Photo opportunity.

A few days after getting back from my trip down south, I met up with my mate Ryan for a short session locally on the western breakwater of Granton Harbour. We’re off to Japan next month, so we spent most of the afternoon talking about that. Fishing away as we chatted, I caught a couple of wrasse and Ryan caught a long spined sea scorpion from around a group of large submerged boulders at the base of the sea wall we were fishing from. This area was very snaggy though, and after losing a few rigs, we turned our attention to fishing further out onto some cleaner ground. This quickly started producing lots of small whiting.

Catching dozens of small whiting wasn’t very exciting. In fact, this is the first whiting that I’ve bothered to photograph this year!

I was hoping that a passing striped red mullet might get to one of my ragworm baits, but even in the highly unlikely event that there was one around, the ravenous whiting weren’t letting anything else get anywhere near them, hitting them as soon as they hit the bottom. After a few hours, we opted to bring the session to an end, with some dark clouds rolling in making the decision just a little bit easier. Hopefully the next whiting I catch will be a Japanese one!

Tight lines, Scott.

Scratching around.

I’ve had a few short sessions over the last week, trying to catch larger sandeel species and my first topknot. The inlet area of Torness Power Station was the first venue and after collecting some bait in the shape of a handful of dog whelks, I tied on a small metal to try and tempt any large sandeel species that might have been present. A few years ago, I caught a sandeel there that I suspect may have been a Corbin’s sandeel. I took photos of it at the time, but really I should have kept it, so I could have carried out a thorough inspection to confirm its identity as either a Corbin’s sandeel or a greater sandeel. 

Matching the hatch in fly fishing terms. Large sandeel species eat small sandeel species. 

After an hour or so, I hadn't caught any sandeel, instead catching quite a few reasonably sized coalfish that were good fun on my ultra light setup. 

These plump coalfish put up a spirited fight. 

After a while the incoming tide forced me from the concrete platform where I was fishing, so I scrambled back up the sea defence boulders where I spent some time dropping pink isome down into the gaps between them. I was hoping to catch a topknot, but after trying several deep holes, all I’d caught were a couple of long spined sea scorpion. I then switched my attention to fishing over a rocky area at the edge of a large kelp bed. Baiting up small hooks with the flesh from the dog whelks was quite productive, with several mini species falling for their strong scent. 

This leopard spotted goby was first to munch a chunk of shellfish. Looks like popcorn but tastes a bit fishy. 

This blenny also took a liking to the small bait. 

As did this long spined sea scorpion. 

A few days later, I decided to visit the end of Granton Breakwater at low tide, to fish in the rocky bottom between the end of the breakwater and the rotten remains of the old wooden pier that used to be there. Fishing small pieces of ragworm I was expecting to maybe catch a few wrasse, but instead all I caught were some tiny poor cod, and I had to go down to tiny hooks to discover what was tapping away. 

There were lots of these, my first poor cod of the year, but sadly nothing else. 

The following day I headed to Newhaven Harbour to use up a small amount of maggots that I had left in my fridge that had started to turn. The juvenile whiting were loving them, hitting them as soon as my rig settled at the bottom of the wall I was fishing down.

Maggot proving once again to be a very effective bait for saltwater targets.

After a while, a piper turned up and began playing his pipes for the passengers arriving from a cruise ship that was moored out in the Forth. It was quite cool catching a few fish as he played his instrument behind me!

What's more Scottish than a red-headed, red-faced young man playing the bagpipes!

The juvenile whiting were numerous and equally ravenous, but eventually a viviparous blenny managed to get my wriggling little baits in its mouth first and was quickly hoisted up.

I've caught a few of these lately, but on maggot was a first for me.

All good fun, and my expectation of catching anything new during these types of sessions is minimal, but you never know. I just got back from a two-day trip down to Dumfries & Galloway with my mate Ryan, and on Saturday I'm heading back down there again with my mate Nick. Ryan and I had a good time, although the fishing was challenging at times. We caught a few fish, but we didn't get the one species that we went for. I have no expectation of encountering anything unusual on Saturday evening, having already ticked off a Dover sole, but I'm looking forward to hopefully another action packed session. I might spend some time trying to catch a starry smoothound during the session, fingers crossed one can get to a peeler crab bait before the hordes of thornback ray do.

Tight lines, Scott.

Dab will do nicely.

I continued my hunt for an elusive viviparous blenny at Granton Breakwater over the weekend with three very short sessions fitting them in before or after work. I popped down on Saturday for a few hours before work and started at the end of the breakwater again. I quickly caught twelve coalfish and a single ballan wrasse before the harbour pilot boat came in at high speed and the wake it created smashed into the breakwater churning up the bottom clouding up the water in the process. No bites after this so I moved along the breakwater, quickly tied up a two down running ledger rig and began fishing close in just past the weed. I soon had a few very shy bites. Crabs and small coalfish I thought and I couldn't seem to connect with any of them. When I finally got a good bite though I quickly struck and hooked a fish. It was a small fish and fought rather oddly. Could it be the fish I was after? No, it was a small flatfish. At the time I was slightly disappointed to catch it, thought it was a flounder and took a photo before quickly putting it back.

Examining this photo whilst writing this post I realised however it was in fact a small dab, my first of 2013. A nice reward for my species hunting efforts at the breakwater I think.

I had a few more casts and whilst reeling in my final one before leaving, a mackerel grabbed my bait. It was quickly landed and dispatched as my stash of raw prawns was beginning to run low and perhaps the viviparous blennies would prefer a portion of Omega 3 on my next visit.

The following day after work I headed back down again. Using the same approach as the day before but with the tide ebbing from high I got very few bites. I bumped into my mate Naz as he was leaving having caught a few mackerel at the end of the breakwater. One small flounder was hooked, landed and quickly released although in hindsight it may have been another dab. I fished for about three hours until last light. Just before I left the sky opened and I got thoroughly soaked.

Granton Breakwater. Slippery when wet!

On Monday before work I popped down for two hours. Despite it being rather sunny when I arrived it soon started raining rather heavily and I got soaked again but fished on through the downpour. Fishing at the end of the breakwater for the first hour I caught a few coalfish and a small pollock before I hooked something much bigger that felt like a ballan wrasse. It charged towards the wooden remains of the end of the pier. I put on some pressure to try and stop it getting into the snag but this bent out my fine wire hook. The second hour was spent trying to fish into the rocks and kelp at the bottom of the breakwater. Working my way along looking for gaps to fish into I found a blenny hiding in a gap in the breakwater itself that was full of water. With my fingers crossed I managed to tempt it to grab my bait and began lifting it up only to find out it was just a common blenny which was just as well as it was not hooked, was only holding onto the mackerel strip which it promptly spat out before doing an acrobatic dive back into the crack I had hoisted it from before I could grab it. Had it been my target I would have been most annoyed! I continued searching but my efforts only resulted in several lost rigs and leads. Session soon over I headed off thinking that I may have to rethink my strategy if I'm going to catch my quarry. Telling my girlfriend Lillian, who caught two viviparous blennies about two years ago, at the end of each session that I haven't caught one is pretty hard and she has even suggested that she should come down and show me how to do it so the pressure is well and truely mounting. I think I'll take a little break and target other species and come back to viviparous blennies later in the year.

Tight lines, Scott.

My annual viviparous blenny hunt begins.

When I woke up this morning I looked out of the window to find it was a nice sunny day contrary to most of the weather forecasts I'd looked at last night. Perfect I though for a couple of hours down at Granton Breakwater before work to begin my hunt for a viviparous blenny, a species that has eluded capture despite me having several goes over the last couple of years at catching one. My plan was to fish small baits on a #6 hook close in on a simple running ledger rig. When I got to the tackle shop though they were out of ragworm, my first choice bait, so I popped along the road to a supermarket and got a bag of frozen raw prawns instead. Parking the car and heading right to the end of the breakwater I was soon fishing in about six feet of water between the rock I was standing on and the remains of the wooden pier that many years ago was at the end of the breakwater. Bites came from the start and a string of small coalfish were caught and quickly released. 

One of the bigger specimens. Quite a fat little coalfish too! 

Just when I thought a move was in order I caught a long spined sea scorpion so I decided to stay put to see what else I could catch. 

Perhaps there were other species down there who could battle through the coalfish hordes to my bait?

After a few more coalfish I felt the distinctive taps of a wrasse and managed to hook the culprit, a nice little dark brown ballan wrasse with subtle gun metal grey spots.

My first wrasse from the venue. 

You can see the gun metal grey markings on the fishes gill covers too. 

Quite pleased with this I then caught another wrasse, this time a rather large battle scarred corkwing that had a chunk missing from his dorsal fin. 

An old warrior. 

As the tide started to flood I caught a second corkwing that I thought might be the same fish but a quick check of his dorsal fin told me he was a different wrasse. A second ballan wrasse soon followed before I had to get back onto the main breakwater as the tide was about to cut me off on the large rock I was fishing from. 

Before leaving I had a few casts to see if I could hold bottom out in front of the breakwater but my 1oz lead was quickly being pulled sideways so if I want to try there on future viviparous blenny hunts I will require heavier tackle I think. 

On the way back to the shore the heavens opened as predicted by the Met Office, finally getting it right for a change! I got a soaking but I still had a big smile on my face after a very enjoyable short session. So, no sign of my target species but with plenty of prawns left over and with reports of them being caught there recently I will be back and the hunt will continue...

Tight lines, Scott.

...It's official! The mackerel are in!

After work on Friday I popped five minutes along the road to the place where my love of fishing was rekindled a few years ago. My mate Naz took me "Mackie Bashing" there and I haven't looked back. Whilst the heavy beachcaster, six feather trace, 6oz bomb and aching arms from winching in half a dozen fish at a time have been exchanged for a Japanese ultra light solid tipped rod, zero stretch super thin braid, a small 7g metal casting jig and an ache free enjoyable scrap the target is still the same, the humble, and very tasty, mackerel.

Granton Breakwater stretches out into the River Forth. A few fish have been caught there recently including some unusual species for the area I'm told including goldsinny wrasse, ling and lesser spotted dogfish.

Arriving on the breakwater I could see quite a few other anglers fishing already and decided to start fairly close to the shore and work my way along a few metres after every cast. My thinking was that the mackerel would chase their prey close into the beach and hopefully this methodical approach would see me locate them. Far better to do this than go to the end of the breakwater and stand in the same place hoping they swim by I think! Anyway, I plodded along flicking out my little metal, a Yoshikawa Jig that my mate Lee Goddard recommended after catching a few fish on one, and it flew out like a little missile, the wind at my back no doubt assisting me.

Look just like a little sandeel.

I soon got to the first angler who was also spinning with a metal lure but he told me he hadn't caught anything yet. Walking past him and starting my search again I cast out and let the lure sink down before slowly retrieving it, pausing every now and then to let it flutter down in the water. As I approached the next group of anglers they caught a couple of mackerel on their bait rods. A good sign so I kept working my way along towards them. Midway through a retrieve and with the lure fluttering down I felt a few knocks through my sensitive rod and after the third or forth my rod bent over nicely. The mackerel on the end of my line put up a great scrap and my rod had a proper bend in it especially as the fish got closer and shot off to my left and the back across to my right. Soon though I brought it to the surface in front of me and lifted up a fairly decent mackerel, quickly dispatching it as it was coming home with me.

Perfect size for a hearty supper.

Quite content with adding another species to my 2013 tally, having enjoyed the scrap it gave, not keen on catching more than I can eat due to them not coping very well with being handled and also starting to feel quite cold due to the blustery wind, I headed home for a tasty supper.

Tight lines, Scott.