The past couple weeks the weather has improved drastically and the waters have been warming fast. As a result, the fry has filled the shallow bays and some summer species made an appearance... It's amazing to note how much some sunshine speeds things up! Sandeels are in and that makes pollock very picky at this time of year thus I turned my attention to lighter targets, namely flounders and wrasse. I was intending to do some freshwater fishing, but the swarms of midges that also came along with the heat, put me off a bit..!
The flounder show up in a couple small harbours in the South part of the island and they're usually pretty aggressive. I used and LRF setup with 3-6g cheburaskas and fat micro pilkers with a #6-#10 hook rigged with Isome or Jackall Peke Peke/Ring.
I suspect the intense sunlight made them more cautious than usual and they were harder to tempt, but with a little persuasion a few came out for a pic!
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| LRF in the sun! Nothing better! |
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| Such cool fish! |
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| Crystal clear! |
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| On a micro pilker tipped with isome worm. |
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| Saw this one take the lure... |
Then it was the wrasse's turn! I was actually fishing for pollock in a shallow mark but they were ignoring my lures for the most part... As I brought the shad over a rocky ledge I saw a shape following it and gave a couple jiggles to the lure. The fish hit and I struck to a plump wee ballan. I recast again and saw another one hit but I struck too fast and startled it...
In the end, I had a couple more casts at the pier and got another smaller ballan.
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| First ballan for 2018! |
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| Fussy pollock... |
Later on the same day, I targeted a much deeper mark hoping that the cuckoo wrasse would show as well. It took a while but I was rewarded with a good sized male cuckoo in full spawning colours. It hit very aggressively OTD on a Texas rig with 28g tungsten bullet weight, #1/0 offset rigged with a 4" slim paddletail.
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| Just stunning! |
Will be making a wee vid of some of these catches and really hope this fantastic weather lasts abit longer!
Tight lines!
Gear used
Rod: MajorCraft Solpara SPS-S792M, APIA Foojin'R Best Bower 96MLX,
Reel: Shimano Stradic 1000Fc, Stradic FK C3000
Mainline: Duel Hardcore x4 PE0.6, Duel Hardcore X8 PE 1.2
Leader: Toray Excellent fluorocarbon 6.8lbs, Daiwa Tournament FC fluorocarbon 20lbs
Lures: Various
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