15/09/2012 - St Abb's Harbour

Delicious

Time - 1030-1600
Weather - Lovely from above, windy from the side
Water - Pretty clear
Method - Isome on a jighead
Tide - Low 0930
Total - 5
Species - Long Spined Sea Scorpion, Coalfish (3), Pollock

The first picture (top right) was taken 20 yards or so from where we parked the car before we ascended to the harbour. As you can see it looks absolutely delightful, the sort of day and location where it almost (almost) doesn't matter whether you catch a fish or not. However we didn't have to worry about blanks for too long.

I reckon it was the last good day of the actual summer although I don't think it was just as nice back up in and around Edinburgh as evidenced by the gloomy skies on our return.

Off the mark with a Long Spined Sea Scorpion

An alternative report can be found here.

Still being firmly in the novice camp when it comes to sea fishing, I've been keenly and rapidly picking up tips and tactical advice from J & H. The journey down was full of interesting snippets regarding things like how much a high/low tide matters, thoughts on gear strength and why LRF is so much more sensible than lugging massive rods and hefty gear about etc.

Beyond the harbour wall

We made our way out along the first harbour wall. The tide was just coming in from low and the clear water made the bottom completely visible. Second cast J connected with a Flounder. If I recall correctly it was 31cm, just 4cm's short of his PB. We were all bumping either Isome or Gulp worm imitations along the bottom on jigheads, however the height of the platform above the sea surface was allowing the persistent breeze to bulge the line and create a bit too much drag resulting in the worm scooting along a bit too quickly. We were also sharing the dockside with loads of people preparing to go out on one of the frequent diving boats and things were getting a bit crowded, so we made off to explore other areas.

Shore view from rocks at end of harbour

Around to the inner harbour wall we were all trying to find the usual goby/sea scorpions or maybe more flatties without much success. Eventually I began enticing some small, thinnish fish which were well beyond my powers of identification. When J & S caught up with me, they were provisionally id'd as Butterfish, but try as we might, we couldn't get one on a hook.

Harbour view

This part of inner harbour mouth was proving quite fruitful though. Aside from the odd crab, I was also getting involved with some other bottom dwellers and got off the mark with a Long Spined Sea Scorpion.

We all got distracted with a landed fish, might have been the Blenny S got, so we'd not paid attention to the water for half a minute or so. J was first back and began chirping excitedly as a whopping great flounder slowly made its way past right in front of us. 10 seconds later it was having to dodge 3 hooks, which it did quite succesfully.

The link above gives J's account of its eventual capture, no need to repeat it here.

Shoal of Coalies (best viewed enlarged)

After leaving the Flounder to J, myself & S made our way round the rest of the harbour but couldn't locate any more fish. After helping J net/return his PB Flounder we made our way out onto the rocks for a while. The tide coming in was well underway now meaning the currents round the rocks were probably a bit too choppy for much success. I tried some more experimentation with plasticene as a weight before opting for some easier fishing again.

Coalfish

Pollock

I made my way back to the harbour mouth where large shoals of Coalies were moving around. Making unbelievably hard work of it, I reckon I couldn't hook one of them for the best part of half an hour before finally getting one, then another the very next cast. After three of these nice wee fish I worked back round to where J was targeting his current obsession, the Corkwing Wrasse. The tide was more or less fully in now and the bottom was no longer visible. After a lot of hard work for no return, I'd pretty much given up. I was still using the Isome (red) on a slightly larger jighead. My tactics now were as simple as casting out, putting my rod down, sitting next to it.

I catch a ridiculous amount of my fish when I'm not paying attention i.e. I've maybe cast out, decided to move a few yards downstream and a fish takes as I watch where I'm putting my feet. Well my rod started twitching and when I lifted, I felt a decent weight on the end. J suspected I was into a flattie, but when it came to the surface we saw it was a nice Pollock. It's bottom lip took it to 16". A new PB. Excellent.

Pollock again

So five fish in total for my good self. All species I'd previously caught though which was 1% annoying, easily outweighed with a PB. A very decent day for J who was made up early doors with that Flounder even if he couldn't get a Corkwing while S invoked his handy recent habit of getting a fish very late on when he enticed a final Long Spined Sea Scorpion.