Short, but sweet.

Back in August, I was contacted by fellow species hunter, Luke Ovgard, about fishing around Edinburgh, as he was going to be spending a weekend in the Scottish capital with his two brothers in October. Not a particularly great time of the year to go fishing, I warned him, but I agreed to meet up with him when he was here to try and help him catch something new. Luke has travelled all over the world and caught over 1350 species along the way, including many of those found around the coast of this part of Scotland, so he sent me a spreadsheet containing all the species he’s ever caught. Having a look through it, I spotted a few species he hadn't caught that we could try to catch. If the conditions were favourable, I felt that we could possibly encounter ballan wrasse, butterfish, leopard spotted goby, pollock, poor cod and Yarrell’s blenny. Luke arrived from Stuttgart, where he currently lives and works, last Thursday evening, and spent the weekend sightseeing in Edinburgh and exploring further afield, making it as far north as Fort William. I had a couple of sessions last week in preparation for ours, just to see what was around. For the first session, I collected some live prawns to use as bait. Netting them out, I found a couple of tiny fish in my net with them.

Probably the smallest wrasse I’ve ever seen. I believe it’s a corkwing wrasse.

In amongst the prawns was also a tiny sand smelt.

Over the two sessions prior to meeting up with Luke, I caught a few fish, but the conditions were far from ideal. The temperature had dropped, and it was very windy too, making fishing quite unpleasant. The sea was pretty rough too and was coloured up as a result. Given the effort required to catch hardly any fish, I was concerned that we might struggle.

At St Abbs I did catch a few coalfish, but it's a species Luke had caught already, on the other side of the Atlantic, in Maine.

At the inlet area at Torness Power Station, I caught a few juvenile cod. Luke had caught this species already as well.

Trying to catch a ballan wrasse proved to be a bit of a waste of time, with only this solitary long spined sea scorpion taking my ragworm section. Another species that Luke had already ticked off.

During the second session, I caught a solitary poor cod. The only fish I caught over the two trips that Luke hadn’t caught before!

We had originally planned to meet up on Sunday evening, but the highland road trip Luke's brothers had organised that day ruled that out. In the end, we met up early on Monday morning, only fishing together for just over two hours, the only time available before Luke had to head to the airport. Arriving at the inlet area of Torness Power Station, the wind had dropped off, had also changed direction and the sea was pretty flat. Whilst it was still very cold, we were pleasantly surprised by the amount of fish we caught. In amongst them, Luke caught his first ever poor cod and pollock, which he was over the moon about.

Luke's first ever pollock.

I was really enjoying his company, and while we fished away we had a great conversation about some of the species we’ve caught, some of the places we’d fished and some of our future species hunting plans. Before we knew it though, it was time to pack up. Focusing on the fishing and our discussion, I hadn’t even taken any photos during the session. It had been great to meet up and when I dropped Luke off, he surprised me with a parting gift, a copy of his book “Fishing across America”, which I am currently reading. I really hope our paths cross again in the future. If he visits Scotland again, which I've suggested he does and next time during the summer months, I’m sure we could travel around Scotland for a few days catching lots of fish! It would be a pleasure to fish together again, and hopefully I could help him add a few more species to his already very impress tally!

Tight lines, Scott.

Species hunting road trip: Cornwall calling.

After three nights in Dorset it was time to head west to Cornwall. Before leaving Weymouth I popped down to the Weymouth Angling Centre to pick up some fresh ragworm and then headed around to the marina nearby to try and catch a gilthead seabream, a thin lipped mullet and a common goby. The first target on my list was quickly caught. A whole small ragworm fished on the bottom on a running ledger saw me land two juveniles almost straight away. 

A nice little gilthead seabream. Another species added to my 2023 tally. 

There were plenty of thin lipped mullet swimming around so I rigged up a small spinner, removed the treble hook, replaced it with a small hook and baited it with a tail section of ragworm. Casting one of these around and slowly retrieving it usually attracts the mullet who then nip away at the worm section, but for some reason they just weren’t interested at all, and after an hour or so I gave up and headed to another spot nearby to try and catch a common goby. A split shot rig dropped down the wall with a tango hook baited with a pinkie produced two fish in two casts. The first was a tiny bass, the second my intended target. 

A little short of the minimum landing size!

Pinkie proving yet again to be a fantastic bait for saltwater mini species, including this common goby. 

Fairly happy with the start to the day, I visited Portland Marina for one last attempt at finding a black faced blenny. Upon arrival, I was confronted with several “No Fishing” signs, it was pretty windy, and taking a walk along the rocks I didn’t spot my target, so I decided just to head back to the car and continue my journey west. 

Spoilsports!

My next stop was Wembury in Devon, famous for its large rockpools. I have fished there before, many years ago, and was told recently that on a big sprig tide it was a good spot to try and catch Montagu’s blenny and also perhaps a clingfish. I arrived about an hour before low water, carefully made my way all the way down the exposed rocks and began my search. 

Wembury, a rockpooling angler’s Mecca. 

Tanago hook baited with a tiny pinkie was my weapon of choice. 

Due to the wind and overcast sky, I found it difficult to see any fish in some of the rockpools, so I speculatively dropped my rig in gaps in the submerged rocks and in front of cracks in the walls of the rockpools. This was fairly productive, and I was soon catching plenty of common blenny and the odd rock goby. Then I got a bite in a dark gap between three flat rocks and hooked the culprit. Lifting the small fish up and swinging it to hand, I could not believe my eyes when I realized it was a small clingfish!

A small cornish sucker, my second new species of the trip! The one I caught was very dark in colour, but you can just make out two dark spots on its head behind its eyes, a key distinguishing feature of the species.

I was over the moon with this capture, as I really didn't expect to catch one. I continued to fish for a while, exploring as many of the rockpools and likely looking fish holding spots as I could, but all I caught were more common blenny, rock goby and long spined sea scorpion. After a while, I decided to head back up to the car and hit the road again. My next stop was the small coastal village of Charlestown on the south coast of Cornwall. It was raining when I arrived, but a group of local anglers had braved the weather and were fishing together at the end of the outer breakwater. 

A few locals were out, suitably dressed for fishing in the rain.  

My target species at the mouth of Charlestown Harbour was a lesser weever. Small sections of ragworm were presented off the bottom and bites came every cast almost. After catching a couple of sand smelt, I caught a couple of lesser weever which were treated with great respect to avoid a potentially very painful sting.

Sand smelt. A few of these fried in flour make for a tasty meal. 

Lesser weever are venomous, so I carefully unhooked them using my forceps. They have a nasty reputation, but I actually think they're quite a pretty little fish. 

Having caught what I came for, I jumped in the car again and headed to Fowey to try and catch a topknot. They are a nocturnal feeder, so as I waited for darkness I fished over some rocky ground and caught a few small wrasse. 

Corkwing on a rainy day. 

The spot I intended to fish required a bit of dodgy climbing and as it got darker the rain got heavier, so I decided against fishing there. It had been a long day, I felt quite tired, and I didn't want to risk a fall in the dark in wet conditions whilst on my own. I was very happy with how my fishing had gone and didn't want to ruin it by having an accident! Another four species had been added to my 2023 tally and of course I was delighted to catch my first ever cornish sucker! Checking the forecast for the next two days when I arrived at my accommodation, it didn’t look very nice. I sent Adam a message to let him know. With weather warnings in place, my plans for the next two days in Cornwall were looking like they could be severely disrupted, and our plan to meet up again was also possibly in jeopardy. 

Tight lines, Scott.

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Sole searching.

My mate Gordon recently “caught” a small sole whilst wading with a push net in Port Logan Bay. The photo he sent me wasn't clear enough to get a positive identification, although I suspect it was either a sand sole or a solenette. I headed down there earlier this week to see if there were any more around. I knew that the likelihood of catching one was minuscule, but I certainly wasn’t going to get lucky sitting in the house, so off I went. The tide was out in the morning when I got there, and it was a lovely day. There were a few people out strolling along the water’s edge at the beach’s southern end, so I headed up towards the Port Logan Fish Pond end and quickly set up my ultra light rod. 

A nice quiet area to fish.

A small ragworm on a simple running ledger rig was fished using my trusty Rock Rover.

Casting my rig out amongst the small breaking waves it didn’t take too long for a fish to home in on my small ragworm as I gave it the occasional twitch and a small turbot was quickly wound in, popped back into the surf and shot off out of sight along the sandy bottom. It was followed a little while later by a flounder and a second turbot. 

Small but...

...perfectly formed.

Not the flatfish I was hoping to entice, but at least I had caught something, after those three fish however the bites dried up completely. Being a stubborn sod, and having travelled all the way down there, I persisted for a few more hours, probably a lot longer than I should have. Eventually, I decided to head off, but rather than drive straight home I decided to make a slight detour to visit Greenock on my way back. I was hoping I’d get lucky there and catch my first tompot blenny of the year but rather predictably I instead caught dozens of small wrasse. I also caught a few sand smelt and some pollock that grabbed my piece of ragworm as it fell down through the water. 

I’ve caught quite a few Scottish sand smelt this year. Perhaps they are becoming more common up here?

The majority of the wrasse I caught were goldsinny wrasse. They’ve got a nasty little set of teeth on them and usually show them off for the camera!

So a fairly good day's fishing, despite not catching the two species I was after! Anyway, I’m back down the Mull of Galloway next week and might try fishing Port Logan again to do more sole searching. I think I’ll try after dark if I do, and I might also fish three hook flapper rigs on two rods as well to try and increase my chances!

Tight lines, Scott.

Effort and reward.

I headed off on a two day trip with two of my mates, Nick and Ryan, last Tuesday. We visited several marks on the west coast and attempted to catch as many species as we could. Greenock was the first stop, where we were joined by a forth angler, Gordon, who like myself is a keen species hunter. He'd sent me a photo of a lumpsucker that had been caught there last week, so it was definitely worth a visit.

We had the harbour breakwater in Greenock to ourselves. Despite a strong wind, the conditions were OK, and we all caught a few fish. 

I was hoping to catch a common dragonet and got one first cast!

I followed this up with lots of goldsinny wrasse,..

...a few juvenile pollock,.. 

...a single black goby,..

..and a solitary ballan wrasse. 

After a few hours, the four of us headed along to Gamble Steps in Gourock, a mark I'd heard of, but had never fished before. Gordon told me he had caught some tompot blenny there in the past, so I was hoping to get one myself.  The four of us fished away and things were slow to start with, but by dropping to smaller hooks we all began catching a few goldsinny wrasse. Ryan had a small cod before I caught a single black goby too. After a while, a large shoal of fish arrived, swimming just below the surface of the water. I cast my rig out and let it fall back towards me through them. This worked a treat and after a few taps I hooked one of them. They turned out to be sand smelt. 

 

Only my third ever sand smelt from a Scottish venue.

After another hour or so we were all pretty bored with catching goldsinny wrasse, so Nick, Ryan and I said goodbye to Gordon, and we drove down to Troon where we tried to catch rock goby. The bottom of the larger rockpools there were all covered in ripped up kelp however, and all we managed to catch was a few common blenny. Jumping back in the car, we headed further south still, to the picturesque Portpatrick harbour. There we spent a couple of hours fishing into darkness. Nick caught a flounder and I caught a pollock before we started targeting shore rockling at the harbour’s mouth. 

Perched on the rocks, I waited for a fish to show interest in my ragworm. It didn’t take long to get some, and it was the target species. Odd as it wasn't even dark!

A very small shore rockling, but I didn’t care, it was my first of the year. 

Nick and Ryan waited patiently for some more rockling to start feeding. Ryan ended up catching three before we headed to Stranraer, where we spent the night in a hotel.

The next day we got up early and headed down to Ardwell Bay Beach on the west coast of the Rhins of Galloway. Our targets there were flounder and turbot. It quickly became apparent that there was a lot of suspended weed in the water, but after moving to the northern end of the beach, we all caught what we were after on small strips of mackerel fished on three hook flapper rigs tied up with small hooks. 

Ardwell Bay Beach. It's a lovely spot.

I caught my first flounder of the year. 

Ryan was first to catch a small turbot,..

...but we eventually all caught at least one. 

For our afternoon session, we drove to Port Logan and headed up and along the high cliffs to the south of it. This was more of an exploratory session as none of us had fished there before. Compared to all the other marks we'd fished, where we literally jumped out of the car and started fishing, this was going to require a fair bit of climbing up, scrambling down, jumping over streams, as well as navigating gorse, barbed wire and electric fences!  There was no path along the clifftop which slowed our progress in places, but it was a pleasant afternoon, we took our time, enjoyed the views and after an hour or so we eventually found a place where the gradient was shallow enough that we could get down to fish. 

The cliffs were massive and most of the sea was inaccessible. 

A fall near the edge would no doubt have proved catastrophic. 

Eventually we found a spot where we could get down to the rocks with relative ease.

Unfortunately, for all the effort we put in getting along to this spot, it only produced one fish, a small pollock that Ryan caught almost straight away. There was a large pod of dolphins in the area, so that may have had something to do with the lack of fish. Despite fishing with bait rods and lures, none of us caught anything else after persisting for a few hours, so we packed up, climbed back up to the clifftop before making our way further south still along to Clanyard Bay. From there we cut inland and followed some B roads back to Port Logan.

The sandy shoreline of Clanyard Bay. 

So, a fairly productive trip, during which I’d added nine species to my 2023 tally. Nick, Ryan and I had a good laugh and caught lots of fish. The mark we found north of Clanyard Bay is definitely worth another visit. I had high expectations of the fishing there, but it wasn't to be. Funny how we caught way more fish at the easily accessible marks! I've caught grey gurnards, tub gurnards, plaice and short spined sea scorpions whilst boat fishing in the area in the past, so I know there are fish there to be caught. It was also great to catch up with Gordon again too, and we'll be fishing together again tomorrow. We’re going to try and target some unusual mini species in Scottish sea lochs from his SIB. I'm really looking forward to it!

Tight lines, Scott.

No gold but happy with silver.

I popped down the coast on Sunday evening for a few hours to try and add to my Scottish saltwater species tally. First I visited Gullane Bents to try for lesser weever and turbot. Armed with a set of sabiki and a small tub full of little chunks of bluey I spent a couple of hours wandering along the beach as the tide started to flood. My baited sabiki attracted no interest whatsoever so I headed further down the coast to Torness Power Station outflow to try for golden grey mullet. My groundbait soon attracted a small shoal of fish and freelining a tiny piece of bluey on a #18 hook saw me land my first ever Scottish sand smelt. 

Sand smelt are easily identifiable. They have a dark green back and a very shiny silver "thread" that runs inside the length of their almost translucent flank. Good eating too when fried whole in a light batter I'm told but you'd need to catch quite a few to make a meal of them.

I caught three more before setting up a bolo float to target golden grey mullet. Adding more groundbait eventually saw some mullet arrive but judging by the size of the disturbances on the surface as they attacked larger pieces of floating bread I think they were thick lipped grey mullet. None of them were tempted by my hookbait and after an hour or so with no sign of any golden grey mullet and my groundbait all used up I called it a night. At least one more trip to Torness Power Station outflow on the cards then. 

Tight lines, Scott.

South Coast and Channel Island Fishathon Part 1 : Dorset.

When my mate Ross, a species hunting addict like myself, told me that he had booked the charter boat "Bite Adventures" out of Penzance for three days I immediately reserved myself a place on it. Ross is currently living on the channel island of Alderney and would be flying over for the boat trips so I thought it would be good to go back over with him after our three days afloat for a few days on Alderney. With the makings of a  bit of a "fishathon" shaping up I decided to head down a couple of days before the boat trips making my little jolly eleven days long so I set myself a species hunting target of twenty five including five new ones.

On Sunday the 22nd of June I set off at 6:00 and headed to Weymouth. I was supposed to be picking up Ross and his boss Mark from Southampton Airport late on Monday afternoon but as it turned out Mark shipped his car over so I would just meet them and the other four lads who were going out on the boat along in Cornwall. Anyway, I arrived early in the afternoon and after parking the car walked through town to the promenade and checked into my hotel, passing the charter boat "Flamer IV" and a few large thick lipped mullet on the way.

I have fond memories of my time aboard Colin Penny's excellent charter boat last year.

Mullet are great fighters. If you can hook one!

Not wasting any time I got my ultra light gear out of my suitcase and headed straight down to the pleasure pier. As it was Armed Forces Day the promenade and beach was very busy, with a brass band playing and a variety of old American military vehicles on display, their owners dressed in period costumes.

A packed seafront.

One of several old military vehicles on display.

Heading through the crowds I found a quiet spot and got my fishing off to a nice start by catching a small pollock on drop shotted Gulp! Angleworm.

My first fish of the trip.

After a few more pollock I decided to head to another spot and was pleased I had as this quickly produced a small black seabream and a corkwing wrasse. Some kids arrived however and started jumping from the pier into the water though so I moved again to another spot further away from them.

My first black seabream from the UK mainland.

My first corkwing wrasse of 2014.

Working my way to the end of the pier I was surprised to find no other anglers there and after ten minutes or so without a bite I spotted a few over on the Stone Pier. I headed back into town and crossed over Town Bridge before making my way along to it.

The Stone Pier had a few anglers on it. Usually a good sign.

On the outside of the pier there were a few weedy areas and boulders. A few casts into the gaps produced another corkwing wrasse and then I made my way along to the end of the pier. Dropping my Angleworm down the side I was surprised when it was taken by a rather big launce. I continued exploring down the wall and this produced a couple more small pollock and a corkwing wrasse.

I normally catch these using small metals or sabikis. Good old Gulp! Angleworm on a drop shot rig tempted this one.

A female corkwing. Note the abscess. More on that later.

I then decided to change methods and tried a small paddletail on a jighead. Casting this out and slowly retrieving it resulted in lots of missed bites so I switched to a small metal jig. The tail nipping culprits were soon hooked and turned out to be sand smelt. After catching half a dozen of them I switched back to the drop shot rig. A small shoal of juvenile black seabream arrived and I quickly caught a few before they moved off again. It went fairly quiet after that with the odd pollock taking my lure before local angler Andy Mytton, who I'd arranged to meet up with, arrived and we headed back into town to try for some gobies. Andy was using a simple split shot rig, something that I've not used for quite some time. I'm not sure why really but Andy gave my some shot, I set myself up a split shot rig too and off we went. Twitching Isome on his rig along the bottom slowly Andy soon caught a few black gobies and then I caught a rock goby. Keen to add a black goby to my tally we kept exploring and then I caught a leopard spotted goby.

A shade of pink with brown spots, the leopard spotted goby is a very pretty goby indeed.

I was having no luck tempting a black goby and a try at one last spot produced a few more gobies for Andy and two more leopard spotted gobies for me. By now it was getting dark however and it had been quite a long day so I thanked Andy for meeting up with me and headed back to my hotel. It was good to meet up with Andy and I was grateful that he had reminded me that sometimes keeping things simple is best especially for very small species like gobies.

On Monday morning I got up, had breakfast and checked out of the hotel. With the whole day free to fish I headed along the coast to Swanage Pier, one of my favourite places to wet a line. I've been there a few times now and it never fails to deliver tons of mini species.

Swanage Pier. I love it!

Armed with my ultra light gear, half a pound of ragworm and a scaled down two up one down rig tied with #10 wormer hooks I had a fantastic fun days' fishing. If you get your tackle right you can catch a lot of fish and in that respect I'd liken it to fishing at a freshwater commercial fishery. The usual suspects were all caught.

Colourful corkwing wrasse.

Cheeky tompot blennies.

Little ballan wrasse.

Weird common dragonets.

Ragworm munching rock gobies.

I also usually catch a few Baillon's wrasse but sadly none seemed to be present. They are a very pretty wrasse. Black faced blennies are another unusual species that have been spotted under the pier by divers but as with my previous visits to the pier none were caught. Not one to give up I hope to go back there with my mate Lee at some point later this year to try again to catch one of those. Quite satisfied nevertheless with catching over a hundred fish by the time the pier closed I made the drive along to our accommodation near Hayle in Cornwall and met the rest of the lads who were going out in the boat. I'd met Ed before when he came up to Scotland and caught a 208lb skate. I was introduced to Carl, Craig, Andy and Mark for the first time and I told them about the very enjoyable sessions that I'd had to start my trip with which had resulted in ten species being caught. We chatted about our hopes for the boat trips too and with the first day out on "Bite Adventures" the following day being a species hunting trip the prospect of racking up a few more species and possibly catching some new ones was a very exciting one that we were all looking forward too.

Tight lines, Scott.

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