More species hunting adventures on Tenerife: Part 2.

On day three of our holiday, we drove up the east coast of Tenerife towards its capital Santa Cruz and then headed up to the north coast. The swell forecast wasn’t great for those parts of the island, but we wanted to see for ourselves just how bad it was, and it was also an opportunity to check out some new spots that we could return to later in the week if the wind dropped off as was predicted. As it turned out, the first series of places we visited were completely unfishable due to breaking waves, and it wasn’t until we reached the picturesque village of Garachico, that we finally found a sheltered spot where we were able to fish. My first cast produced a nice emerald wrasse which was followed by lots of ornate wrasse, Canary damselfish and puffers.

I’ve only caught a handful of emerald wrasse over the years. My first was at the very same place just over ten years ago!

The fishing wasn’t producing anything interesting, so we decided to drive up the incredibly steep and windy Camino Real las Arenas, through the mountains and then back down to Los Gigantes to spend the afternoon fishing into deep water from the rocks. Given its location and the direction of the wind we weren’t expecting much of a swell there, but when we arrived the sea was rolling in, crashing violently onto the rocks periodically. After walking along the coast for a while, we eventually managed to find a spot that we could fish that was fairly flat and elevated above the water. Nick and Ryan spent their time casting jigs and hard plastics around on heavy tackle, but had no joy. I tried to fish small baits on the bottom, but the current made that difficult, and all I caught were a few ornate wrasse and Canary damselfish.

The massive cliffs of Los Gigantes.

All things considered it had been a bit of a wasted day as far as the fishing had gone. In the apartment that evening, after going out for dinner, we formulated a plan for the next day and decided we'd try somewhere new in the morning  and then head out in the evening with our heavy gear to target stingrays.

The following day we headed down to a rock mark near the small coastal village of El Puertito. We had to walk a fair distance from the car down to the spot, but it looked quite promising when we arrived, and we quickly set up our gear.

Tenerife's nearby neighbour La Gomera off in the distance.

Again, Nick and Ryan spent a bit of time casting jigs and lures to see if any larger fish were around, but had no joy. I fished the bottom initially, and quickly discovered that Canary damselfish and ornate wrasse were present in plague proportions yet again.

They might be colourful, but I soon got fed up catching them.

Feeling slightly frustrated, Nick and I decided to do some float fishing. Again I went with a small bait under a small float to try and catch a needlefish, whilst Nick put out a large bait under a cigar float to try to tempt something big. After a short wait, my float jerked to the right a couple of times. Suspecting it may be what I was after, I let the bite develop to ensure the fish had taken the bait all the way inside its mouth before winding down. A small needlefish was then quickly wound in and hoisted up, but was it my first new species of the trip?

As far as I know, there are three species of needlefish present in the waters around the Canary Islands. The garfish, the Agujon needlefish and the keeltail needlefish.

Having done some research before the trip on the key identifying features of the three species I knew by examining the fish’s tail, which was obviously flattened out, that I’d caught my first keeltail needlefish.

After that, I float fished for a while longer, hoping that an Agujon needlefish would pass by and take my bait, but only the occasional ornate wrasse swimming up from the submerged reef as my float drifted over, was all I caught. Before we left, I switched to bottom fishing at distance to see what else was around, but disappointingly, all I caught was a steady succession of Canary damselfish.

In the evening, we headed down to Playa de Aguadulce, to have a go for stingrays after dark. Arriving just as the sun went down, we got set up at the top of the beach’s steep slope and lashed mackerel and sardine baits onto the dongle hanging from the circle hooks on our pulley rigs. Casting them out as far as we could and setting our rods into our tripods with the drag on our reels backed right off, we got as comfortable as we could on the beach’s large stones and patiently waited.

The waiting game begins.

To be honest, I wasn’t sure how productive the session was going to be, but not long after it got dark, my rod started nodding away and then line started coming off my reel as a fish moved off with my bait. Picking up my rod and tightening up the drag, I felt the weight of something decent. A ten minute fight then ensued, with me following the fish along the beach as it moved off to my right. Scrambling over the loose stones was quite difficult, and I almost lost my footing a couple of times. Luckily, I ended up at an area where the gradient of the beach was a little less steep. This made it easier to land the fish and Ryan came along to give me a hand. Eventually a nice spiny butterfly ray appeared in the breaking waves and using them to my advantage, I successfully got the fish far enough up the shore that we could quickly lift it up away from the breaking waves. Ryan did get wet feet in the process though! Since the tail on the spiny butterfly ray is very small, the risk of its stinger coming into contact with you is neglegable unless you get really close to it. Regardless, I exercised caution and stayed in front of the fish whilst I carefully unhooked it. The debarbed circle hook was easy to remove having worked perfectly, ending up in the corner of the fish’s mouth. After a couple of quick photos, we carefully lifted it back down to the water’s edge and released it again.

I was over the moon to catch my first ever spiny butterfly ray. It was also my second new species of the trip.

After watching it disappear from sight, I took a few moments to catch my breath before carefully heading back along to where I’d started. Using a good amount of bait elastic, I prepared my second bait of the night. Lashing two sides of mackerel taken from the tail end of the fish together, flesh side facing outward around my dongle. Casting this back out to roughly the same spot, it didn’t take a great deal of time for my rod to show signs of interest again. Much smaller indications, but they were clearly out of sync with the breaking waves. After letting the bite develop, I lifted my rod to feel the weight of a much smaller fish. This time it was easily wound in, and thankfully I didn’t have to scramble about on the stones too much.

My first ever common stingray was a very small specimen. They can reach weights of several hundred pounds! Despite being so small, I took great care unhooking it due to its stinger. Holding its tail by the tip using a wet towel, again the circle hook was nicely placed and removal was very straightforward.

With such a good start to the evening, I was sure that Nick and Ryan would soon get in on the action too. Ryan and I were sharing a tripod, whilst Nick was located about twenty yards to our left. He seemed to have a few snags directly in front of him though and had lost a couple of rigs. Then, whilst winding in to put on a fresh bait, his lead had got stuck in the stones down in front of him where the waves were coming up the beach. Trying to release it, the lead suddenly came free and flew straight back towards him, striking him hard in the face. The first Ryan and knew about this was when he came along towards us with blood pouring out of his nose and over his face. I thought perhaps he had lost his footing, fallen and hit his face on the ground, but then he explained what had happened. Ryan and I were obviously concerned about his well-being, but he assured us he was fine, so we helped him clean up his face and kept a close eye on him for the rest of the session.

Despite taking a 7oz gripper straight to his face and being bloodied and sore, Nick managed to crack a bit of a smile!

A couple of hours went by with no further action, despite fairly regular bait changes, until Ryan’s rod started nodding away. Lifting it from the tripod he had a fish on. Unfortunately after a short fight it somehow managed to throw the hook just before we caught sight of it, which he was very upset about. Not long afterwards we ran out of bait and called an end to a quite eventful session.

The next day the wind had dropped off, so we decided to try a couple of spots up the east coast near the island’s capital Santa Cruz. Rather than taking the quickest route, directly via the TF-1 motorway, we took a leisurely drive up into the island’s interior and through the Teide National Park. Stopping at various spots to take in the incredible views and alien lava field landscapes as we headed north.

Driving through strange volcanic landscapes,…

…eventually you find yourself almost 3km above sea level, up above the clouds,…

…where you can take in stunning views of the majestic snow capped Mount Teide, Spain's tallest mountain.

Driving back down to sea level, we spent an hour or so fishing from the sea defence boulders near the Castillo de San Juan Bautista. Again it looked like a promising spot, but it didn't seem to matter where we cast, all we caught from the open sea were Canary damselfish, ornate wrasse and puffers. I spent half an hour dropping baits down into gaps in the boulders, hoping to pull out a hairy blenny but all I caught were even more ornate wrasse and a couple of Madeira rockfish.

The Castillo de San Juan Bautista is almost four hundred years old. The modern concrete builing in the background is the Auditorio de Tenerife Adán Martín. Build at the start of this century, I'm not sure that'll last as long.

By that point in the trip we were all quite fed up of catching ornate wrasse.

Heading back to the car and making a short drive slightly north of the capital, we parked up and made our way to the Muelle de Cory, one of two small stone piers that run parallel to each other with a slipway between them. It was quite windy, but there were a few locals float fishing and they were catching a few fish, mainly bogue. Heading to the end of the structure, we tried fishing down the side and casting around in various directions, but our efforts only produced endless puffers.

Guinean puffer were also beyond annoying by that stage. Bait stealing pests with razor sharp beak like teeth that damage line. They can also bite hooks clean off.

Again feeling a little frustrated, we decided to head along to a concrete platform situated near the edge of a public swimming area. As we made our way there, we reached a point where we had to scamble up some rocks to reach the platform. Just before we went up, I had a look down the side to see if I could spot any fish. In amongst the Canary damselfish and ornate wrasse I spotted a few Azores chromis, so I quickly tied on a small hook and caught a couple of them.

Another species added to our trip’s tally and a very welcome change to the repetitive catches we’d suffered all day.

There were a couple of women fishing on the platform, but we didn't see them catch anything. The three of us caught some fish, but there are no prizes for guessing what they were! Heading up the east coast to try out luck had proved to be very unproductive. All three of us were thoroughly bored of catching ornate wrasse, Canary damselfish and puffers. It wouldn't be so bad if occassionally other species got to your bait first, but it didn't seem like there were any other species around!

Tight lines, Scott.

Click here for the final part...

Thorn in my side.

Last weekend, I headed back down to the Solway Firth with my mate Nick. Having caught my first Scottish Dover sole there recently, I wasn’t really expecting to be returning so soon, but the conditions and tides looked good for an evening session. Nick hadn’t caught a ray for a while, and as I’ve discovered, they’re pretty much a guaranteed catch down there. After driving down and digging some lugworm to add to our supply of ragworm, we headed to our chosen spot, got set up, and started fishing. As expected, our first few casts all produced a thornback ray. 

The channel we were fishing was once again full of these spiky flat sharks.

As the session continued, the thornback ray kept coming, but eventually I also started to catch a few lesser spotted dogfish as well, a welcome change!

How exciting?!

Both fishing two rods, we were kept busy well into darkness but eventually, as it always does, the tide got to the point where it was ebbing strongly and weed became a major problem. With a couple of hours of driving for Nick to do and having enjoyed another action packed session, we packed up and headed home. A pity we didn’t catch any other species, but at least we caught plenty of fish!

Tight lines, Scott.

Fishing. Like a boss.

On Monday I headed west to the old crusher pier situated to the south of Creetown with my mate Ian. He’s an accomplished shore angler who fishes matches regularly. He also happens to be my boss, being the retail manager of the Edinburgh Angling Centre, where I work. Our main target species for the trip was starry smoothhound, a species I've never caught from the shore before, but I was also hopeful that I’d get a common eel too. Ian assured me I’d probably get one of those fairly quickly and he was right! A three hook flapper baited with small crab baits soon did the trick. 

I got a small common eel on my third cast!

Rig wrecking slippery swines. I’m not a fan if I’m honest.

I then turned my attention to fishing a big crab bait on a pulley rig at distance for starry smoothhound. Ian also cast out a pulley rig to target them as well, but he decided to also fish a three hook flapper on a second rod closer in with much smaller baits, to try and catch flounder, possibly bass and no doubt more eels.

Ian brought some top quality fresh peeler crab for us to use.

After watching our rod tips for thirty minutes or so we wound in to change our baits. There was a fair amount of weed in the water, but I got my rig in fairly quickly, Ian’s rig however had picked up a substantial amount of it, and he struggled to get it in. Eventually, once he'd dragged a huge mass of weed in to the side of the pier, he lifted it up by hand. As soon as he began removing the weed however he got a bit of a shock in the shape of a bass!

This silver surprise was hidden under a large amount of weed!

Over the next few hours, Ian caught a few flounder and eel on his second rod and spent a fair amount of time removing weed from his rig! I stuck with fishing just the one rod and sat watching it diligently, waiting for something bigger to hopefully take my pungent bait.

Ian winds in more weed. Occasionally there would be a flounder or an eel too!

A horrible messy tangle of eel and weed.

Just after the tide turned and began to ebb, Ian got a cracking bite on his big bait rod and wound in the first starry smoothhound of the trip. He had predicted their arrival at this stage of the tide and with some moving through the area I was hopeful I'd get one too before too long.

Ian showing me who's boss!

About an hour later, Ian caught his second starry smoothound of the session. We fished on for another two hours or so, but as the tidal flow increased it became very difficult to hold the bottom and I admitted defeat, probably a while after I should have. Ian had caught a lot of fish, species hunting like a boss too, catching all four that the mark usually produces. The solitary common eel I'd caught at the start of our session meant it wasn't a complete blank for me, and I'd added another species to this year's tally so that was something positive at least. On the way back we discussed the fact that spent more time driving than we spent fishing. Crazy really, but if I’d have caught a starry smoothhound I guess I wouldn’t have minded! If I return to the area I think I’d probably stay overnight and have a couple of sessions at the old crusher pier and perhaps head round to the Isle of Whithorn to fish over low water to try and catch a tompot blenny. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Overnight success.

Way back in April I had an enquiry from a fellow angler living in Edinburgh about meeting up for a light game session on the coast. We tried a few times to arrange this but never managed to meet up. Last week I asked Mikey if he fancied a day out in a boat that I had booked but he couldn't make it. During this conversation he told me he was going to Loch Etive to fish through the night and asked me if I fancied going too. I jumped at the chance and finally we met for the first time last Friday night. After putting my gear into his car off we went, chatting about fishing pretty much the whole way there. When we arrived at our preferred mark it was already being fished and a brisk wind was blowing directly onto the second mark we visited so we ended up going all the way around the loch to Bonawe Quarry. Walking through it we arrived at a spot I always do quite well at and got set up. Pulley rigs baited up we cast out our first baits of the night. Mikey fished two rods whilst I elected to fish only one. Our baits hadn't been on the bottom long when Mikey spotted a common eel snaking through the bladderwrack at our feet. I quickly tied a small hook onto a length of 15lb line and baited it with a small piece of mackerel. Flicking this out near the fish saw it eagerly swallowing the bait very aggressively and I quickly yanked the line upwards hooking it. Soon hoisted clear of the water it was a superb start to the session. 

A great unexpected bonus capture, adding to my 2015 tally.  

Action on the bait rods was quite slow to begin with and we amused ourselves watching more eels appear as we tossed scraps of bait in at the water's edge. They fought for these with the resident shore crabs and provided us with a bit of light relief. Eventually one of Mikey's rod tips registered some interest and he struck into the first spurdog of the night. 

The first of a few spurdogs for Mikey. 

I then caught a few dogfish whilst Mikey's rods produced a few more spurdogs. As we were pretty much fishing the same end tackle and baits I was puzzled as to why he was catching spurdogs and I wasn't but a cast over nearer to the spot he was fishing eventually produced one for me.

My first spurdog of the year. 

As the evening progressed we carried on catching fish and as well as more sharks a few cod and whiting were also landed too. The general size of the fish was small but the action was reasonably constant and it was quite a nice night to be out. By about 6am we had caught about twenty fish between us and things had slowed down a bit so we ended the session. We were both pretty tired but as I had to get back to Edinburgh so I could go to work in the afternoon we loaded the car and drove home. It was pretty hard going trying to stay awake but thankfully Mikey just about managed it thanks to a coffee break on the way back and with the help of the the rumble strips on the M9. I enjoyed fishing together and I hope it's not another four months before we meet up again although next time I think we'll stay on the east coast for a spot of light game at a much more sociable time of the day.  

Tight lines, Scott.

Icy cold Furnace.

To hopefully get my 2015 Scottish saltwater species hunt moving again I decided to visit Loch Fyne last Sunday. It has in the past produced a number of different species but at this time of the year my expectations were realistic and I had the much maligned dogfish in mind with perhaps the chance of a thornback ray as well. My mate Nick was keen to join me and I also asked along a lure angling enthusiast called Dimitrios who writes the excellent Luremaniac! blog. We picked him up in Glasgow on the way and after a quick visit to the Glasgow Angling Centre were soon on the road again. As we got closer to our destination the weather got gradually nicer and by the time we got to Loch Fyne the sky was clear and the sun was shining. Unfortunately the first mark, normally a good one for the two shark species I was after, was already being fished so we headed down the western side of the loch to Furnace quarry. It is well known amongst bait anglers as a conger eel mark but I thought it might also produce some dogfish and perhaps some other species but never having fished there before Nick and I were not sure what to expect.

Adequate warnings were posted.

Dimitrios on the other hand has fished the area extensively with very light lure tactics and while we set up on the pier he set off hopping around the rocks to target coalfish, cod and pollock using small metals. It might have been sunny but any icy cold wind was blowing down the loch and this made fishing from the wooden pier rather unpleasant at times. Undeterred, Nick and I were soon set up and had a single bait rod out each. I went with a mackerel bait on a pulley rig whilst Nick opted to fish black lug on a running ledger. Whilst we waited for bites we both started drop shotting Angleworm with ultra light tackle. This didn't produce any fish initially and then an old battered looking boat arrived, mooring up to our left.

One of the crew came around to ask us what we were catching. "Nothing yet!" was our reply.

Casting my drop shot rig around the snaggy bottom closer in eventually produced a couple of little taps and just as I converted two of them into a couple of tiny cod Nick caught a bigger cod on his bait rod.

One of my micro cod. It obviously still had a health appetite judging by its portly little gut.

Nick soon caught a second cod on his bait rod then I caught a short spined sea scorpion and a poor cod on my drop shot rig as Dimitrios returned to see how we were getting on, reporting that he had caught a few of his target fish.

I was quite pleased to catch this little fish. They aren't anywhere near as widespread as as their long spined cousin but seem to be more common in Scottish sea lochs than they are around the coast.

This little poor cod was the third species added to my 2015 tally so on that front things were going well.

Nick and I then joined Dimitrios fishing metals from the rocks but the wind was making things difficult and after a couple of coalfish and loosing some of our lures Nick and I tried another spot with the bait rods. We were sure that some dogfish would start biting but they never did and the water was very deep, we were struggling to hold bottom and our rigs were being pulled into snags resulting in multiple tackle loses. We ended up returning to the wooden pier and thankfully the icy cold wind had finally dropped off a bit. The sun had disappeared too though so it was still a bit chilly. Nick decided to drop a mackerel flapper down the side for a conger but probably would have been better visiting the mark at night for them. I lobbed out a mackerel bait again and drop shotted but neither of us had any joy. Dimitrios meanwhile went off rock hopping again and caught a few more coalfish, pollock and cod on metals.

Dimitrios fishes from the rocks in front of the nearby fish farm cages as the blue sky turns into a much more dark and moody one.

He caught a few dozen fish on a variety of different metals. This one wasn't even hooked, just having the vibe bait wedged in its jaws.

When he came back to the pier we called it a day and Nick and I hadn't added to our tally. I was surprised by the lack of action on our bait rods but I did move three species closer to my 2015 target of fifty from Scottish saltwater and it was nice to try fishing somewhere new. It was also good to meet up with Dimitrios in person for the first time, even if he did end up ambling off to do his own thing most of the day. He is quite dedicated to the style of fishing he enjoys most and clearly does it with great skill. Hopefully we can meet up again in the summer for a lure only session. A trip to Skye is something he's keen on so perhaps we can head up there?

Tight lines, Scott.

Not a big fan?

At the weekend I made a comment on an online messageboard about not really being a big fan of winter cod fishing. My mate Ad, who lives in Aberdeen and does a lot of it, read this, questioned my manliness and invited me up to the North East for an evening clambering up and down its rugged coastline in the dark to target them. I couldn't refuse and drove up to meet Ad on Tuesday afternoon. Having checked the forecast before I left I knew the sea might be a bit rough but due to the direction the wind was forecast to be blowing from I didn't think it would be too bad. When I was almost there and the A90 approached the coast however I could sea that it was pretty rough. When I met Ad we quickly checked out a mark nearby to see how bad it was but it was just to dangerous to fish really.

Bit of a swell running and breaking over the rocks. Ad insisted on going down just to double check.

Undeterred, we headed north and found a slightly more sheltered bay although there was still a fair swell running. Ignoring the notice at the top of the cliffs we carefully made our way down to a comfortable grassy ledge high above the turbulent water below.

The North East coastline is a cod angling Mecca but fishing there is not without its risks. Great care is required even accessing marks.

Setting up a rod each with a pulley rig incorporating a rotten bottom link we had a few casts with black lug, squid and bluey cocktails being the baits of choice. After an hour or so with no interest shown we decided to head to another mark though. By the time we got there it was dark so on went the headlights. The wind had started to die down a bit and the large peeble beach we made our way down to offered us a bit of shelter too. The rain came on for a while and as the ebbing tide started to reveal some rocky skeers off to our left we stared getting a few bites. These were all missed until I connecting with a couple of them and landed two nice cod of about 2lb that I returned to get bigger.

The cavernous mouth of an eating machine.

As the tide turned the bites dried up so we decided to have a break and grabbed a tasty portion of chips before heading to try one final mark. Once there we started fishing from some rocks but as the tide flooded we were forced onto another large peeble beach nearby by waves breaking in front of us sending a lot of spray up almost soaking us a couple of times before we got the hint. There was not much action from the beach until Ad's rod tip violently came to life not long before we were going to call it a night and a cod of about 3lb was soon landed before we packed up.

A nice fish to end the session with for Ad.

It had been a fairly mild night temperature wise, we managed to find some shelter and a hat trick of cod. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and it was good to catch up with Ad. It's a wonderful stretch of coastline and I can see that whilst fishing it can be dangerous it can also rewarding. Ad, like many other winter cod devotees, is chasing a double figure cod from the North East shoreline and has come pretty close. Big fish are what attracts most anglers who focus their efforts solely on cod over the winter, driving them to fish in tough conditions on dangerous marks and it takes a special type of angler to do it I think. I'm happy to admit that I'm just not one of them. I'll stick to the odd occasional winter cod session in good company when the opportunity arises.

Tight lines, Scott.

Rays of sunshine.

All of last week I couldn't decide where to go fishing on Sunday. The weather forecast locally wasn't great so I started  to look further afield. Trips to Lochaline or Killantringan were considered but in the end I decided to revisit Loch Leven to try again for thornback rays. With my girlfriend/ghillie Lillian joining me we made the scenic drive north west and arriving in Glencoe Village turned off the main road and headed along the southern side of Loch Leven to Kinlochleven to look for a spot to try. I stopped the car at a few parking places high above the water but couldn't really see how difficult access to the rocks below was so we headed to the top of the loch and back down the northern shore. As we drove I spotted two anglers fishing next to a lay-by and pulled in to talk to them. They had a few bait rods set up but told me things were slow with the only fish caught being a few small pollock on their spinning gear. The mark looked quite good however so I decided to give it a go anyway and quickly set up along the rocks from them.

A nice day with the sun making the odd appearance through the clouds and hardly any wind meant the loch was like a mirror.

Fishing two rods, one with a pulley rig to try for thornback rays and the other with a three hook flapper to see what else might be around I baited up my circle hooks with cocktails of mackerel, mussel and razorfish. 

We relaxed, trying to keep an eye on my rods whilst also enjoying the scenery, it was a lovely peaceful day but unfortunately my rod tips were rather peaceful too. As high water came and went I was starting to think I was going to blank for a second session in a row when I finally got a decent bite. Lifting the rod the culprit was hooked and I wound in quickly to get it up over the ledges in front of me and through the kelp and bladderwrack. 

It took about two hours to get a bite. This nice little thornback ray, my first from the venue, was worth the wait though.

They are very graceful swimmers. An elegant flap of their wings and they glide for a while. It's a real pleasure watching them go back.

Pulley rig rebaited and cast out again it wasn't on the bottom long when I noticed the line moving in a peculiar manner. Not enough to move the rod tip but I suspected something was hooked and reeled in to find a small and rather greedy dab had guzzled a fairly big mackerel and razorfish cocktail.

Dabs are almost transparent when held up in strong light. 

After that it went quiet again for an hour or so. As the tide ebbed its strength increased making holding bottom difficult to the point I was thinking about calling it a day but before I did my pulley rig rod tip suddenly arched over and sprang back again. Another fish on, the lack of fight gave away the identity of the shark on the end and my second Loch Leven thornback ray was soon landed. 

A larger specimen to end the session. 

Put back it sulked around in the weeds in front of me before heading through them and disappearing.

I had another couple of casts but the current in front of me was now pulling my gear around with relative ease. Lillian was also feeling hungry and as I hadn't needed her expert net handling skills was a bit bored too so I packed up. We headed home stopping at the charming 17th century King's House Hotel in Glencoe on the way for a tasty bit of grub in its public bar.

So, a fairly short session fishing wise but the drive was a real pleasure and we escaped the weather at home which was pretty miserable. It's always good to catch the target for the day, even if it's a species that the venue is renowned for producing. It was also good to find another mark for future visits. I have a feeling it may be a popular spot though given it's extremely easy to access. The ledges typical of many deep Scottish sea lochs were also not as much of a problem as the spots my mate Nick and I fished earlier this month. I think finding such marks where the ledges aren't such an obstacle to landing fish is the key to a successful day fishing such venues. I also think Loch Leven is perhaps a venue that's better fished afloat as this obviously takes rock ledges and weed out of the equation altogether. I also note from a few online reports that those who did so at the weekend enjoyed excellent fishing and caught dozens of thornbacks. Another reason to get myself a kayak and explore fishing sea lochs from it.

Tight lines, Scott.

Who let the dogs out?

My mate Stewart has a mild case of galeophobia so on Sunday we headed west to Loch Fyne for a nice relaxing days' fishing. In order to prove to him that whilst sharks should command respect and require careful handling when caught they are also very interesting, beautiful creatures that are worthy of admiration and are not really that scary, the main targets for the session were dogfish and thornback rays.

It was a lovely sunny day and after a quick stop to pick up a few packs of frozen mackerel and a couple of boxes of squid on the way, we were soon at our chosen spot, a comfortable mark very close to the car. Two rods were quickly setup, one with a pulley rig and the other with a three hook flapper rig. I explained the rigs to Stewart and quickly gave him the lowdown on using my slosh multipliers before baiting up with mackerel and casting them out. Last year I fished the same spot with very light tackle and caught dabs, dragonets, black gobies, sand gobies, haddock and cod so I started to set up a third, lighter rod to fish very small baits on #10 wormer hooks to see if I could tempt any mini species that might be present. Before I had finished doing that however one of the other rod tips started bouncing away.

Lifting the rod it kept nodding so I handed it to Stewart and told him to wind in quickly. Sadly he didn't reel quite quickly enough and the fish was lost on the way in as it came up over the weedy ledges in front of us. Fortunately it didn't take too long for another bite and I thought it would be best to demonstrate how to quickly retrieve a fish up over the ledges to hopefully help Stewart minimise any further fish or tackle losses. Feeling slight pressure to land the fish I was glad when I managed to do so, the first dogfish of the day was soon on the bladderwrack and a quick lesson on handling and unhooking dogfish could begin. I explained how confidence is key when handling sharks and to maintain control of them two hands should be used. Unhooking the dogfish I gripped it firmly behind the gills and brought It's tail forward, holding it against the side of the sharks body leaving one hand free to work on removing the hook. I explained that alternatively the tail of the shark could be placed between the thighs again leaving a hand free to unhook and that the reason for handling them in this way is that dogfish have extremely rough skin, will try to wrap themselves around your arm and attempt to rasp your skin from it causing nasty wounds that will bleed for a prolonged period. Maybe Stewart was right to be cautious!

Dogfish are quite strong for their size. This one was particularly feisty and refused to behave for a photo.

Put back into a shallow bay to our left it adopted a defensive position. As well as being efficient hunters and scavengers they are also pretty tough. Easy to see why they are so prolific in places.

After a while it uncurls itself and gracefully swims off.

It wasn't long before another fish was attacking our bait and Stewart lifted the rod to feel for the fish. Once he confirmed it was on he kept the rod high, wound in fast enough to clear the ledges and soon he was looking rather worried as his first ever shark came through the weed. He was clearly still a bit nervous so I unhooked it for him and again explained how to hold it before he had a go himself.

Stewart lifts the rods and feels for a fish on the end.

Still slightly unsure Stewart faces his fears and gets to grips with his first shark.

A rather cute one if you ask me!

Pretty soon we had landed a few more although it was a bit of a pain getting the three hook flapper rig back through the weed so I swapped that over to a second pulley rig. I also swapped the circle hooks from #3/0 to a #1/0 because a couple of the dogfish had the hook points penetrate close to their eyes and gills and I didn't want to risk causing unnecessary damage to these delicate organs on future catches. This worked a treat as the next few fish were all hooked nicely in the bottom jaw. After about ten dogfish between us I decided to put out a couple of sandeels wrapped in squid, a cocktail that has produced rays for me in the past. I asked Stewart to reel in one of the rods whilst I prepared the baits and low and behold a tiny thornback had taken the mackerel bait.

Speak of the devil and a cute little ray doth appear.

Stewart with his second shark species of the session and he was a bit happier handling it.

Popped back the little ray sulked in the shallows for a while before heading off.

We carried on fishing, hoping for some more rays but all our sandeel and squid cocktails were attracting was more dogfish. Meanwhile my mini species rod hadn't attracted anything at all which was quite a surprise so I decided to pack it up. I then headed along the shore to check out another spot. When I returned Stewart had caught a dogfish, unhooked and released it on his own. I was suitably impressed. In the early evening we headed along the shore to try the other spot but this turned out to be not as productive as our first mark. The water there was a lot deeper but the ledges proved more difficult to get our gear and fish back up over. Three more dogfish were caught before we called it a night taking our tallies to ten sharks each making the day a fairly busy one with plenty of exposure to sharks for Stewart. 

Another lovely evening making it a real pleasure to be out fishing.

After our failed attempts afloat on Loch Etive a couple of weeks ago it was good to see Stewart get his first sharks and I think he has gone some way to curing his mild phobia of them, although more "therapy" is probably required. Maybe in the summer we can up the ante and target tope and bull huss. Stewart's isn't keen on conger eels either so maybe that's an issue we can work on too. He does seem to be enjoy our fishing trips though which is of course the most important thing. Next time we go fishing we'll have a break from sharks but whilst we may target some smaller species I can't promise Stewart we won't encounter some vicious Blennies. If he thinks sharks are nasty he's in for a shock!

Tight lines, Scott.