal jig. This produced a few mackerel at distance and several pollock closer in. It had turned out to be quite a productive mark and I’d quite enjoyed fishing there. By the time I left however, fatigue had started to set in, which isn’t normal given I’d not been fishing that long. As Ive mentioned in most of my recent posts, I’ve not been feeling right for quite a while now. A load of blood tests have been done recenty and the results have all come back normal. This is good news obviously and another appointment with the doctor has been scheduled, so hopefully we can try to get to the bottom of what exactly is the matter with me!

Tight lines, Scott. 

Submarines and butterflies.

I haven’t been out fishing too many times since getting back from Gran Canaria. At the beginning of this month, I had another session in Greenock with my mate Ryan. I was hoping to catch a topknot, whilst Ryan wanted a tadpole fish. It was pretty tough going, but we caught some fish. Mainly small wrasse, but I did also catch a tompot blenny, which made making the drive across the country to hunt for the two more unusual fish worthwhile because I absolutely love tompot blenny!

The bulk of our fish were goldsinny wrasse. 

Tompot blenny are awesome! This one was my first from East India Harbour. 

Towards the end of the afternoon, a few photographers arrived armed with some ridiculously long lenses. Puzzled by this development, we wondered what they were hoping to photograph. Not long after they showed up, a submarine passed by, solving the mystery.

It’s not everyday you get to see a submarine!

A day or so later, I had a session down at the inlet area of Torness Power Station. Whilst we were fishing in Greenock, Ryan had told me he had hooked and lost a flatfish whilst fishing over a rocky area there. Suspecting it may have been a topknot, off I went, armed with some live prawns and some ragworm. Things were incredibly slow, and over four hours, I only caught two tiny long spined sea scorpions. 

The bigger of the two fish!

On the way back to the car, a lovely peacock butterfly landed on the path in front of me. Quite uncharacteristically, it stayed put whilst I fumbled around getting my phone out and just sat there as I took a few photographs of it. 

Enjoying nature is a big part of fishing. 

So, a couple of tough session where capturing my rock dwelling flatfish nemesis had eluded me yet again. I’m fairly realistic about my chances of catching one but will keep on trying anyway. That’s fishing at the end of the day, especially when you’re after more unusual species!  Also, as happened to me during both these sessions, being outdoors can reward you in other ways too!

Tight lines, Scott.

Look what’s been caught!

Since getting back from the Canary Islands last month, I’ve not been out fishing that often. One evening session locally with my mate Ryan only produced two fish. Tough going and a reminder of why I don’t fish much here at this time of year. Receiving photos of yet another topknot and also a reticulated dragonet that had been caught by anglers I know in Greenock, inspired me to travel through a couple of times to try my luck. I’ve caught both these species before, but not in Scotland. Fishing over the spot where the reticulated dragonet was caught for a few hours at the start of the first session, produced a single black goby and over a dozen sand goby. 

This black goby was my first fish of the two sesssions. 

Twitching my tiny bait along the bottom, I caught loads of sand goby. 

Turning my attention to targeting topknot as high water approached for the last couple of hours of the first session, I wasn’t overly surprised when I caught a few small wrasse from down in amongst the gaps in the rocks I was dropping my rig into. 

Goldsinny wrasse are plentiful all along the rocky edges of the venue. Over the summer months, they become a bit of a nuisance. 

Corkwing wrasse are also present in great numbers. 

For my second visit, my mate Ryan decided to join me. I spent the entire session targeting a topknot down in the rocks, whilst Ryan fished a bigger bait at the edge of them, hoping to catch his first ever tadpole fish, another species the venue is known to produce. A brisk easterly wind made it a fairly cold day and to make matters worse the fish weren’t really in the mood. A few wrasse were caught between the two of us, and towards the end of the session, I caught a solitary Yarrell’s blenny. 

Yarrell’s blenny are a strange fish. I love catching them. 

Their head in particular is quite odd. I think it looks a little too small for their body!

So, the hunt for my first Scottish topknot will have to continue. Quite a few have been caught there now, so I’m fairly confident that I’ll get one eventually. A Scottish reticulated dragonet would also be most welcome, although I think that may require a massive slice of luck. Also falling into this category are streaked gurnard, lumpsucker and small-headed clingfish, three other species that have also been caught around Greenock that I’ve never caught before. So, I dare say I’ll be fishing there quite a lot this year. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Eastern shores before foreign shores.

Yesterday evening, I headed down the A1 with my mate Ryan, to fish the inlet area at Torness Power Station for a few hours. It can be a sheltered spot to fish when an Easterly wind is blowing. Armed with some ragworm, we fished small pieces, on small hooks, using ultra light tackle. Plenty of bites from the start of the session saw us catching a lot of juvenile fish.  Poor cod, cod, coalfish and pollock that were all fighting over the bait as soon as it reached the bottom. These were followed by a small ballan wrasse for Ryan and then we both caught a few of my least favourite fish of 2024, the goldsinny wrasse!

Not another goldsinny wrasse! Thankfully, next Sunday, I'll hopefully be saying the same thing about Mediterranean rainbow wrasse when I'm fishing on Malta! No chance of any goldsinny wrasse there!

After an hour, light started to fade and I recieved a WhatsApp message asking my opinion on the identity of a clingfish. Putting my rod under my arm whilst I had a look at the photos I’d been sent and replied, I popped my phone back into my pocket and turned my attention back to my own fishing. Rod in hand again, my line had went a little slack and winding that up I felt another small fish on the end. Winding it up, I was pleasantly surprised to see a butterfish come to the surface. 

Not another butterfish! My twelfth of 2024! I never thought catching so many in a year would be possible!

We both caught a few more juvenile cod and also a few leopard spotted goby as it continued to get dark. As well as these fish we pulled up a few velvet swimmer crabs too that grabbed our ragworm and stubbornly refused to let go of it until they reached the surface, or were lifted up to have it coaxed from their claws. Once our headtorches were required I also pulled up a lobster. Instantly recognised by the thrashing of its tail. Following that the bites slowed right down over the area we’d been fishing over, so we moved a short distance and began fishing into a rougher patch on the bottom, made up of boulders covered in kelp. Ryan caught a couple of small cod and then pulled out a small shore rockling that had a lovely reddish brown colouration. 

Not another shore rockling! Ryan's second consecutive Sunday evening session shore rockling. I was jealous and wanted to catch one myself!

Determined to get a shore rockling too, I carried on fishing away and it didn’t take too long before I felt a couple of gentle tugs. Allowing the bite to develop, a few more pulls were followed by my rod being pulled down much harder. Lifting into a fish, it put up a spirited little fight but was soon wound up to the surface and quickly hoisted up onto the platform we were fishing from.

Yes! A shore rockling! My first of 2024. A bit bigger than Ryan’s, it was, in my opinion anyway, a much less attractive colour than his and also had extensive mottling all across its body. 

Not many sea anglers enjoy catching shore rockling, but Ryan and I sure do. They’re great fun on ultra light tackle too when you can feel them taking your bait! After a period of no further fish showing an interest in our ragworm sections, we called it a night, and headed back to Edinburgh. It had been an enjoyable short session. I’ve got some ragworm left, so I may pop out locally to use it up before I fly out to Malta on Saturday. My mate Chris has also told me where I can catch some lovely looking rudd from a small drainage pond about an hour outside Edinburgh, so Ryan and I might go and try to do just that later this week too. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Returning the favour.

Now and then, a fellow angler who has found this blog, or my Instagram account, gets in touch looking for more detailed information on some of the fishing spots I post about or to ask me where I would recommend they go to catch a certain species. I’ve been helped many times over the years by other anglers who have been very generous with their advice and knowledge, so I like to do the same whenever I can. Species hunter Ben contacted me last year about haddock fishing off the north coast of Scotland, and we’ve kept in touch ever since. When he told me he and a friend were coming up to Scotland from Pembrokeshire for a few days and had based some of their mark choices on my blog posts, I decided to go and meet up with them. The weather was pretty terrible while he was up here with his friend Nev, but their final day trip to Lochaline saw a slight improvement in the conditions and I got up early to make the long drive up there to fish with them. Four hours later, I arrived at the first spot. 

Logs on the logging pier in Lochaline. I found two species hunters fishing behind them in the corner. 

When I joined them, they were each had a mackerel bait out in the incredibly deep water directly in front of the pier and were fishing for mini species down the side of the pier with ragworm baited sabiki rigs while they waited for bites on their heavier gear. Both of them are taking part in species hunting competitions and were up in Scotland hoping to add to their already very impressive totals. Ben’s main target for the session was a spurdog, whilst Nev was hoping to catch a leopard spotted goby. I fished small pieces of ragworm down the side of the pier, keen to catch a quintet of UK wrasse species. I managed four of the five quite quickly, but a cuckoo wrasse proved elusive, and I didn’t catch one until later on in the day, completing the set. 

With their lovely pastel shades markings, rock cook or small mouthed wrasse were present in large numbers.

I caught lots of them in Norway recently, but this was my first Scottish cuckoo wrasse of the year.

My four hundred and fifty seventh* goldsinny wrasse of the year! *Estimated, but it feels like I've caught that many. This particular specimen had lovely golden markings on it.

While I was fishing away, chatting to Ben and Nev about fishing, species hunting and various fish species we’d all caught over the years, they both added a couple of species to their competition tallies. Ben caught a coalfish and shortly afterwards a small spurdog, and Nev caught a Connemara clingfish followed later on by a leopard spotted goby. Later in the afternoon we decided to change venue and headed around to the stone pier near the ferry terminal in the village. From this spot, Nev wanted to target a couple of small goby species and Ben was keen to try for a sea trout. Whilst Ben fished metals, Nev and I baited tanago hooks with tiny pieces of ragworm and caught a few painted goby and two spotted goby with relative ease. 

I’m not taking part in any species hunting competitions, but it was still nice to get another species ticked off for 2024 with this two spotted goby.

Having quickly caught our two target goby species, we headed further north up the shoreline, passing Europe’s only underground sand mining facility, to reach the village’s small marina. Nev and I targeted tiny fish with tanago hooks whilst Ben continued casting metals around hoping to tempt a sea trout. 

Ben fishes from the marina pontoons with small metals, hoping to catch a sea trout.

It didn’t take any of us long to catch fish. Nev and I very quickly pulled out several sand goby, whilst Ben began to supply some of the marina’s boat owners with freshly caught mackerel. 

One of several sand goby that we caught. 

Nev was over the moon to catch a sand goby as it was another addition to his competition tally. We carried on searching the sandy bottom and caught a few more species. There were lots of tiny poor cod around, and I also caught a couple of tiny grey gurnard.  

Perfection in miniature and incredibly adorable into the bargain!

The last time I visited this spot I thought I saw one of the UK’s two smaller clingfish species, so I was scanning the bottom trying to spot one of those. When I saw a small dark fish sitting motionless, I spent some time trying to catch it. It didn’t seem interested at first, moving around a few centimetres at a time before settling in a new position. Borrowing a bright pink cheburashka weight from Nev I was able to more accurately lower a tiny piece of ragworm right in front of the fish and after a while it took the hook into its mouth. Quickly lifting the fish up, I was slightly disappointed to discover it was in fact a tiny short spined sea scorpion. 

My first of the year, but not the species I thought I’d been trying to catch!

Ben had come over to see what we’d been catching before returning to the pontoons to target sea trout again. Just before we all called it a day, Nev managed to catch a juvenile short spined sea scorpion too, which was also an addition to his species hunt tally. By this point, light was beginning to fade, and we called it a day. With a ferry to catch as well as an overnight closure of the road through Glencoe and a detour increasing my journey time home, I said farewell to Ben and Nev and hit the road. It was great meeting up with them both, and I wish them success with their future species hunting. I might not be too long until Ben and I meet up again for another spot of species hunting, he’s invited me down to Pembrokeshire to try and catch my first ever UK grey triggerfish. Fingers crossed the right conditions for them materialise! 

Tight lines, Scott.

Packing for Norway.

Two weeks ago, when I really should have been packing my bags for a one week trip to Norway, I put doing that off until the last minute and crammed several fishing sessions in hunting for a topknot. With the summer coming to an end, I guess I figured I had better make the most of what was left of it. By the time I got back from Scandinavia it would be Autumn after all.

The weather wasn’t great when I visited Torness Power Station for my first session, but I tucked myself away down in the sea defence boulders and dropped live prawn down into the deepest holes I could find.

This nice deep hole didn’t produce a topknot,..

…only this solitary blenny.

After a few pretty fruitless hours, scrambling around the rocks and not catching much, I drove down to St Abbs to try my luck there. The fishing there was much more productive, and there were lots of ballan wrasse around that were more than happy to munch a live prawn. A few long spined sea scorpion found them tempting as well. I’m sure a topknot would eagerly eat one too. I suppose I just didn’t manage to put my bait near one.

The rocky areas surrounding the outside of St Abbs harbour held plenty of ballan wrasse.

They're home to a few long spined sea scorpions too.

A couple of days later, I headed back to St Abbs again, this time to fish Starney Bay from the rocks on its right hand side.

Only accessible at low tide, I hadn’t visited the rocks on the right of Starney Bay for a long time.

It was a beautiful day when I made my way down from the coastal path, scrambled over the rocks and finally got out onto the point, and I was soon catching a few fish. Dropping sections of ragworm and live prawns down close to the vertical rock surfaces produced a couple of ballan wrasse, which were followed by a succession of coalfish.

Coalfish give a great account of themselves on ultralight tackle.

I did intend to stay on the rocks for several hours, but a change in the weather forced me to alter my plans. Thankfully, I made it back across the gully that fills up as the tide rises just in time, otherwise I would have been stuck out on the point for a few hours in the rain. By the time I made it to St Abbs Harbour, the blue sky had been replaced by dark grey rain clouds passing overhead, and I did end up getting slightly wet a few times as rain sporadically fell. I focused my efforts on lowering live prawns down the vertical concrete surfaces, exploring as much of them as I could. I may have been slightly damp, but the fishing was pretty good, and I was also rewarded with some pretty spectacular rainbows.

Somewhere over the rainbow, topknot lie.

Live prawn has become one of my favourite baits this year. Fish love them, collecting them is easy, and best of all they are free!

One of several chunky ballan wrasse I caught.

I carried on fishing into darkness, working over the same areas I’d covered earlier in the session. Eventually, I ran out of prawns, so I switched to sections of ragworm. This produced a couple of long spined sea scorpion and a small lobster.

A bizarre creature, but sadly not the one I’ve been after for weeks!

Two days later, Lillian and I went for a walk around Butterdean Wood in East Lothian. Afterwards, we visited the inlet area at Torness Power Station where I was permitted to fish for a couple of hours to use up some ragworm I had left over from my previous session. This produced a few wrasse, and a couple of other species, but once again no funky flatfish, unfortunately.

Yet another ballan wrasse over 40cm on ultralight tackle,..

...a colourful corkwing wrasse,..

...a nicely coloured small codling,..

...and a couple of butterfish. I think those take me into double digits of butterfish caught this year!

Just as we were about to leave, another angler who was heading off offered me some cracking, freshly dug ragworm. At that point, I had no intention of fishing the following day as I still had to pack for Norway, but this generous offer was too good to turn down, so I gratefully accepted the free bait.

So, the day before I flew out to Norway, and with most of my packing still to do, I headed west to Gourock, to use my newly acquired supply of fantastic quality worms for one final pre holiday topknot session. At the first spot, rather unsurprisingly, all I caught was endless wrasse and a few tompot blenny and long spined sea scorpion.

If I never catch another goldsinny wrasse again...

Three tompot blenny made a nice change from the endless wrasse!

My mate Andrew popped down to fish with me on his lunch hour, and as we caught more of the same species I'd been pulling out all morning, we had a good chat about topknot. Just after he left to go back to work, I headed along to a try a second spot in Greenock that I know has produced several topknot this year. I only had a small amount of ragworm left, and the resident goldsinny and corkwing wrasse rapidly set about depleting that. Almost out of bait completely, a fairly gentle take resulted in all hell breaking loose when I lifted into it. A large fish started stripping line from my reel at a worrying rate. Luckily, the fish didn’t dive into the submerged rocks, instead charging off, swimming furiously away from me horizontally just above them. It made a few of these surging runs before I eventually got it up to the surface. Extending my net down, a large ballan wrasse was drawn into it and lifted up onto the venue's distinctive cobbled brick.

43cm of very chunky ballan wrasse. I didn't bother weighing it, but I'm confident it was my heaviest one of the year on ultralight gear. A real test of the tackle I was using!

I had a last few drops after catching the large ballan wrasse and caught a few more goldsinny wrasse, but it was soon time to head back to Edinburgh to do what I had been putting off all week, pack my suitcase full of fishing tackle! Sadly, a fishing session packed week in the lead up to my Norwegian adventure had not produced a topknot. I’m back from Norway now, and I’ll keep trying to catch a topknot in the coming weeks. The days will be gettting shorter soon, so I’ll be out after dark more often too I think. The wrasse should be less of an obstacle once the sun has vanished below the horizon and topknot are supposed to be more active at night as well.

Tight lines, Scott.