Crossing borders.

Last weekend, I had a couple of after work sessions with my mate Ryan. Poor weather conditions had wrecked his fishing plans during the previous week on his days off, so as the weather was nice, off we went. On Saturday, we met up with four other species hunting anglers at St Abbs harbour. Jack, Josh, Cal and Leigh were all up visiting Scotland from down south. Having travelled all around Scotland during their trip, trying to add a few species to their lifelists, they’d done just that, and were visiting St Abbs on their way back south for one last go at adding one or two more. 

When they arrived, I gave them a few pointers on where they could potentially catch butterfish, viviparous blenny, Yarrell’s blenny and tadpole fish. Ryan and I then set about trying to catch a few fish ourselves. Ryan wasn't after anything new, but wanted to add to his tally in a species hunt he's taking part in with some of his other mates. He was after a plaice or a short spined sea scorpion, but the tide was almost fully out and as a result, things were pretty slow. 

A shanny kicked things off for me after a pretty uneventful start.

There were plenty of flounder around, but unfortunately no plaice for Ryan.

A rather chunky long spined sea scorpion I caught. It's short spined cousin evaded capture!

As it got dark, and our headtorches became neccesary, I probably spent more time talking to the visiting species hunters than I spent fishing. Sadly, none of them got any new species, but they'd clearly all had a great time travelling around and fishing various different venues in Scotland. It was good to meet up with Jack again and to meet Cal, Josh and Leigh in person for the first time too, having talked to them all online at various points over the last few years. I'm sure I'll cross paths with them all again in the future, most likely when I head down south for a cross border species raid of my own!

The following evening, Ryan and I went fishing after work again. This time we visited Burntisland Harbour, a venue I've not been to for many years. This mainly due to the installation of an extensive network of fencing, designed to keep the public out. After hearing reports that access to the breakwater and the area near the sailing club was once again possible, and that lots of locals were regularly fishing there, we were pleased to find out that this was indeed the case, via several large holes and missing sections in the security fencing. Our main target for the session was a Yarrell's blenny, but as the tide was fully in, it took us a little time to locate a very specific spot on the bottom, that has for me, produced them more often than not. With several years having passed, I didn't know if the species would still be present, but fish are creatures of habit, and on Ryan's second drop into the deep hole on the bottom, a hungry Yarrell's blenny hit his tiny ragworm bait and was quickly wound up.

Mission accomplished! Ryan was over the moon to catch this Yarrell's blenny.

I may not have been taking part in any competitive species hunts myself, but that didn't mean that I didn't want to catch one too, so I set about plundering the bottom feature myself. After catching a few juvenile cod, poor cod, goldsinny wrasse and corkwing wrasse, something substantially larger picked up my tiny piece of ragworm and pulled my rod tip round as it swam off along the base of the harbour wall, engaging my drag as it realised something wasn't quite right and charged off. Fishing with a tiny hook and very light line, I took my time playing the fish and didn't apply too much pressure. Just enough to slowly raise the fish up through the water column and to steer it away from a set of ladders that could have swam behind to break me off. After a very decent scrap, a large ballan wrasse came to the surface. We had neglected to take a net with us, and I didn't want to risk lifting it up the harbour wall so Ryan scrambled down to the edge of the water to lift it out for me. After it made a few more attempts to swim off, down through the bladderwrack next to where Ryan was waiting, it was finally landed successfully.

What a cracking bonus ballan wrasse! A great fish on very light tackle!

We fished on for a little while longer, to see if I could catch a Yarrell's blenny of my own, but feeling pretty tired, we decided to call it a night and to head off for some tasty fish and chips before driving back to the capital. After a few "last casts" before we did pack up to leave, I caught a small shore rockling.

Not as cool as a Yarrell's blenny, but still pretty cool as far as I'm concerned and a nice species to finish the session with.

So, Ryan and I had a couple of very enjoyable short evening sessions. We really should make more of an effort to do these after work, especially when the weather is nice. This weekend, Ryan and I will be doing a cross border raid of our own, when we head down to Cornwall for five days of species hunting. I'll mainly be focusing my efforts on catching species that I've never caught before in the UK, Ryan will be doing the same and has more potential targets than I do, but he'll also trying to add as many species as he can to his 2026 tally. We'll be meeting up with several other species hunting anglers whilst we are there as well and we're both really looking forward to it!

Tight lines, Scott.

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.

I'll take the high road.

At the end of last month, I set off on a road trip up to the highlands to try and see two species of butterfly for the first time. My first stop was the Allt Mhuic Butterfly Reserve, situated on the northern shore of Loch Arkaig in Lochaber. It’s a great place to see the chequered skipper, a rare butterfly that is only found within a thirty mile radius of Fort William. After a four hour drive, it didn’t take me too long to spot one, just a short walk up into the reserve from the car park. 

My first chequered skipper!

With the possibility of seeing a few other species of butterfly, I continued walking up the hill further into the reserve, but after a while all I had seen were a few more chequered skipper, so I headed back down to the car and began the second leg of my journey, heading much further north to Balnagown Woods in the County of Ross. Once I arrived, it didn’t take me long to walk from the car to a clearing in the trees and spot my target, the dingy skipper. Much to my delight, there were also large numbers of small blue fluttering around the vegetation.

I saw quite a few of these dingy skipper.

They small blue is the UK's smallest butterfly species.

I spent an hour or so wandering around the woods and all the open areas I explored had lots of butterflies flying around. Walking back to the car, the prospect of doing another four hours of driving to get home didn’t fill me with excitement, but seeing two new species of Scottish butterfly and my first small blues of the year had made the trip well worthwhile. 

The following day Lillian and I drove north again to spend the weekend at her parent’s house in Keith. A last minute unplanned trip, I didn’t expect to drive all the way back up to the highlands quite so soon! Whilst there we visited Cullen on the Saturday and Portknockie the following day. While Lillian and her mum went for a walk, I spent an hour at both of the town's harbours fishing. Not much was biting, and I only managed to catch four fish, but all of them were different species. 

This savage shanny didn’t take too kindly to being caught and clamped its jaws onto my finger. 

It really didn’t want to let go either!

When it finally did, it had left quite an impression!

After spending some more time working my way along the inside of Cullen harbour, fishing straight down the wall, I’d only tempted two fish to bite my piece of Angleworm. The second, a very small rockling, most likely a five bearded, fell off as I lifted it out of the water. Fancying a change, I walked around to the mouth of the harbour to try fishing there. 

When your chosen area is not very productive, sometimes it’s a good idea to move.

At the end of the harbour, there was a bit more structure around the base of the breakwater, some small kelp beds and more depth. It looked promising, but despite that, nothing was biting to begin with in close, so I had a few casts further out. This produced a few odd knocks and then I caught a small sandeel. 

Given it’s relatively smsll size, it could have been one of several species. 

Small teeth on the roof of the mouth meant it was one of the two Hyperoplus genus that are found in UK waters, the greater sandeel or the Corbin’s sandeel. 

With no obvious spot on its snout and a black chin, most species hunters would declare this as a Corbin’s sandeel, but I'm not convinced these features can be relied upon to distinguish between the two.

A Corbin's sandeel would be an addition to my Scottish species tally, but I'm not going to add it at this point. For the time being I'm recording this as a greater sandeel. I feel that further investigation is required because the research that I've done online and looking through the books I own fails to provide a more concrete way to tell the two apart. Corbin's sandeel is only supposed to be found on the west coast of the UK for example and it's also described as more commonly found offshore. 

The following day visiting Portknockie, we went for a short walk along the cliffs to see Bow Fiddle Rock. As we walked along the cliff top path, I was also on the lookout for butterflies, and we did see quite a few painted lady, but that was the only butterfly we spotted.

Bow fiddle rock is an impressive natural sea arch near Portknockie.

Heading down to the town’s harbour, I fished from the small concrete pier on the outside of the harbour’s outer wall, accessed through a small tunnel. Again, not a lot was biting, but a small ballan wrasse eventually grabbed my Angleworm and tried its best to get into the kelp. Just before I left, I caught a solitary long spined sea scorpion. 

Even relatively small ballan wrasse fight dirty. 

This cheeky little fellow was the last fish of the weekend.

The following day we drove back down to the capital again, and over the two back to back highland trips I'd probably done about twenty hours of driving! It wasn’t as bad as it sounds however. Large parts were actually very pleasant. I always forget just how stunning some of the scenery is in the highlands and I really should make more of an effort to head up there more frequently! 

Tight lines, Scott.

Nine out of ten.

I made the most of some nice weather last week, heading down to St Abbs Harbour for a session with fellow species hunter Luke. We set ourselves a target of ten species just after we started fishing and ended up catching nine.

Some juvenile pollock were the first species of the day. 

Working a small piece of ragworm over the bottom produced a few long spined sea scorpion. 

Dropping my rig close to the edge of a kelp bed by the harbour mouth produced my first ballan wrasse of the year. 

Heading around the harbour, I caught this flounder. 

Whilst trying to catch a corkwing from a gully this chunky blenny appeared and munched my bait. 

We spent a bit of time fishing over a clean sandy patch, sight fishing for this nice plaice which we both ended up catching!

Tying on tanago hooks, we both caught some painted goby from a shallow sandy patch.

Back at the mouth of the harbour, Luke caught a few corkwing wrasse before I finally caught this nice colourful male.

Not long before we called it a day, we both caught some codling.  

During the session, we spotted quite a lot of fifteen spined stickleback and tried to catch them, but only one briefly showed any interest in a tiny piece of ragworm. I also spent some time sight fishing for a solitary dragonet, but despite repeatedly twitching a bait past it, it just couldn’t be tempted. Two sea trout also swam into the harbour just before we left, so whilst we didn’t reach our little goal, it was achievable. Regardless, it had still been an enjoyable day down in the sun-kissed Scottish Borders. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Pre-trip reconnaissance.

I popped out with my mate Ryan on Sunday evening, for a couple of hours’ fishing at Newhaven Harbour. Ryan had never caught a viviparous blenny before, so that was our main target for the session. I also had another motive for trying to catch my second viviparous blenny of the week. My species hunting mate Ben is heading up to Scotland soon, and a viviparous blenny is high on his list of targets, so I promised him I would get out to see if any were around! 

Ryan brought a box of ragworm with him, but fishing small pieces of it straight down the side of the harbour wall didn’t produce any bites to begin with. Moving our rigs around, I eventually caught the first fish of the session, but it wasn’t the species we were hoping to catch.

A greedy long spined sea scorpion was the first fish to munch a bit of ragworm. 

Things continued to be very tough, with nothing else biting, and as the sun set it got pretty chilly. Ryan eventually got off the mark with a small codling, and once it was dark I caught a pin whiting. Almost all of the viviparous blenny that get caught there, seem to reside within a fairly concentrated area, and Ryan’s rig was right in the middle of it. Not long before we were about to pack up, he hooked a small fish and wound it in to find it was the species we were after. 

Ryan’s first ever viviparous blenny was small but very lively, making getting a photo of it challenging! Mission accomplished for Ryan and confirmation for Ben that viviparous blenny were around for his upcoming trip.  

We carried on fishing for a little while longer, but when I caught a few more pin whiting in quick succession, we decided to call it a night. Once they start feeding, often hitting the bait as soon as it touches the bottom, not much else is getting a chance! I’m looking forward to hopefully meeting up with Ben locally to target viviparous blenny when he comes up from Wales. I think he’ll be spending the bulk of his time in the highlands and perhaps I’ll be able to do some fishing with him up there too. 

Tight lines, Scott.

I got more than what I came for.

Over the years, I've met quite a lot of other species hunting anglers, and many of them have helped me out enormously. As a result my fishing knowledge has improved greatly and my success as a species hunter too. I now try my best to give back to this branch of fishing whenever I can. Knowing that I'm still keen to add more species to my Scottish and UK life lists, fellow Scottish and UK species hunters often get in touch when they hear about anything unusual being caught or even seen. This is exactly what happened on Monday evening, when I received a screengrab from a Facebook group chat discussing the recent sighting of some lumpsucker in Hartlepool Marina. Checking the weather forecast, it looked very good, so I found myself some cheap accommodation, booked it for two nights and drove down there the following morning. Arriving early in the afternoon, I had a look around and paid a quick visit to the bronze statue of the infamous Hartlepool Monkey to make a wish.

Hartlepool Marina on a pleasant March afternoon.

You can probably guess what wish I made!

Returning to the area where I had been told the lumpsucker had been spotted, I set up two rods and fished fairly long three hook flapper rigs straight down the side of the Marina wall. With my hooklengths spread out at different depths I was hopeful that should my target swim past it would find one of my six raw prawn chunks! The water in the marina had a bit of a green tinge to it and I wondered if the nice weather had caused an algae bloom. Things were very slow for the first couple of hours, and I was beginning to think the trip might turn out to be a waste of time, when some interest was registered on one of my rods. Picking it up I felt a couple of very subtle knocks and lifting the rod I was pleasantly surprised to feel the weight of a good fish. It turned out to be a nice plaice that had taken my bottom bait. Not too long afterwards, this scenario played out again almost exactly, and with the aid of my extendable net, a second much bigger plaice was landed!

At 47.5cm this is the biggest plaice I've ever caught from the shore!

Over the next few hours my rods sat pretty much motionless. I was hopeful that darkness would bring some action, but things didn't really improve much. Occasionally, I was getting strange little indications, so I wound up one of my rigs and swapped out the hooklengths for some coarse fishing #26 hooks to nylon. Baiting them with miniscule flecks of raw prawn, I dropped them down expecting the next bite to result in a tiny goby or some other micro species I'd caught before, but you never know! More time passed, with nothing happening, not even the little taps, and to be honest I was contemplating calling it a night, when my tiny hook rigged rod began twitching away. Picking it up, whatever was on the end felt bigger than a small goby and was putting up a strange fight. As it came up to the surface, I got quite a shock when I realised that it was a rather big pipefish! My first ever, it turned out to be a specimen greater pipefish.

What a bizarre fish! Cousin of the seahorse, they have a bony armoured body, but are surprisingly flexible. While trying to get some photos it kept moving its long tail around in a circling motion!

With a long straw like snout, they slurp up their food. I'm not sure what they normally eat to be honest, but was certainly glad this one had taken a tiny piece of raw prawn!

A totally unexpected bonus species, I was over the moon to catch my first ever species of pipefish. It was also my 93rd saltwater species in the UK, so I now only require ten more to hit my target of one hundred. I carried on fishing for a couple more hours but nothing else was biting, so I packed up and headed along the coast to my accommodation, happy in the knowledge that regardless of what happened during the rest of the trip, it most certainly had been worthwhile visiting Hartlepool Marina!

The next day, I didn't get up too early and after breakfast I decided to visit the exposed intertidal rocks on the shoreline between Pilot Pier and Heugh Breakwater. I wasn't expecting anything unusual there, but it was a lovely day, and I was still in a high spirits after the previous day's specimen plaice and greater pipefish. Carefully making my way down over the bladderwrack covered rocks, I eventually found a few rockpools that looked quite promising and spending some time dangling tiny pieces of prawn into potential hiding spots eventually produced a few fish.

My playground for a few hours of rockpooling fun.

Slightly deeper rockpools with large rocks in them provide perfect hiding places for small ambush predators and highly territorial species.

I caught a few tiny long spined sea scorpions. They're super aggressive, and if present, quickly rush out to gobble a tiny bait.

Common blenny are a bit more cautious. They won't dart out and prefer the bait put inside their hiding place or at least right next to it, so they can grab it and retreat to safety. Once caught they like to bite you, which I still find very amusing.

Walking back to the car, feeling quite relaxed and enjoying the sun, I passed a mural featuring a local angler who seemed to be struggling to catch anything.

Andy Capp wasn't having much luck with the lumpsucker either.

After some lunch, I headed back to Hartlepool Marina for another session. Hoping that lightning would strike twice, and I'd somehow catch my second new species of the trip in the shape of a lumpsucker, it was very slow. Towards the end of the session, Bill, the local angler who had spotted the lumpsucker last week, came down to say hello, so at least I had someone to talk to for the last hour or two. It was great chatting to him and the info he shared on the lumpsucker and their behaviour was very interesting. A few have been seen and some of those caught over the last few years in Hartlepool Marina, in fact only one person that he knew of had caught one fishing blind. As we chatted away, my rods sat still, and by the time I threw in the towel the only thing that I'd landed was a solitary large common prawn.

Crustaceans do not count! I'd suffered my first blank of 2026.

The following morning, I met up with Bill and another local angler named Kev. Meeting up near the marina, we walked out across Middleton Beach to fish in some rockpools next to Middleton Pier that were about to be exposed over low tide. They were both fairly confident that we'd be able to catch viviparous blenny, a species I normally target in the open sea, so the prospect of catching them from rockpools was a fairly novel concept to me.

Bill & Kev patiently searching for our target species.

One of several long spined sea scorpion I kicked the session off with.

Eventually I caught a common blenny from a deeper hole.

The rockpool that Bill had caught nine viviparous blenny from during one session a previous year, sadly didn't produce any, and left us wondering if there were any around. The lads explained that recent storms had moved a lot of the boulders around and sand had also filled in some of the cracks underneath some of the larger rocks too, limiting likely spots somewhat. Working our way along the base of the pier, Kev found a dark recess and dropping a piece of isome in, pulled out the first viviparous blenny of the session.

I think this is the first viviparous blenny time I've seen caught from a rockpool.

As we carried on exploring all the nooks and crannies we could find, a few more long spined sea scorpion were caught. The deeper and darker the hole, the bigger they got. Some also had some beautiful spots on the back sides of their pectoral fins.

The colour variations in long spined sea scorpions are diverse, but these marking are pretty awesome too.

The biggest long spined sea scorpion I caught.

As the tide turned and began to flood, we doubled back and made our way back towards the shore. When we reached the spot where Kev had caught the viviparous blenny, I dropped my bait into the same spot. It wasn't in there long before a fish was pulling my rod tip down and the second viviparous blenny of the session was quickly pulled out.

My first viviparous blenny from a rockpool. A new way to target them that I might try locally.

Bill then encouraged me to drop my split shot rig down into a small but particularly deep hole. Rather than a gap in rocks in a rockpool, it was part of the foundations of the pier and the hole went down a few feet. Again, it didn't take too long for a fish to take my bait and pull my rod tip down. Pulling it out, I could tell it was a bigger fish and was quite surprised when a shore rockling appeared!

My first shore rockling from a rockpool too!

Three beards does not always make it a three bearded rockling!

By that point, the tide was about to cut us off, so we made our way back up onto the sea coal covered sands of Middleton Beach. It had been great fishing with Bill and Kev, I'd really enjoyed their company and had learned a new approach for targeting viviparous blenny that may prove to be useful in the future at similar venues.

Middleton beach is covered in a layer of sea coal giving it a jet black appearance.

Heading back to our cars, I thanked Bill and Kev for inviting me to join them, sharing their knowledge, and then we said our goodbyes. After some lunch, I decided to make the three hour drive back up the road. It had turned out to be a very enjoyable trip. The specimen plaice and the unexpected bonus capture of the greater pipefish made the tough fishing in the marina well worth the effort and the time spent rockpooling had also been very enjoyable too. I'd gone to try to catch a lumpsucker, but despite having failed to do that, it felt like I'd gained a lot more out of the trip. A new PB plaice, a new species, and I'd also met two local anglers who had given me valuable information and shown me a new way to target viviparous blenny. All that being said, the draw of catching a lumpsucker might see me returning to Hartlepool again very soon!

Tight lines, Scott.