Not more species hunting adventures on Crete?!: Part 1.

Yes, that's right! I’ve been to Crete again! At the end of last month, Lillian and I headed off there for a relaxing holiday. We’ve been to the Greek islands several times and love Crete in particular, this being our fifth holiday there! This time we decided to stay in Elounda and then Agia Gallini, both for four nights each. We didn’t arrive until very late in the evening, so after we got to our accommodation, we just went straight to bed. In the morning when we woke up the sun was shining, and I was keen to get my species hunting under way, so we went for a walk into town, stopping on some piers as we went. I had a brand new Nebula Rock Rover to break in, along with a new Daiwa Exceler reel, freshly loaded with some nicely colour coordinated grey Daiwa J-Braid Grand X8.

The nice view from our room balcony. 

Before long, I set about catching some fish. 

All shiny and new! Lovely. 

Fishing Angleworm on a drop shot rig, I soon caught a few black goby, rock goby, an annular seabream and a small painted comber. The black goby were all very light in colour, so I popped one in my photo tank just to check they were actually black goby.

The ability to examine fins is one of the great benefits of the tank. Identify confirmed! Just a black goby. Always worth checking!

No tank required to identify this small annular seabream, although it would probably have fit into it!

I was expecting to catch a few more painted comber, as in the past I’d caught lots of them there, but instead I began to catch a few yellow spotted puffer, one of many migrant species that have travelled from the Red Sea into the Eastern Mediterranean via the Suez Canal. Over the years, the number of these I catch when on Crete has been steadily increasing. They are super aggressive and don't seem to be in any way cautious, so they often get to lures and bait first before other fish get a chance. As a result, some of the native fish seem to be in decline. Ornate wrasse, Usually a common capture, were noticeably absent, and I didn’t catch any more painted comber either, another species that's normally present in big numbers. 

These yellow spotted puffers quickly became a real pain. They damage your line and can even just bite hooks off completely!

After a while, and following a quick visit to the local fishing tackle shop where I bought some small lures and some preserved shrimps in a small jar to try out, we headed back to the apartment complex, jumped in our hire car, and made the short drive north to Plaka. On the way there, we passed a roadside viewing point for Spinalonga, a small island and former leper colony out in the bay, and stopped briefly to take a photo or two. When we arrived in Plaka we had some lunch and afterwards I did a bit more fishing around its small harbour.

Having been over to Spinalonga by boat a couple of times in the past, we decided just to admire it off in the distance.

I started off fishing with tiny pieces of the preserved shrimp on tanago hooks to try and catch a damselfish. Their small mouths can make them tricky to catch, but I got one reasonably quickly, and a few other species were also caught whilst I tried.

A few bogue took my tiny pieces of prawn. Their scientific name is Boop boops, but it should be Poop poops if you ask me!

I also caught a couple of marbled rabbitfish. Covered in venomous spines, this is another well established invader from the Red Sea.

After a bit of persistence, I caught a damselfish.

The wind then suddenly changed direction causing a slight swell to kick up, so we moved over to fish from the rocks down the back of the harbour where it was fairly sheltered. At this point, I switched to the ever reliable Angleworm on a drop shot rig. The bottom was mainly rocky and produced a couple of combers, an Atlantic lizardfish, a few Mediterranean rainbow wrasse and lots of yellow spotted puffers. There were also a few sandy areas as well, and casting my rig onto these I caught a wide eyed flounder. 

This common comber was the first fish to munch my Angleworm. 

The beautifully patterned wide eyed flounder. I love catching these funky floral flatfish!

Before we called it a day, the wind switched back again, so we moved back to the inside of the harbour. Fishing down the harbour wall, I spotted a small group of reticulated filefish amongst the shoals of damselfish. Tying on a smaller hook and baiting it with a little piece of shrimp I eventually managed to get it close enough to one so that the damselfish didn't have a chance to strip off the bait and the weird looking fish took it straight away.

Yet another Lessepsian migrant. A lot less annoying than the puffer though! This fish was my 200th species of 2023 as well.

So, a fairly productive start to my holiday's species hunt, and I'd achieved my species hunting target for this year of catching two hundred species on day one of the trip. The amount of puffer I was catching and the slightly limited number of other species was a bit of a concern, but I was hopeful that some of the other venues I was planning to fish over the remainder of the trip might produce more native fish and hopefully some new ones as well!

Tight lines, Scott.

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Even more species hunting adventures on Crete: Part 2.

As the second half of our holiday progressed, we continued to make the most of the hire car. On another day trip, we drove up through the mountains in the island's interior and back down from them again to the south coast's picturesque town of Agia Galini. I did a fair bit of fishing in the harbour there and added a few more species to my tally. I also had a lot of fun freelining bread for some pretty large salema that were coming up tight into the side before smashing my bait. I didn't manage to land any of them however, after stripping line off my reel as they bolted back down the harbour wall they all somehow managed to throw the hook sadly.

Perched on a bollard with my net at the ready, just in case a hook actually stayed in a salema's bony mouth.

Switching to raw prawn fished close to the bottom produced some small Couch's seabream...

...a few East Atlantic peacock wrasse....

...and this nice little goldblotch grouper.

A day or two later I fished a deep water rock mark near Boufos Cave, but the fishing was surprisingly poor. In fact other than some ornate wrasse and yellow spotted puffers closer in, I caught nothing else. Despite this, I think I'd try there again at dawn or dusk if I return to the area in the future. The spot just looked so fishy!

Fishing in the shade of the cliffs at my back, I enjoyed the view towards the uninhabited island of Dia, off in the distance.

On the recommendation of my mate Nick who had also been on Crete earlier in the year, we spent a morning exploring Sisi, a lovely village with a small harbour that cuts inland and is surrounded by cliffs. An onshore wind made fishing in the open sea with my ultralight tackle difficult, so after a stroll around the village, I had a short session fishing on the inside of the harbour's rocky breakwater.

Fishing was tough, but I eventually caught some ornate wrasse and some yellow spotted puffer. The number of puffers had definitely increased since my last holiday on Crete. They're a total pain as they bite your line and damage it.

Whilst I was fishing away, Lillian spotted a moray eel swimming close in amongst the rocks right at my feet and christened it Bill. I think Bill was drawn out by the smell of the scraps of raw prawn that I had been dropping there. I quickly tied on a heavier leader and a chinu hook. Dropping a chunk of prawn down, Bill took it straight away, and before I could fully load my rod and apply pressure, he had quickly swam backwards into a hole. I couldn't get him out again, and trying to bully him saw me eventually being broken off. Bill would have been my first new species of the trip, so I was gutted.

Here are some of Bill's relatives in CRETAquarium.

On the penultimate day of our stay, we headed east to Agios Nikolaos to spend a day there. In the morning we went out on the glass bottomed boat. While you're down below, the crew are up on deck, throwing in a steady supply of fish scraps to attract various species of fish to the boat. As well as spotting some of the more common ones, we also saw a couple of silver cheeked toadfish, and they weren't half greedy buggers. They've got a serious set of teeth and were devouring entire carcasses in seconds.

A silver cheeked toadfish chomping away.

On the way back to port, we went up onto the deck as the boat followed the coastline back. As well as enjoying some of the views, we were also lucky to see shoals of flying fish swimming/flying/gliding up out of the water, into and through the air as they got out of the way of the boat.

Flying fish. How cool. I'd love to catch one!

Back on dry land, we took a walk around Lake Voulismeni, stopping for lunch before I got the green light to grab my tackle from the car to do a bit of fishing.

"The Lake".

After a quick trip to a supermarket and fishmongers to grab some bait, I was soon catching lots of thick lipped mullet on freelined bread and some Bucchich's goby on small chunks of raw prawn on a split shot rig. As well as those two species, I also added another three additional species to my trip tally.

This small blue runner grabbed a chunk of prawn and powered off, almost making it under some boats and their mooring ropes. Great fun on my HTO Rock Rover.

As was this small, aggressive bluefish.

A small shoal of these Yellowtail barracuda, a migrant from the Red Sea, swam past the spot I was fishing and this one also took a chunk of raw prawn.

On the way back to Koutouloufari we took a detour and went to Plaka, grabbing some more bread and some tins of sardine from a supermarket on the way. After making up some ground bait, I started tossing in a small amount regularly.  This soon had some bream up in the water feeding on it, including some reasonably sized salema. Again, I managed to hook a few of them, but every single one managed to throw the hook after a brief tussle. I then switched over to a Gulp! Angleworm on a drop shot rig and cast out fishing close to the bottom.

From the rocks at the end of Plaka's small harbour, I caught...

...lots of painted combers...

... a few common two banded seabream...

...some Mediterranean rainbow wrasse...

...and a reticulated filefish.

I'd forgotten how good Plaka was for catching a wide variety of species. A fact that was demonstrated when we finally spotted our first lionfish in the open sea. It came up out of the submerged boulders in front of where I was fishing, probably drawn out by the groundbait. It lazily floated around for a while and then swam slowly around the area before vanishing again. I tried a few things to try and catch it, but it wasn't remotely interested in anything I put in front of it. Before we left, we also witnessed another angler catching a silver cheeked toadfish. If we return to Crete, I think we'll stay in Elounda again, so I can spend a bit of time fishing around Plaka again.

So, the end of the trip had arrived, and we'd had a great time. I didn't do any fishing on the last day, but I'd managed to catch thirty-six species over the two weeks, which I think is a fairly respectable effort. The only disappointment being I'd failed to catch any new species.

Here's a summary of the species I caught.

1. Annular Seabream
2. Atlantic Lizardfish
3. Axillary Seabream
4. Black Scorpionfish
5. Bluefish
6. Blue Runner
7. Bucchich’s Goby
8. Cardinalfish
9. Common Comber
10. Common Two Banded Seabream 
11. Couch’s Seabream
12. Damselfish
13. Derbio
14. East Atlantic Peacock Wrasse 
15. Giant Goby
16. Goldblotch Grouper
17. Golden Grey Mullet
18. Goldfish
19. Grey Wrasse
20. Madeira Rockfish
21. Marbled Rabbitfish
22. Mediterranean Rainbow Wrasse 
23. Ornate Wrasse
24. Painted Comber
25. Pearly Razorfish
26. Reticulated Filefish
27. Rock Goby
28. Rusty Blenny
29. Salema
30. Slender Goby
31. Striped Seabream
32. Thick Lipped Mullet
33. White Seabream
34. Wide Eyed Flounder
35. Yellow Spotted Puffer
36. Yellowtail Barracuda

Lillian and I both love visiting Crete, and I dare say this won't be my last set of catch reports from there. I might however set out to deliberately focus my efforts on targetting new species if we do return, or perhaps do a spot of boat fishing. Lionfish, silvercheeked toadfish and Bill better look out!

Tight lines, Scott.

More species hunting adventures on Crete : Part 1.

At the end of August I returned to the Greek island of Crete for two weeks' holiday with my girlfriend Lillian. We didn't arrive in Kissamos, where we'd be staying for the first week, until late in the evening but it was quite windy when we got there and as our accommodation was very close to the sea we could see a swell running and some waves were coming over the sea wall at the front of the town's promenade. In the morning we went for a walk along the coast to get our bearings. The wind had died down during the night but the sea was still fairly rough and coloured up.

Not great for fishing with the ultra light tackle I had with me.

Later that morning I got permission to quickly check out the nearby port of Kavonisi, a venue recommended to me by my mate Andy where several large vessels moor at night that take tourists on day trips to Gramvousa island and the lagoon at Balos on the western side of the island. It was fairly sheltered inside so I had a quick fish and discovered that the water inside was very deep. I thought this was promising but to my surprise the fishing was pretty slow going. I still managed to catch a few fish and got my species hunt for the trip underway.

My first fish of the trip was this rainbow wrasse.

A few common combers were also keen on my angleworm.

I caught this saddled seabream in a corner where some fishing boats were tied up.

In the afternoon to get away from the wind we drove south through the mountains to Paleochora for lunch. I thought it would be sheltered on the south side of the island but it was still fairly windy. After lunch I fished in Paleochora's large harbour for an hour or so but again things were pretty slow. I only managed a single striped seabream, a couple of annular seabream and a few black gobies.

Black gobies are probably just about small enough to escape from the fine mesh nets the Greek fisherman use.

The next day we headed east into Chania and wandered around the harbour area before having some lunch. As well as seeing all the old buildings we were lucky enough to see a large sea turtle swimming amongst the moored boats. After lunch I had a quick fish as we walked along the inside of the breakwater and added three more species to my tally for the trip, catching a few ornate wrasse, a single rusty blenny and a common pandora.

Chania's old Venetian harbour is very pretty with lots of shops and restaurants lining it.

The breakwater of Chania harbour where I did my fishing.

Seeing this sea turtle was an unexpected bonus. Not the empty plastic bag though,its never great seeing those in the sea.

In the evening I popped along to Kavonisi Port for an hour's fishing whilst Lillian had a nap. Again the deep water out in the harbour didn't produce much so I turned my attention to fishing for the small species down the side of the wall using #26 hooks baited with tiny pieces of dried ragworm. Amongst the fish I caught as light faded I added bogue, cardinalfish, damselfish, marbled rabbitfish and salema to my tally.

Cardinalfish are like little rubies.

In the morning on the third day of our holiday I got up early and headed back to Kavonisi Port again. The wind had now completely dropped off and the open sea was flat calm so after an hour of trying various methods inside the harbour with little reward for my efforts I decided to move along the coast to try a new spot.

This needle nosed chap took a piece of angleworm on a drop shot rig and was my only reward from the deep water in the harbour.

At my chosen mark the sea floor was very rough and I quickly lost a fair amount of drop shot rigs so I moved along to try another spot. This was less tackle hungry and produced a few ornate wrasse and a common two banded seabream.

Feisty little fish.

Later that morning we took a drive up through Therisou Gorge. It's the only gorge on the island that has a road running through it. Perfect if you are a little out of shape.

The easy option if you want to explore one of Crete's many gorges without all the hassle of walking.

Watch out for pedestrians! The gorge is full of goats but the noise of their bells clanking gives their presence away.

Exiting the top of the gorge we carried on up into the mountains and headed to the small village of Drakona to have lunch in a restaurant called Dounias that Lillian had read great things about online. It's on a sharp corner making it easy to miss it and we did just that, driving right past before realising our mistake and turning back. I'm not sure how I missed it though to be fair as some of its ovens are out in front of it and lunch was already being prepared!

Dounias' speciality is traditional Cretan food cooked slowly using wood ovens.

You can sit inside but on a beautiful summer afternoon the outdoor dining area is the only real choice.

Relaxing in the shade we didn't even have to order any dishes, instead simply allowing Stelios the chef to send us a selection of dishes including some meat ones. The food soon started arriving a dish at a time and whilst my expectations were high the food didn't disappoint. Everything we ate was mouth wateringly tasty.

Stuffed vegetables have never tasted so good.

The rustic meat dishes were full of flavour too.

After several plates of amazing food we continued our mountain drive, heading slowly east until we eventually reached the National Road. Driving on the windy roads was a lot of fun and some of the views from the mountain roads were great too.

A view from the mountains towards the island's north coast.

Before heading back to Kissamos we visited Kalyves Harbour, a venue where my mate Andy has caught stargazer whilst fishing during his holidays on the island. While Lillian hid in the shade and enjoyed an ice cream I chose to ignore the obvious target, namely the several mullet cruising around in the harbour, and instead began by working a small metal along the sandy bottom hoping to twitch it close to a buried predator. This approach didn't produce anything though and when Lillian spotted some gobies moving around on the sand I got some tiny hooks, split shot and a packet of dried ragworm out. I had an idea what the tiny gobies were and being gobies it didn't take long to confirm my suspicions.

An incognito goby. When species hunting you can't ignore micro species.

Having turned my attention to the fish I could see, I began pestering some blennies that were hugging the wall below my feet. They were being quite skittish, and I was pleasantly surprised when a filefish appeared from a crack down the harbour wall to eagerly attack my baited hook. It had a few goes before being hooked and was quickly hoisted up into my hand. Whilst it looked similar to the filefish I've caught before in the Canary Islands, the planehead filefish, this one was a little different shape wise and had different markings too. I remembered looking into the filefish found in the Mediterranean when Andy had sent me a photo of one he had caught and this one was the same species as his capture.

This is a reticulated filefish, a migrant from the Red Sea. It was also my first new species of the trip.

By this point Lillian was getting a little bored and when I suggested we go and get some bread and try and catch a mullet she gave me a look that told me I was pushing my luck, so I packed up, and we drove back to Kissamos. It had been an enjoyable start to our holiday and whilst the short sessions spent species hunting were slow at times I'd still managed to catch a few different fish and an unexpected first new species of the trip.

Tight lines, Scott.

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