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

Last month I flew down to the Canary Islands for the second time this year after Lillian and I decided a couple of months ago to have a holiday on Gran Canaria. I’ve visited the island for fishing trips with my mates three times over the years, but for Lillian it was her first time visiting Gran Canaria. Our accommodation in the small fishing village of Castillo del Romeral was next to the sea and had a small harbour, but was well away from the main tourist areas, so we were really looking forward to a relaxing vacation. When we arrived in the afternoon, we unpacked our bags and then went for a walk around. A strong wind was blowing and a slight swell was eviden with waves crashing on the shore, but thankfully this was forecast to drop off over the coming days. In the evening after dinner we visited the pier in the nearby town of Arinaga. For some reason it's the place I always fish first when I visit Gran Canaria, perhaps because it’s usually close to where I've stayed and is very sheltered from the prevailing wind. I was pleased to see that the statue of the angler located on it has been given a new rod. The last time I visited he only had half of a butt section!

A nice new rod for this local fisherman.

Work was being carried out on the pier, and as a result we couldn’t get along to the end as most of it was fenced off, so I fished from the steps at the side, next to the slipway. The water was slightly coloured up and there was a bit of suspended weed in it, which was a bit of a pain when I tried to cast out into deeper water. Dropping pieces of raw prawn straight down the side over rocky ground, there are no prizes for guessing what species I caught first.

My first fish of the trip was this ornate wrasse.

It was followed by a treble shot of Canary damselfish. Maybe a three hook rig wasn’t a great idea?

A Madeira rockfish was the third species to get to my bait first.

As it got dark, I was expecting a few cardinalfish to start feeding, but the three species I'd already caught weren't giving anything else much of a chance, either getting themselves hooked or stripping the bait in no time. That was until I caught a rather large blenny, which I was pleasantly surprised to discover was a Molly Miller.

The first time I've caught a Molly Miller fishing blind and it was the biggest I've ever caught by a distance.

The next day, we drove around the southern side of the island to the end of the CG-1 and down into the picturesque town of Puerto de Mogan. After a visit to the local Spar supermarket to get a small sliced white loaf, I spent an hour or so fishing in the canal that runs up into the town. The tide was in and there were plenty of mullet swimming around. Fishing from a small bridge over the canal, Lillian fed in a constant supply of free offerings and once the fish were feeding confidently and competing with each other, I soon caught a few freelining bread on my favourite presentation, a two hook rig. 

All the mullet I caught at this first spot turned out to be the thick lipped variety.

Seeing a few salema swimming about underneath the mullet, I added a split shot to get my rig down below most of the mullet where they could get to it. This worked perfectly and I caught a couple before we went for a stroll around the town's streets and marina.

Salema love a bit of bread too!

The area around the marina is very nice, with immaculately painted houses, lots of lush plants and colourful flowers. 

Walking back in the direction of where we had parked the car, I got permission to spend another hour pestering the mullet again, this time at a second spot a little further down the canal. Again Lillian did a great job of getting the resident fish fighting over free offerings and I caught another dozen or so. Most of them were thick lipped mullet, but I also caught a couple of golden grey mullet in amongst them. Sadly, I didn’t spot any flathead mullet in amongst the shoals, a species I caught there for the first time during a trip last year.

One of two golden grey mullet. 

In the evening after dinner, I headed down to the harbour in Castllo del Romeral for a quick session after dark. Poking around in the rocks I caught a few fish, but again the water was slightly coloured up and as a result the bites were strangely few and far between. 

I caught this small dusky grouper down in a dark hole. 

Pufferfish normally switch off after dark. I guess this Macaronesian sharpnose puffer fancied a bedtime snack. 

Cardinalfish normally switch on after dark. Hiding down in dark areas down in rocks during the day. 

Ten species in just over twenty four hours wasn’t a bad start to my species hunt, especially given I hadn’t been fishing all the time like I would on a dedicated fishing trip. I was a little bit concerned about the wind and also reports that a Calima, a large dust storm from the Sahara Desert, was on its way. It was also obvious that the water clarity wasnt as good as it usually is in the Canary Islands and seemed to be effecting amount of fish that were present and biting. I didn’t have a target in mind for the number of species I'd like to catch during the trip though, and really, I just wanted to enjoy whatever short sessions I could do as the holiday progressed. That said, a new species or two would have been nice, but my options on that front were quite limited.

Tight lines, Scott.

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Species hunting advetures on Sardinia: Part 2.

For our third evening session fishing around Isola Rossa's marina, I turned my attention, initially, to fishing for small species straight down the inner wall of the breakwater. This produced a few damselfish and some small annular seabream. After a while, I caught a mystery blenny.

The mystery blenny is very similar to the ringneck blenny. Examining the cirri is the easiest way to tell them apart. Luckily, I had a new photo tank with me, which makes this task much easier!

As the sun was about to fade, I tied on a heavier leader and clipped on a small lipless sinking pencil lure. Lee was already targeting barracuda, so I joined him and did likewise near the end of the breakwater. The rocks there seemed like a perfect ambush point, and there were plenty of tiny baitfish around, so our hopes were high. Giving the lure a good jerk and then pausing briefly before winding up the slack line and repeating was my chosen approach, and much to my delight, it only took about half a dozen casts to tempt the target species. After a short scrap, a small barracuda was successfully landed.

This small European barracuda was great fun on my ultralight setup!

Seeing me get one, Lee was even more determined to catch one too, so he carried on trying. Having ticked it off, I decided to switch my attention back to fishing straight down the harbour walls again, hoping to catch some nocturnal species like cardinalfish or black scorpionfish. Once it got dark, I shone my headtorch over towards Lee to see his rod was bent over. He'd hooked a barracuda, on a Halco twisty of all things, so I went along to help him land it and take a photo for him.

Target acquired. Another nice fish for Lee.

Us both catching a barracuda felt well deserved given the difficult time we'd had over the first few days of the trip. Fairly pleased about how the session had gone, we headed back to the apartment. 

In the morning we drove up to Santa Teresa Gallura, where we fished around the headland where the Torre di Longonsaro is located. The views up and down the from around the tower of the coastline were spectacular.

The impressive Torre di Longonsardo lookout tower is over five hundred years old.

The beach to the west of the tower looked amazing, but we weren’t there to swim. 

Following the path around the headland, we tried fishing at a couple of spots. The ground was fairly shallow and very rocky, so it didn’t come as a great surprise when all we caught was a few wrasse. 

A nice example of a male Mediterrranean rainbow wrasse. 

After a while, we decided to try another spot and headed back to the car. On the way up from the rocks, we spotted a lizard sunbathing on a wall. Usually, they run off when you get too close, but this one happily posed for a few photos. 

This Tyrrhenian wall lizard wasn’t too bothered by me, or my iPhone. 

A short drive later, we arrived at a small pier in the middle of the town’s port. Again, it looked promising but for some reason there weren’t too many fish around.  Casting over towards a few rocks at the opposite side of the port, I did manage to catch a few small white seabream. 

Another species added to my tally. 

The following day, we returned to Castelsardo to have a wander around the town’s narrow streets and to climb the steep hill to explore the walled fortress at its top. 

The picturesque town of Castelsardo.

We had a casual stroll around its steep narrow streets. 

Before we left, we had a quick session fishing from some rocks to the east of the town. Tucked away in a bay out of the wind, it was fairly shallow rocky ground and didn’t look very promising. Yet again, the fishing was pretty slow and all we caught were a few juvenile Mediterranean rainbow wrasse and a couple of small white seabream. 

Our effort certainly couldn’t be faulted. 

The following day, we decided to head to the north east coast again. We visited a few potential fishing spots, but the strong wind either made them unfishable or fishing simply wasn’t allowed. In short, beautiful scenery aside, the morning had been a bit of a waste of time. In the end, we ended up revisiting the black goby infested area in Olbia again!

At least we were out of the wind, but would we catch anything other than black goby?!

Almost as soon as we began fishing, Lee hooked into a nice fish that definitely wasn't a black goby. It shot off under a nearby yacht, but he managed to get it away from the mooring ropes, and a nice salema soon came into view. Sadly, we'd left the net in the boot of the car, and it threw the hook on the surface. We were hopeful there would be more of them around, but all we caught at that spot after that was black goby. Moving to an area with some rocks at the water’s edge, I tied on a tanago hook and targeted some small silver fish. They turned out to be big scale sand smelt. 

A lateral line scale count was used to positively identify this species. 

Switching to a split shot rig and dropping my bait into gaps in the rocks, I caught a few more black goby. After a while, I eventually caught something slightly different in the shape of a rock goby. 

A third goby species added to my tally!

Working my way along the rocks, I spotted what I was confident was a peacock blenny. The second I put my rig in its vicinity however, it swam off under a large flat rock. Despite my best efforts, I could not tempt it out again, so I moved slowly along the rocks, speculatively putting my bait into likely looking holding spots. Eventually, this paid off when I caught a rather large peacock blenny from down behind a large rock.

Probably the biggest peacock blenny I’ve ever caught. 

On the way back to Isola Rossa, we stopped briefly at a park up in the mountains. In the park, a small river has been dammed to create a series of ponds. As well as ducks, geese and terrapins, the largest pond also contains a few carp and lots of goldfish. No one else was around, so…

Hundreds of goldfish swimming around waiting to be fed was an opportunity too good to miss. 

A piece of line, a split shot and a hook baited with a piece of bread, immediately produced a few  of the colourful fish. 

The following day, our last full day of the trip, it was very windy again. We were pretty much resigned to the fact that fishing in the sea was either going to be very challenging, pretty unproductive, or both! Regardless, we decided to visit a few places on the north coast. Our first stop was Costa Paradiso. Whilst having an espresso in the morning, a local spearfisherman had told Lee that the sea surrounding it contained more fish, so we went to check it out. 

Costa Paradiso. A stunning location, but a fair swell was crashing over the rocks, so we had a quick stroll and then headed further up the coast. 

Portobello di Gallura was our next stop. Another beautiful stretch of coastline.

It also had a small harbour. We decided to fish at the outside of its inner breakwater.

We gave it a go, but all we caught before throwing in the towel were a few juvenile wrasse and seabream.

After enjoying some lunch, we decided to get away from the coast. Opting to be a little bit naughty and visiting a freshwater venue again. This time we headed to a stretch of the Coghinas river, which has lots of hot springs. As a result, there were lots of people around enjoying the warm water, but we found a quiet spot downstream from them and quietly wet a line. 

The rivers of Sardinia contain several species. I was hoping to catch a Mediterranean trout, but spotting some pumpkinseed in the margin, I quickly caught some using a small piece of worm. 

Such a nice looking fish. I love catching pumpkinseed!

Lee quickly caught one too, his first ever, in fact. Shortly afterwards, he caught a couple of juvenile largemouth bass on soft plastics. I spent ten minutes trying to get one myself, but as we didn't have the required licences to fish in freshwater, we didn't want to push our luck and left. 

In the evening, we had one last session in Isola Rossa marina. Lee spent his time trying to catch another barracuda, whilst I focused on fishing down the side again. This produced a few damselfish, small seabream and an East Atlantic peacock wrasse before the sun set. After dark, the bites dried up until I caught a small dusky grouper.

My biggest East Atlantic peacock wrasse of the trip. 

This juvenile dusky grouper brought a smile to my face. Even the small ones are fiesty!

Our last day on Sardinia had arrived. As we had a few hours spare in the morning before our flight back to the UK, we had one last go fishing around Olbia. Revisiting the rocky areas, Lee quickly spotted a few small salema in amongst some other seabream in a corner. Dropping a small section of ragworm in amongst them, I managed to catch one fairly quickly.

This small salema was my last species of the trip, taking our joint tally to twenty five.

In amongst some rocks slightly further along from where I caught the salema, I spotted a small peacock blenny. It couldn't resist a piece of ragworm either!

Male peacock blenny have a rather impressive forehead!

We carried on walking along the boardwalk, ending up underneath in the shade of a road bridge crossing the estuary. There we found a shoal of annular seabream, and having used up my ragworm, I caught a few more on Gulp! Angleworm before it was time to head to the airport.

My last fish of the trip was an annular seabream.

My third trip in three months had come to an end. It was nice to go away on holiday with Lillian again, and it was nice for us both to catch up with Lee again. The wind had been blowing strongly most of the time, and the fishing had been hard going, but we still caught a few fish. Here's a summary of what I caught with my only new species of the trip in bold...

1. Annular Seabream
2. Big Scale Sand Smelt
3. Black Goby
4. Common Two Banded Seabream
5. Damselfish 
6. Dusky Grouper 
7. East Atlantic Peacock Wrasse
8. European Barracuda
9. Five Spotted Wrasse
10. Goldfish
11. Mediterranean Rainbow Wrasse
12. Mystery Blenny
13. Ornate Wrasse
14. Painted Comber
15. Peacock Blenny
16. Pumpkinseed
17. Red-Mouthed Goby
18. Rock Goby
19. Rusty Blenny 
20. Saddled Seabream
21. Salema
22. Sharpsnout Seabream 
23. White Seabream

Lee also caught...

24. Black Scorpionfish
25. Largemouth Bass 

Sardinia was a beautiful place, lush and green with wild flowers everywhere and some incredible breathtaking scenery. The fishing was very dissapointing though. Perhaps it would be better in less windy conditions or later in the year? Perhaps the fishing around Cagliari and the southern end of the island is better. Will I return to Sardinia at some point in the future to find out? You never know!

Tight lines, Scott.

More species hunting adventures on Gran Canaria & Fuerteventura: Part 4.

The following day, we decided to fish a few marks around the southern end of the Fuerteventura. Our first stop was the pier at Las Playitas. During my last visit to the island, I caught a golden grey mullet whilst fishing at this venue, so I made up some groundbait and started trying to catch one fishing bread flake under a float. They were present, but the sea was pretty flat, and they were being very cautious, holding their position further out, waiting for my groundbait to drift out towards them. I struggled for a couple of hours, only managing to hook two briefly before they got off, and in the end I failed to catch one.

To begin with, we had the pier all to ourselves, but that didn't last long.

Gordon and I did both catch our first salema of the trip before the constant arrival of people on the pier and a procession of kayakers launching from the slipway and paddling right over where were fishing, made the decision to head off to the next venue a pretty easy one to make. 

Salema love a bit of bread too.

Next, we headed to the rocks on the outside of the eastern breakwater of Puerto Gran Tarajal harbour. Carefully making our way along to the end of them, we decided to have a few casts then move back along them towards the start, stopping at different spots to see what we could catch. We didn’t catch anything right at the end, but a move of about twenty yards saw us locate a large shoal of striped seabream. 

We enjoyed some great sport, catching dozens of these striped seabream.

Gordon into a striped seabream.

As we continued to make our way along the boulders, we continued to catch more striped seabream. During my last visit to Fuerteventura, I caught a few common pandora when we fished from these rocks, and was hopeful we would catch some this time too. Eventually Gordon did catch one, and almost straight afterwards, I caught one of my own too.

Mission accomplished. Species number forty of the trip!

With two full day’s of fishing left, we decided to up the ante, and try to reach forty five species. I drew up a shortlist of potential targets, most of which I had caught on the island myself during my last trip, or knew specific spots where other anglers had caught them. Despite this bit of strategic planning, the last venue on our itinerary for the day was the a shot in the dark. Remembering the western breakwater of Morro Jable harbour from my last trip to Fuerteventura, I speculated that there might be a reasonably good chance that it held a population of glasseye, so we headed there. However, after making the forty five minute drive down there, we found that the area we wanted to fish was completely closed off due to the construction of an exclusive marina. Disappointed, we parked in the main harbour area so we could formulate plan B. Glasseye were definitely off the table, but I thought we could try fishing on the white sandy beach of Playa las Gaviotas, located a short drive to the east of us, there we could target wide eyed flounder and lesser weever as light faded. This proved to be a great decision, not because we caught either of those species, but instead because we caught a few nice gilthead seabream from the realively shallow gully we chose to fish in! In a relatively short period, Gordon caught two and then I caught a slightly bigger specimen that gave a great account of itself on my ultralight tackle. Very happy with this unexpected action, we called it a day and drove back to Caleta de Fuste.

What a scrap over fairly shallow ground! Species number forty one!

In the morning, we decided to stay local, fishing around Caleta de Fuste and from the rocks near the Museo de las Salinas del Carmen, 3km to the south of the town. Before any swimmers arrived, we began on Playa de la Guirra, twitching Gulp! Angleworm along the bottom. Wide eyed flounder were the target species, and I soon hooked one, but it managed to throw the hook as I wound it in. I called Gordon over, and he promptly caught four of them in fairly quick succession! Another species had been added to our tally, but I still wanted to catch one myself, so I switched to a small piece of raw prawn and cast that out. A bite came almost instantaneously, and a wide eyed flounder was quickly wound in. 

Wide eyed flounder are awesome flatfish! Species number forty two!

Having ticked off another species, we headed to the pond at the back of the Elba Sara Resort again, to see if we could catch a golden grey mullet or a flathead mullet. I quickly caught one of the larger thick lipped mullet in the pond, however, the commotion it made spooked the other mullet in the pond, and they all swam up the pipes at the top end of it! The sailfin molly were still around, so I quickly caught a plain looking one before we left.

A "standard" sailfin molly. The specimens I’d caught two days earlier, the more colourful fish, were melanistic I believe.

Jumping back in the car, we headed south to fish from the rocks near the Museo de las Salinas del Carmen, a well known spot for early morning bonito and barracuda fishing. As we walked down from the car park to the sea, we were met by a Barbary ground squirrel. It obviously thought we might give it some food and followed us for a while, scampering over the rocks. 

Our new furry friend! It hung around for the duration of the session. 

There was a bit of a swell running, and waves were breaking on the vertical rock faces in front of us, sending spray up onto the ledges we wanted to fish from. We managed to find one small dry area and had an hour or so casting baits out into the relatively deep water out in front of us. This produced a lot of Canary damselfish, ornate wrasse, planehead filefish and pufferfish. I caught one particularly large Macaronesian sharpnose puffer, and also managed to catch my first butterfly winged comber of the trip.

Beautiful, but very annoying!

Gordon had already caught a butterfly winged comber earlier in the trip, so this wasn’t an addition to our trip tally.

With nothing else interesting turning up, we decided to head back north again to Caleta de Fuste. There, we found a place on the rocks fairly close to where we had fished the day we arrived, just north of the edge of the town. I focused my efforts fishing with small chunks of raw prawn in close on ledges, the target being a hairy blenny. Gordon tried his luck fishing with Gulp! Angleworm further out in deeper water. The only species I caught, were the ones you would expect to catch at close range over rocky ground, lots of ornate wrasse and Canary damselfish mainly. Gordon was also catching those too, as well as plenty of planehead filefish and pufferfish. Midway into the session, he caught something rather unusual. As he was winding it in, the fish came to the surface and leap from the water, trying to throw the hook. Initially we thought he had hooked a garfish. However, as it got closer, and he was about to lift it up, I realised it was in fact a halfbeak.

Doing some research later, I discovered this was a Balao halfbeak. A very close relative of the ballyhoo. The Balao halfbeak has a much longer pectoral fin. Bent forward it reaches the anterior nostril. On a ballyhoo it doesn’t reach that far. 

Halfbeaks have the strangest mouths! Species number forty three!

This was without doubt the most unexpected species caught so far and, yet again, I was slightly jealous of one of Gordon‘s captures, but I was happy we’d caught yet another addition to our trip's tally. We carried on fishing away for a few hours more, but neither of us caught anything else that we hadn’t caught already earlier in the trip, so as it got dark we called it a day. With one full day left we still needed another two species to hit our new target, so we decided to head north to fish some different spots. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Click here for the final part.