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. 

Species hunting adventures in Norway.

At the end of August I flew out to Oslo Gardermoen Airport with two of my mates, Nick and Ryan, for a week long fishing holiday staying in a Hustadnes Fjordhytter wooden cabin. Located right next to Hjørundfjorden, and surrounded by the stunning Sunnmøre Alps, a range of breathtaking mountains rising steeply up to 1700 metres from the fjord on all sides, providing stunning vistas in all directions. Landing in the afternoon, we picked up our hire car and made the seven hour drive north. The last few hours of the drive took us through some stunning scenery. Emerging from a tunnel, we stopped to stretch our legs and took in this stunning view.

A small picturesque village nestled in a Norwegian valley

By the time we arrived at the cabin and met our host Anders, it was dark, so we got our gear into the cabin and were quickly shown the boat we had hired for the duration of our stay. Up early the following morning, the view across the fjord from our cabin window was awe inspiring, even if the weather forecast for the next few days was not.

Imposing mountains surround the fjord.

Grabbing our boat fishing tackle, we headed around to the tiny harbour and motored out into the bay, where we set about catching some mackerel to use as bait. Catching some was fairly straight forward, and we soon had enough to start fishing for other species in the area. Beginning our species hunting in relatively shallow areas, we were soon catching lots of lovely grey gurnard on strips of mackerel fished close to the bottom.

We all caught plenty of nice grey gurnard. They are so spiky!

The real target was megrim, a flatfish with a very large, cavernous mouth, and Nick managed to catch one pretty quickly. The grey gurnard were present in large numbers however, and catching anything else proved quite difficult. After a while, I caught a cuckoo wrasse when we drifted closer to shore over some mixed ground.

A nice female cuckoo wrasse.

In the afternoon, we headed across the fjord to fish in the shadow of a particularly massive and very steep lump of rock that had a waterfall running down it. The ground close in was pretty rocky and our first few drops produced some big whiting and some coalfish that hit our baits as we dropped them to the bottom. These were followed by a few cusk caught from some rougher ground.

My first new species of the trip. All three of us caught a few of them.

We call them cusk or torsk in the UK. They can be caught in the Shetland Islands. The Norwegian for cod is also torsk, so things can become slightly confusing. Its scientific name is Bromse bromse. The Norwegian name for this species is bromse. Hope that's cleared that up?!

Drifting along a little further out in deeper water, we all began catching small Norway haddock. A second new species of the trip for us all.

The Norway Haddock or redfish. Not related to the haddock from the cod family, this fish is a rockfish. By the end of the trip we'd all caught a lot of these brightly coloured bottom dwellers.

The following day, we continued our search for megrim in the bay to the west of the cabin. Fishing close to the clean bottom, in different areas, at various depths, I was quite surprised when I lifted into a bite and pulled up a small hake! I knew they were a potential catch but was expecting to catch them in much deeper water. This was followed shortly afterwards by my first megrim of the trip. A great start to the day's fishing! Four new species in my first two days boat fishing was a fantastic start to my trip.

My third new species of the trip! This long, streamlined member of the cod family possesses a large mouth full of small razor sharp teeth and also has an impressive set of large fins.

My first ever megrim, a flatfish species I was hoping to catch, so I was pleased to get one on day two.

As the day progressed, we carried on exploring the bay out in front of Sæbø. Over some mixed ground we caught a few small ling and our first haddock of the trip. Ryan also caught a blackbelly rosefish, also known as a bluemouth.

My first ling of 2024.

My first haddock of the year too.

I was quite jealous of Ryan's blackbelly rosefish, but at least we knew where we could potentially catch more.

That evening after dinner, we messed about outside the cabin with ultralight tackle and caught tons of wrasse. There was a huge amount present, we caught a few ballan, corkwing and cuckoo wrasse, but the most abundant were definitely goldsinny wrasse, attacking our small pieces of Isome aggressively. Through the crystal clear water, I was positive I could also see a few rock cook wrasse as well. I tried hard to pull one out from amongst the hordes of other wrasse to complete the set, but didn’t manage to get one.

Due to my determination to catch a rock cook wrasse, I probably ended up catching more goldsinny wrasse than any other species during the trip! Slightly ironic, given it's certainly my most caught species back home this year too!

The following two days the weather forecast was pretty poor with lots of rain forecast. Wearing our waterproof clothing, we went out in the boat anyway. There ended up being lots of showers, but we avoided the heavy rain that was predicted. As well as visiting areas we’d already tried, we also spent some time fishing bigger baits in deeper water to see if we could catch long nosed skate. This produced a nice hake for Nick. Ryan and I both caught a black mouthed dogfish. I say caught, but both were merely holding onto our baits all the way up through about a hundred and fifty metres of water, only deciding to let go once we lifted them into the boat.

A nice hake for Nick from deep water.

Black mouthed dogfish. Not the smartest shark in the ocean but a very cool one.

In the evening the worst of the rain fell so we chilled out in the cabin and had a few beers. In between a couple of downpours, Ryan heard some splashing outside and looking out of the cabin window spotted several groups of pilot whales slowly making their way up the fjord. It was an incredible sight, and Nick ran outside with his camera to get some photos.

Pilot whales passing by.

The following day more heavy rain was forecast, so we headed out again suitably dressed. In the morning, we really struggled to get locate any mackerel. Maybe the arrival of the whales had something to do with it, I speculated. After three hours, we had only caught two mackerel between the three of us! Nick decided he fancied a hike in the afternoon, so Ryan and I dropped him off, and we went back out to drift over the spot where he'd caught the blackbelly rosefish two days previously. We didn't get any, but after a while we started catching a few fish out in deeper water, but no species we hadn't caught already.

A nice whiting for Ryan.

Tired of making our own food, in the evening we drove up through the valley to Ørsta for some pizza. We did intend to fish there, but it was very windy, quite cold as a result, and we weren't suitably dressed, so we decided to head back to Sæbø to fish there instead where it was much more sheltered. Dropping scented lures down the harbour walls, the results were quick predictable, wrasse, lots of wrasse. The water was so clear we were able to do a bit of sight fishing, trying to target specific fish, which was fun. All three of us caught plenty of wrasse, and in amongst them, I caught an absolutley stunning male cuckoo wrasse.

Sæbø's Harbour and ferry port. The perfect venue for some ultra light fun.

Possibly the most incredibly brightly coloured male cuckoo wrasse I've ever caught!

After a while, we went for a wander along to the marina in front of the Sagafjord Hotel. More wrasse were caught, and we added a couple of mini species to our trip tally in the shape of a long spined sea scorpion and a black goby. Before too long it got dark and we returned to the ferry port where we spent some time looking for topknot using our headtorches. Sadly, the topknot in Norway proved just as elusive as the Scottish ones!

Ryan fishes in amongst the rocks and bladderwrack.

There were probably lots of black goby around, they were just being beaten to my Angleworm by the resident wrasse.

During our last two days afloat on the fjord, we were treated to some glorious weather. We really struggled to find mackerel though, and once we did, we generally found the fishing to be much more difficult, catching less fish than we had during the first few days of the trip, and nothing new species wise.

Not a cloud in sight.

As we fished away, we were treated to a second, much closer encounter with a pod of pilot whales when they swam by the boat, and we were also visited by a white tailed sea eagle which was also fantastic to see up close. Nick had his camera out on the boat with him and got some great photos.

Pilot whales pass the boat.

Bird of prey.

Flying high.

We spent a reasonable amount of time over the last two days dropping bigger baits in deep water trying to tempt a long nose skate, but this only resulted in a few more very greedy black mouthed dogfish being caught. Our last hour or so of fishing was spent drifting over much shallower areas. Nick and Ryan spent some time fishing jigs, whilst I stuck to fishing strips of mackerel close to the bottom. A few ling, cusk and whiting were caught. While Nick and Ryan declared their fishing was over and tidied up the deck, I had one last drop with the last of the bait and caught the final fish of the trip in the shape of a megrim.

I think I caught five of these big gobbed flatfish over the trip. Nick and Ryan caught some too. I wish topknot back home were so easy to catch!

Light was fading by the time we got back in to the harbour. Our species hunt was over and overall, despite the mixed weather and fishing, it had been a most enjoyable trip. Between the three of us, we’d caught twenty one species. I was slightly disappointed not to catch either a blackbelly rosefish or a long nosed skate, but was happy I’d caught four new species during the trip, highlighted in bold in our trip tally below.

1. Ballan Wrasse
2. Blackbelly Rosefish/Bluemouth*
3. Black Goby
4. Black Mouthed Dogfish
5. Coalfish
6. Corkwing Wrasse
7. Cuckoo Wrasse
8. Cusk/Torsk
   
9. Golsinnny Wrasse
10. Grey Gurnard
11. Haddock
12. Hake
13. Ling
14. Long Spined Sea Scorpion
15. Mackerel
16. Megrim
17. Norway Haddock/Redfish
18. Pollock
19. Poor Cod
20. Pouting
21. Whiting

*would have been a new species for me, but I failed to catch one sadly.

I'd like to return to Hustadnes Fjordhytter, it’s a stunning place and a feel like we’ve barely scratched the surface. Perhaps it would be more apt to say we barely scratched the bottom. The fjord is 400m deep in places, and there are all sorts of unusual species down there that I’d love to have a go at catching. A trip to northern Norway to target wolfish and halibut is on the bucket list too!

Tight lines, Scott.

A kraken day afloat.

On Tuesday I headed down to Port Logan with two of my mates, Nick and Stewart, for a day out with skipper Spike aboard his boat Go West. I was hopeful that I could add some species to my Scottish saltwater species hunt tally with bull huss, herring, tub gurnard and red gurnard being the most likely captures that would see me do that. In the end I only managed to add one but we all caught a few fish, had a laugh and to top it all off the sun even managed to appear in the afternoon.

Once upon a time herring were plentiful around Scotland, sadly this is no longer the case due to overfishing. They can still be caught in the Irish Sea at certain times of the year and I was happy to catch two of them on a set of sabiki.

Nick caught a couple of tub gurnard after his first one spat the hook at the side of the boat. I had no luck catching one despite us spending a bit of time repeatedly drifting over the area where Nick caught his.

In the afternoon I caught a couple of nice colourful male cuckoo wrasse while scratching around on the bottom. They are one of my favourite UK fish. 

I also hooked and boated a couple of these amazing creatures. The first octopus was friendly enough, crawling around on my arm after I removed my hook from its tentacle, but the second one decided to bite me with it's rather sharp little beak whilst clinging onto my hand. Putting my arm in the water it let go, spurted its ink and swam off.

Later in the day we headed a bit further offshore to try for a ling over some rougher ground but instead we caught a few ballan wrasse and some dogfish before I caught this small haddock.

Before we knew it was time to wind up for the last time and head back to port. It had been an enjoyable day out and the herring had left me with only five saltwater species remaining to catch to reach my goal for the year. There are quite a few species I can catch out of Port Logan that I haven't caught yet this year so I will be back down there again as soon as I can. My mate Martin is trying to organise a day out for us with one of the guys from his angling club, also named Scott. I might also book another day out with one of the charter boats down there too with Stewart and some other guys from my work who are keen to go fishing. Hopefully the weather will be kind. 

Tight lines, Scott.

The final countdown.

Last Monday I managed to get away from work early and headed through to Galston in Ayrshire to my mate Martin's in preparation for our flight to Spain the following day. It was a lovely afternoon so on the way I made a slight detour, picked up a small tub of ragworm and decided to visit Greenock's Victoria Marina to have have a go for a common dragonet. There were lots of juvenile cod and hadock around and I thought that getting through them might be a big ask but before I had used up my first worm I caught my target.

Number forty in my Scottish saltwater species hunt. A fantastic start to my time off.

Having caught what I went for fairly quickly I decided to head south to Troon. Martin had told me there were plenty of rock gobies to be found in the rockpools there and he wasn't exaggerating. When I slowly approached them I could see my target sitting on the bottom before shooting off into the weeds when they saw me. A #14 hook and single split shot was soon on the end of my leader and a little piece of ragworm was soon being dangled in close to potential fish holding areas. Rock gobies are not shy but a particularly bold blenny bullied its way past one to be my first fish from the mark. Not to be outdone in the kamikaze mini species stakes, three rock gobies all took my miniscule offering, darting out to gobble it up, were hooked and quickly landed.

The biggest of the trio.

Grinning like an idiot I headed off to Martin's, grabbing a couple of celebratory bottles of beer en route. I now have nine species left to catch to reach the fifty mark. Looking at my list of remaining potential targets I'm feeling fairly confident with a day out of Port Logan already arranged and a second in the pipeline where I have a good opportunity to tick off a few more. Those trips along with shore sessions on my days off work will with any luck see me achieve my goal over the next four months.

Tight lines, Scott

Each to their own.

Looking at my list of possible remaining saltwater target species last Monday night I decided to head west again last Tuesday. With last Wednesday off work as well however I opted to have an evening session at Greenock, fishing the Victoria Marina, followed by an overnight stay in Glasgow before heading up to Loch Fyne early on Wednesday morning. I knew my mate Dimitrios who lives in Glasgow was free on the Wednesday and is still without a car so I sent him a message to see if he wanted to ride shotgun which he did. My plans complete I put them into motion early in Tuesday afternoon. Really I choose Victoria Marina with shore rocking and common eels in mind as I have read reports online of them both being caught there recently. Common dragonets are also known to turn up there too from time to time. Given these facts I felt there was a good chance of adding a species to this year's tally.  There were a few other angler fishing when I arrived but one leaving as I got organised to start my own session told me that not many fish were being caught but looking along the marina I could see most anglers were fishing heavier gear and no doubt large baits for larger fish. Fishing a scaled down three hook flapper and various small baits on #10 hooks I quickly caught a couple of small cod at fairly close range and when I cast out a bit further I caught a few tiny haddock.

A pleasant little surprise and my first of the year. Even juveniles bear the "devil's thumbprint".

As the session carried on I caught a few more fish and when the tide turned and began to flood, submerging the weed covered rocks at the bottom of the marina wall, I caught a few goldsinny wrasse.

There are a few of these little chaps who feed in the weedy rocks at close range.

I fished away quite happily catching mainly juvenile haddock, dab and cod. As the evening progressed the other anglers, who still didn't seem to be catching much, slowly started to pack up and head off and before too long I had the place all to myself. 

A nice little early evening codling.

It was quite a nice night and as the sun set I changed end gear and was hopefully that maybe a shore rockling or common eel would become active and take my ledgered fish bait and my #6 hook with it.

Red sky at night. Lines will be tight?

As darkness fell however all activity ceased apart from the resident shore crabs which had my rod tip rhythmically nodding ever so slightly, a few of them holding on for dear life, munching away, as I reeled in to rebait periodically. At about 01:00 I called it a night and drove east to Glasgow where I stayed the night in a budget hostel. 

In the morning it was a lovely day. I picked up Dimitrios and after making the nice drive through some lovely scenery we were soon on the bladderwrack covered shore of Loch Fyne. I was hoping for a common dragonet again and fished small chunks of raw prawn on a three hook flapper using very light tackle. Dimitrios fished small metals and before I had finished setting up my gear he had caught a launce and a tiny whiting. The area I planned to fish was fairly weedy and quite shallow until it reached a drop off though so he soon headed south to fish some deeper water. 

Dimitrios heads off to do his own thing.

I was soon fishing and catching the usual suspects. A black goby was first to be caught and was followed by a few tiny cod, a mackerel and a string of dabs. 

Even at range holding my rod meant I could feel the fish attacking my little baits. 

I've been catching a lot of dab recently. 

I have a strange fixation with the big eyes of the dab. They are just plain weird and freak me out a bit if I'm honest.

Rather than swimming off this one just went straight to the bottom and with a quick shake buried itself. I held my cheap sunglasses close in front of my phone to take this photo without the surface glare. Who needs an expensive camera and a polarising lens filter? 

After a while Dimitrios came back along to get his ultra light rod. He had with him a few mackerel which he'd had fun catching but he wanted to up the ante and catch a few more on even lighter gear. After a while doing just that he returned again and decided to have a bit of a nap in the sun. I carried on fishing away and as the tide dropped away revealing more of the shoreline I was able to get my three hook flapper out further and further. After catching a few more black gobies I was getting a few bites that I couldn't connect with so I switched from #10 to #14 hooks. I was hoping the culprits were common dragonets but after missing a few more of the tiny little knocks I was beginning to wonder if it was crabs when I eventually hooked something and landing it added another species to this year's tally. 

Feeling the bite of this tiny sand goby at a fair distance in deep water is testament to the incredible sensitivity of the tackle I was using. Still very lucky to hook it on a #14 hook though.

Quite pleased I carried on fishing hopeful that the receding tide would allow me to reach an area that held my target. Dimitrios feeling refreshed from his afternoon snooze headed back along to enjoy some more sport with the mackerel. Most of them had moved off but he did have some fun when he hooked a sea trout. As they often do however it eventually managed to throw his hook. I didn't manage to locate any common dragonets in the end but I caught a few more dabs, cod, mackerel, a solitary juvenile haddock and a couple of short spined sea scorpions before it was time to pack up and head home. 

These are much more prevalent in sea lochs than their long spined cousins.

It had been an enjoyable little two day trip and with the addition of another two species taking my 2015 saltwater tally to thirty four it had been worth putting a few more miles on the car's clock again too. It was good to meet up with Dimitrios again even if we both spent most of the day doing our own thing. Nothing wrong with anglers enjoying different styles of fishing but as Dimitrios fishes exclusively with lures I think next time we meet up I'll join him fishing with them too, if not for the entire session then for the majority of it at least. Personally I think Dimitrios is one of the most talented light game anglers in the country and I think I could learn a lot from him, particularly when it comes to fishing metals. We're thinking about a trip to fish Loch Linnhe with ling and cuckoo wrasse being the main target species. I think between now and the end of the year I'll be spending a lot of my time fishing over on the western half of the country so no doubt Loch Linnhe won't be the only venue that Dimitrios and I visit.

Tight lines, Scott.