May-June 2013 Update - Various Locations

The reef at Torness at low tide

The lack of blogs has coincided with a new job but that doesn't mean I've not been wetting a line whenever I've had the chance. Rather than update loads of trips individually through a hazy memory into individual blogs, I'm going to roll them all into this one blog and provide details where I can recall them. Here goes.





St Abbs Harbour - 18/05

After some success with Pollock I was keen to return to the Harbour, but the weather wasn't playing ball.

Driech personified

It was raining when I arrived, requiring me to take shelter in some old outbuilding whose door opened when I was trying to keep dry.

Once the rain stopped, the wind made things difficult. An explore all round the harbour bore nothing and I cut the session short.

But not before discovering a seemingly abandoned gulls nest.



Loch Lubnaig/Falkirk Wheel - 23/05

Keen to give Lubnaig a shot I headed up for an evening session.

There are two permits for opposing banks and I opted for the western side which is looked after by the Forestry Commission. Knowing there are Perch as well as brownies and Char I decided on the spinning rod which was just as well as the wind was a little too stiff for casting flies.

I covered a fair amount from the southern tip upwards but didn't find a thing. In the face of the incessant wind I decided to cut my losses and head off home.

The Falkirk Wheel - we're not all trams and parliament shambles

Not content with one blank in the evening, on the way back I decided to have a quick thrash in the basin at the Falkirk wheel. Nowt.


Union Canal - 24/05

Heading out with all my kit but not quite knowing where I'd end up, I finally alighted at the Union Canal just to the west of Edinburgh at a spot known as Wilkies Basin.

Nice day for it, but no fish

I've heard of Pike being taken in here and had an offer once from a wee jack, but otherwise it's really living up to the tag 'looks better than it fishes'.

As usual I fished the entire stretch but couldn't find a fish. But I'm sure it'll get another visit at some point.


St Abbs Harbour - 30/05

In much better conditions I gave St Abbs harbour another go.

A bit more like it

The Coalies are as good as bankers here with a chance of all sorts of other fish like Pollock, flatties, Wrasse and many more no doubt.

I was in straight away at the harbour entrance and quickly hauled three small Coalfish up next to me.

Sample Pollock

The action tailed off though as the returned fish passed on the message there was a predator about so I began to explore around the outside walls of the harbour. This involves standing even higher and more precariously around the outer wall. I soon found another couple of willing coalies as I progressed around before trying the harbour mouth again from the opposite wall but still no more luck there. On the way back I hooked another wee coalie at the same spot as before making it 6 small Coalfis for the evening.


Dunbar Harbour - 11/06

There is a corner in Dunbar that I've been reliably informed held flatfish from 2 or 4 different species.

First ever flattie

I arrived at Dunbar intent on breaking my duck with these weirdly formed fish and found conditions to be excellent. I could see all the way to the bottom on a rising tide and began twitching some Isome along the bottom.

Second ever flattie

Soon I felt a little tremble and was into a fish which turned out to be a Flounder. I followed this up 10 minutes later with another and growing in confidence I almost immediately felt another bite. Expecting another flattie I was amused to find I'd connected with an aggressive wee Long Spined Sea Scorpion with two tone markings. He went back to patrol the deep and quite soon I lifted out my third Flounder.

Peculiar fellies

There were to be no more though so I decided to explore around the other side of Dunbar Castle to see what if anything it offered. I drove round to West Barns and started following the Biel burn for the mile or so until it joins the sea.

Likes his Ska

There were scores of small trout about, but nothing to get overly excited about.

Flounder number 3, come in, your time is up

Unless you're a Heron. I followed the stream all the way down to the sea and suspect it will be good for flatties or finnock in the right conditions.

Fish munching machine at work

Torness/Dunbar Harbour - 17/06

Spoiling for some Blenny action I went down to the outlfow at Torness and found I had the place to myself at low tide. I explored the whole reef but only located the odd fish in a couple of pools and couldn't get any to take my Isome.

The quickest Blenny in the pool

By the time I reached the breakwater another guy with standard Bass gear had appeared. As I lobbed my Isome down the hole next to the rock he was on, some Blenny action finally began. About 3 or 4 very decent Blennies came charging out with about double that number of small ones all looking to take my bait. Thinking a biggie had it, I struck and pulled out a little booger. Releasing him into another pool, I was back in the same spot.

PB, 6 inch Blenny

Again there was plenty of action. This time I managed to hook one of the bigger ones, probably not the biggest, but a full 6 inches long. Definitely a new PB. After a few near misses, the bigger specimens seemed to have grown a bit more suspicious and showed themselves a lot less.

The wee ones were beasting my Isome, although in time they too became more suspicious and I had to be more patient. I rebaited with a new piece of Isome and chucked the old shredded piece into the same hole, watching as it slowly sank. An inch or two off the bottom it provoked a renewed frenzy and a little bulb went on in my head.

With the weight of the jighead, my bait was plummeting to the bottom and taking them a wee while to work themselves up to the take. So I  lowered my hook into the water as if it was slowly sinking and it was met just off the bottom by a frenzied Blenny mob. I ended with 6 Blennies before it was time to head up the road to Dunbar where I was meeting a few mates later after their work for a session in the harbour.

Bonus Flounder

Arriving first I was able to pull another flounder out of 'flattie corner' and also lose a flatfish that was about the size of a limpet. Then a choir turned up and began singing Moon River. Can't say that happens too often whilst fishing.

Jolly entertaining

I then went to the rocks outside the harbour mouth to see what was about. Immediately I hooked into something half decent and was delighted to find a Coalfish measuring 14 inches. Another of the same size quickly followed, then another smaller one.

Example Pollock

After the initial success, the big ones seemed to move away, but I still managed to catch and release 7 in total. One last hopeful attempt was made on flattie corner without success as I happily toddled back to the car and headed home.

Rock in the sea with birds on it

6 Blennies, 1 Flounder and 7 Coalies.


Eliburn 26/06

First Rudd for a while

My first visit to Eliburn for about 3 months came about after H requested an evening session to use up some leftover maggots. Notoriously difficult to raise in the AM, this suited me fine. We arrived to find nobody else fishing and quickly set up at my favourite peg.

In no time we were under assault from the Perca Perca. On occasion the Perch Army would let a maggot slip through their cordon and we'd snaffle another species. I caught a couple of Roach, an Ide and a bonus Rudd, first one for a couple of years, with the rest of my 15 or so fish being Perch. Hutch motored off into the distance with over 50 fish, around 40 of whom were the stripy anger merchants.

Ducklings providing some fun

An excellent wee session, but once again, as Hutch mentions in his blog of the day, we were left scratching our heads at the blank experienced by 3 boys on the opposite bank. To reiterate, we were under assault by the Perch. I fail to see how it would be possible to blank in there in those conditions short of using a ships anchor as a hook. And even then...Genuinely perplexing.

23/10/2012 - Torness

A numbers game

Time -
Weather -
Water -
Method -
Total -
Species -

For the second night in a row we headed to Torness. H was still in hot pursuit of a Conger whilst I'm still at the stage I'd be quite happy to get bothered by a crab.

On the way to the mark we were treated to the sight of a Barn Owl hunting on the open ground between the sea and the power station. The last time I was in the Holyrood Park Rangers office getting a permit for Duddingston Loch I'd noticed a pile of postcards which were for people to record owl sightings on and send them off so that relevant ornithologists could do whatever they do with the information. On return I looked up the website and duly reported our sighting. Well worth checking out at http://www.barnowl.co.uk/page24.asp .

With a similar rod approach to the previous evening, I'd topped up my Mackerel bait with some squid this time (Both H & J are like a combination of walking tackle & bait shops) whilst H scaled down from full-on Mackerel flappers to slightly less ambitious sized Mackerel baits.

I'd also purchased some small bell bite indicators which meant the requirement to keep a close eye on the bait rods for movement was much less of an issue. As we began lobbing our lures about hoping for another 6lb Pollock, one of H's rods immediately began tinkling.

More prepared than the previous evening, H had brought a drop net and before long I helped him land another surprise (not a Conger or Cod anyway) in the form of a Lesser Spotted Dogfish (photos through link at end of report).

Whilst that was the sum of all catches on the bait rods, I was in hot pursuit of the shoal of Coalfish that could often be seen passing in pursuit of a shoal of sand eels. Using a dropshot/Isome combo I was having some success whilst for once H couldn't quite get the hang of it. With my Coalfish record haul standing at 6 I powered on until I reached double figures taking my total for both evenings to 11. A quick totting up of H's total's made the final score 12-11 to him although two of them were a muckle Pollock and a doggie. Still, better to catch something rather than nothing. I suspect we'll be back in pursuit of Cod 7 Conger soon enough.

H's account of the session and some better photos accessible here.

22/10/2012 - Torness

Time -
Weather -
Water -
Method -
Total -
Species -

H informed me he had three evening sessions in a row planned over at Torness in a bid to break his Conger duck and I was welcome to tag along. We would be fishing at the same spot I'd seen a Cod landed a day or two before so I was more than happy to exponentially increase my very limited sea/bait knowledge.

En route we stopped into Dunbar Harbour to wet our lines and hopefully see the as yet unidentified fish I'd watched on previous outings allowing Hutch to get a proper ID on them.

The shrimp boats were not long in and unloading, creating a bit of a hubbub. As well as plenty of scavenging gulls there were 5 seals in the harbour helping themselves to any unwanted catch.

Before long H was howking out Coalfish, banking 4 in no time whilst I could only explore the infinite variety of ways of missing fish. A bit frustrated it wasn't long before I had him back in the motor and heading to the intended destination.

I was set up with a pennel rig and a Mackerel bait on one rod whilst I'd use a variety of lures on my second rod. H set himself up with two bait rods using Mackerel flappers in a bid to entice a Conger. He also had a lure rod to keep active in between bait takes.

Very soon H was into a fish which turned into a Pollock I estimated at about 6-6.5lb (later weighed in at 5lb 12oz). We were quite high above the water level, but fortunately the fish tired quite soon and muggins was able to scramble down the rocks and lift it out as the waves threatened to sook it down the side of the breakwater blocks. An incredible and very unexpected start to the evening. He followed this up with another slightly above average (for here) Pollock and another couple a bit smaller to finish with 8 fish in total. Despite doing little wrong and even taking his rod and fishing from the same spot as him, I couldn't connect with even a piece of seaweed before eventually coaxing a small Coalfish ashore to avoid the granny.

The bait rods failed to do their job but we did have a couple of taps, H (typically) getting the biggest tickle but finding nothing on the end when he struck.

Whilst I didn't exactly have a great session myself, I was still pleased for H and delighted to see such a braw Pollock making the journey more than worthwhile.

H's account of this session and the one that followed can be viewed here.

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.

06/09/2012 - Torness

Anyone for some camouflage?

Time - 1230 - 1600
Water - Clear, Low tide rising
Weather - Late teens, nice, but very blustery
Method - Isome
Total - 6
Species - Long-Spined Sea Scorpion, Blenny

With a woeful sea fishing resume I met up with Shogsky & Hutch to sharpen up my sea fishing knowledge and hopefully get ticking off some new species. Their full time shift had began well before I arrived at Dunbar Harbour where a few Pollock had been taken. Being a pretty windy day there were a few unfishable spots so the experts decided to head down to Torness. Jake has his sights set on a specimen Corkwing Wrasse whilst Hutch would introduce me to as many Blennies, Gobys and Sea Scorpions as possible in the rock pools as low tide was around 12.30.

Long Spined Sea Scorpion

In essence, Hutch set-up my tackle, took me to the fish and showed me how to catch them. Can't ask for much more than that. With such expert tutelage I could hardly fail. Quite soon I'd dropped the Isome into a small pool deep under the breakwater rocks. A Long Spined Sea Scorpion (LSSS) immediately took offence at the intruder near its lair, shot out from under its rock and I had a new species under my belt. While these wee rascals look like fully armoured prehistoric throwbacks, they're actually perfectly handleable, although it's going to take me a wee bit of getting used to.

As I increasingly got the hang of things I managed to extract another 5 LSSS, all of much the same size. One was weighed at 24.1g and I'd guess measured between 4-5 inches (I'd left my trusty measuring tape in the car).

Plenty pretty colours underneath

Whilst introducing myself to the LSSS, a few Blennies had also been showing an interest. However I wasn't able to hook any of the blighters despite having as many as 3 at a time showing an interest. When Hutch appeared, dropped his own slightly different set-up (I had a jig head, he had a small hook under a single weight) onto my mini shoal, he lifted out two Blennies in two casts and I demanded we swap rods. A short time later I also extracted a Blenny and had another new species to tick-off.

Blenny

The tide was working its way in now filling up the rock pools and gullies, so we made our way across to where Jake was hunting for his Corkwing Wrasse, so far without success. Myself and Hutch decided to see if there were any Mackerel about and began throwing some lures long. Hutch soon connected with and lost a probable Mackerel before Jake hooked and lost what he suspected was a very nice Wrasse.

Hutch needed to be back in town for 5 so we ended the session at 4 and returned to Edinburgh. After dropping him off and with high tide due at 7, I fancied giving somewhere else a go and headed to the Granton Breakwater. Although still very windy, it was blowing pretty much West to East and so aided casting from the breakwater. However it was getting gloomier with the odd speck of drizzle about.

Caveman painting

With a big silvery blue toby I fished from reasonably close to shore all the way out past the elbow. But without success. There were 3 or 4 other anglers about, but they didn't seem to be successful either. It is a bit late in the season for Granton Mackerel, but you've got to be in it to win it.

I noticed this rather smart piece of art on my return to shore. Just a pity a Mackerel must have been wasted to do it unless the artist has a predilection for the taste of spray paint..

10/08/2012 - Port Seton Harbour

Harbour view on departure

Water - As previous night
Weather - Lovely
Where - East wall
Time - 2030-2130
Method - See text
Total - 0

The weather and tides were similar to the previous evening (tide later, sunset earlier of course) although the breeze was up and the sea had more of a chop about it.

There were three anglers where I'd been on Thursday although the adjacent (east) platform was free so I headed across there. As I arrived I caught up with a local gent who was thinking about setting up too, though he wasn't keen when he heard how scant the offerings had been the previous evening. After a bit of encouragement he attached a silver lure to his rod and immediately hooked into a Mackerel which he returned. He declared early it was from a "shoal of one" and so it turned out.

I employed a new tactic I've been meaning to put into practice for a while. Instead of anchoring Mackerel lures to the bottom with a heavy weight (increasing the chances of a snag), I suspended them (four silver flashed hooks) under a bubble float and weighted them with some plasticene which allows an easy adjustment of the weight should I be able to add bait (Pollock/Mackerel strips etc) to the lures in due course. It also has the added 'bite indication' bonus of using a float.

The other rod used the toby from the previous evening although this was eventually lost low and close in on a sub-surface harbour reinforcement. So I switched to a Flying C which is surely as good a lure as any.

For the last half hour I noticed plenty of small fish close in on the outside of the harbour as well as in through the entrance. Although I couldn't get a good look, they appeared to be feeding, occasionally flashing their sides as they changed angles in the water. I obviously dragged my lure through them a few times, although I seemed to be getting attention, they refused to become hooked.

The fish didn't agree and shunned both tactics. In mitigation, I barely spent an hour at the harbour. I was over half way there when I realised I'd left all my sea rigs at home and cut a good 50 minutes out of my fishing time returning to get them before setting off again.

09/08/2012 - Port Seton Harbour

Port Seton Harbour on arrival

Water - Darkish cloudy
Weather - Lovely, very light breeze
Where - Harbour wall (west)
Time - 1930-2130
Method - Silver flashed hooks, toby and Pollock live & dead bait
Total - 4
Species - Pollock

On my first sortie to the shore in this neck of the woods I didn't get quite as far along the coast as Port Seton Harbour. However a mate who'd fished it previously informed me that the water off the harbour wall is deeper here and therefore makes it more likely to be able to reach fish. He'd previously taken Mackerel without bait.

Looking up the Forth Estuary to Inchkeith Island

The weather (including forecast) was excellent and high tide was about 2040. With aforementioned buddy working til 1730 this made the conditions and availability fit nicely.

The sea was almost flat calm as we could see on the drive down. On arrival there was one dude fishing off the other (east) harbour wall, leaving the west wall to ourselves.

Cockenzie under the clouds

I began with weighted lures (silver foil flashes) chucked as far as I could having been reassured they catch fish here (they don't, in my experience, at Granton). I put a toby on my second rod to 'double' my chances.

Quite early there had been a couple of splashes in the harbour entrance, most likely of some fish breaking the surface. By the time I had my spinner set up, my mate had been at his for a while although he kept connecting with seaweed. I resorted to jigging my toby off the side and soon began getting a little bit of interest from what turned out to be small Pollock. After a while I decided to use these as bait and attached them to the lure rod and chucked them out again.

Not much bigger than plankton

A Pollock with chunks out of it

The newly baited rod attracted some attention. A couple of pulls and plenty of little bounces, but no fish if/when I struck. The Pollock bait was taking a hit though with the usual cartoon bites taken out (The photo isn't the best as I had the rod in one hand, the camera in the other and the fish/bait was spinning and swinging in and out of shot). I'll need to devise a more intricate hook set up to increase hooking chances I think.

Quite late on, there was a flurry of fish breaking the surface in front of us with around 10-12 fish appearing from nowhere in maybe a 20-30 second spell. In this mini-frenzy, my buddy connected with a Mackerel but despite rapid relocating of my rods, they were away almost as soon as they appeared.

His fish was quite thin, but at 15.5 inches was almost as long as my four tiddlers put together.

Sun setting over the Forth

Nothing else was landed, but we left reasonably chuffed. It's always good to get off the mark at a new venue.

Arthurs Seat to the left

In the first sunset photo you can see a small rowing boat (dark blob), this had left the harbour and was doing some fishing a wee bit further out. I'll definitely have to get further down the road to getting myself some sort of fish seeking craft.

Solitary Mackerel (not mine)

19/02/2012 - Cockenzie

Elaborate & brooding wind break

Time - 15.30-16.45
Water - Halfway between high & low tide
Where - Warm water outflow & North Harbour wall
Weather - Breezy and not too warm
Method - Spoon
Total - 0 (zilch)

A quickish hour or so on a mainly investigatory expedition. A couple of boys on the sea side of the bridge over the outflow appeared to be bait fishing with set lines. Another dude on my side using a rubber sandeel under a float on lightish tackle and my good self with a blue/silver spoon. All without success.

Cockenzie Harbour

There was a cormorant coming and going suggesting the presence of something worthwhile. The guy I spoke to had only restarted fishing last year but had been told that the odd bass is taken when they come near to the warm water in the power station outflow.

Otherwise, in June-July a bit of orthodox Mackerel bashing can provide a bit of fun.

With no success at the outflow, I tried the harbour entrance for 10 minutes but the tide was well on it's way out and nothing registered.