Fish and molluscs from my holidays in Greece!

As in last year I managed to spend almost a month back home in Greece! I went along with my girlfriend at the end of December and returned yesterday night. Similarly to last year my fishing time was greatly overestimated (girlfriend and too many friends and relatives 😁) but the variety of species was pretty good.
First off I had some LRF sessions in the local harbours and rockmarks of N. Iraklitsa, N. Peramos and Kavala. The weather was fantastic for the duration of my stay, in stark contrast with the polar-like conditions of the year before...
I was surprised to find many 'summer' species still around and large shoals of baitfish close in.
Unfortunately on my flight to Greece, my LRF case was stolen (!) and I had only very basic gear left... Thankfully that included a small bag of cheburashkas and some jigheads. I had some soft plastics and of course Isome and Gulp sanworms, with the latter proving the most successful bait...

A good fighter on the LRF...

Beautiful striped seabream

Weevers over sandy bottom...

Hungry goby.

The ubiquitous painted comber!

like a mirror...

This winter weather was fantastic!

While LRFing over a rocky point I noticed baitfish shoals moving about and fishing boats close to shore trolling. I wasn't sure what they were fishing for and started casting some metals on the heavier gear I had with me... I then decided to put on a topwater and picked a Lucky Craft Gunfish 95 as dusk was approaching. After a few casts I started seeing splashes and hits on the topwater from multiple fish and with a few more casts and missed strikes I managed to connect with a fish! It jumped a couple times but was soon brought on the rocks and it was a small bluefish!

Been a long while since I caught one of them and was gutted that the Gopro had no battery!

Baby bluefish were close in.

My next fishing outings took place in Southern Greece at the lovely town of Ermioni with my fishing buddy Stelios. We chose Ermioni as it offers a good variety of targets and also because my friend's contacts reported meagre results in Poros (our first choice). 

We mainly night fished and concentrated on squid and cuttlefish and also false scad.

The mollusks were more forthcoming and again it was a while since I had done any 'eging' to target them. Thankfully Stelios had an endless variety of squid-jigs and we had a lot to play with!

Most of the squid were small but my friend got one of over 800g while I got half kilo one as my largest. Moreover I managed to catch my smallest ever mollusk, a tiny musky octopus (μοσχιός)! Some cuttlefish and an octopus raised the species count for mollusks to 4...

Later in the night it was time for scad and we used 6-10g darting and Gamakatsu range swimmer jigheads with 3" Sluggos and Tiny Xlayers. The fish were not tightly grouped (possibly as there wasn't much fry in the harbour) and after covering the area with the softplastics we thought to try small metals to try deeper. Metals are not a lure I tend to use much at night but for such aggressive fish they can actually be very effective, especially if they have some 'fluo' on them. The only drawback to the metals was that they came with too small a treble and I had no assist hooks with me. This in combination with my rod having a stiff tip meant that I lost a couple fish. 

It was interesting to note the size of these false scad with all of them being descent fish...

Squidlet...

Cuttlefish...

A tiny musk octopus!

Octopus..

Plenty of them around..

Lovely colour..

They put up a good scrap when bigger..

False scad.

Predators of the night..

At dawn we would move at a nearby rocky point and target barracudas with jerkbaits. A pattern that seems to get results very often as the cudas target passing fish high up in the water column at that time. To be honest the results weren't that good and I only managed to get a couple small fish but they're such a cool fish even small! 

After the sunrise I fished softplastics and metals near the bottom and this resulted in a few small golden groupers.

Cuda at dawn on Duo Tide Minnow Slim.

A small cuda..

Love groupers!

On our way back from Ermioni we got a text from Stelio's friend in Poros only to find out that he went and smashed the barracudas there! We cant be lucky all the time...

After my return from Athens I started targeting some local harbours and coastal lagoons for bass but unfortunately just when I started finding the fish my time was up!

Used 3"-4" slim paddletails on 10-14g jigheads on medium fast retrieves near sundown for them and would switch to 4" soft jerkbaits on the same jigheads but worked near the bottom when it got dark. Successful lures were 4" Pontoon 21 Attira, 4" Reins Rockvibe shad and Megabass Xlayer.

The presence of bait was always necessary for the bass to be in numbers in the harbour...

Local bass from the lagoons..

...and from the harbour.

Well that was it for my fishing adventures in Greece and I'm now back in Scotland!

Time to see how them pollock are doing...

Tight Lines and best wishes for a productive season!

Gear used.

Rod: Gamakatsu Akilas mobile 80MH, Snowbee Kuroshio 4pc travel LRF rod (05g-7g)
Reel: Shimano Stradic Ci4 2500f, Shimano Stradic 1000fc
Mainline: YGK P.E Line Frontier WX8 Shore Casting Line 150m P.E 0.8 , 14lb,
Duel Hardcore x4 PE0.6
Leader: Daiwa Tournament FC fluorocarbon 18lbs, Toray Excellent fluorocarbon 6.8lbs
Lures: various

Feels a bit more like summer now...

The past week the weather has been pretty good although with variable winds and it finally feels a bit more like it should for the end of July!
Had a late afternoon guiding session on Friday that didn't produce the expected results for various reasons though the brisk easterlies and hungry seals played a major part to that. Thankfully everyone caught and it was also the first session that healthy numbers of mackerel showed up!

Dougie with a nice one.

Jamie with a fish caught on metal.

Adam with another one.

Fished till the sun went down...

The next day I thought to make a dedicated mackerel trip for a nice dinner and headed to my most prolific mackerel-spot. It was almost high tide and as I was squatting to tie my lure I heard some loud plopping noises.. I then realised that the plopping sound were coming from diving gannets and indeed there was a number of them working quite a large area of the bay and diving for what I presume were mackerel as I started getting them from the first cast!
It wasn't as intense as say in a blitz but they kept at it for over an hour, something that indicates large numbers of mackerel there.
I was fishing 20g slow jigs with a teaser in the form of a long shank #8 hook baited with a 2" Gulp sandworm hoping to pick up anything. This rig had no chance of hitting bottom and the double headers were coming in thick and fast!
Closer in I'd pick up pollock and also the first wee ballan of the year! I saw it chase the metal and after a little waggling of the sandworm in its face it took it!

On the teaser.

On the jig...

Hello there..

A lamprey mark?

Didn't manage any more wrasse though, something that I find peculiar.. Even more peculiar was when ending the session and gutting the mackerel, I tossed the guts and heads in the sea but there was absolutely nothing bar a few tiny coalies coming for the scraps! I have done this in the past in different locations and its always a pleasure watching the multitudes of smaller fish (wrasse mainly but also gobies, blennies and little congers) congregating and fighting over the scraps but nothing happened this time....
Anyway, hoping to do some LRF over the coming week and possibly try and find a few ballans.. Moreover there are couple spots I need to be checking out and will also try and get some footage of my Apia and new Gamakatsu travel rod in action...

Tight lines

A wee LRF flounder session.

Yesterday I had the afternoon off and I had a double plan in my mind... I was gonna hit some harbours and jetties with the LRF to see if the mini-species started to show and later on would target Neist with the new rod to give it a workout and see how it behaves.
Thus I drove down to an often overlooked little harbour that is en route to one of my pollock marks, but this time I got the Crostage out and had a few casts.
Started with a 4g cheburashka, #8 hook and a 2" Berkley Sandworm as its a very effective search-bait. It was almost high tide and there was a brisk wind to my face but not too strong so as to affect my fishing.. The bottom was mostly sand with patches of weed and the water clear although with some drifting weed. I worked the lure near the bottom mostly and got a small pollock within the first few casts.. I then started to cast around the patches of weed and work the lure to the base of the harbour-wall, got a positive take and struck. The fish was holding down but soon enough I got it up and it was a lovely little flounder! Its been a long while since I caught one as I don't really target sandy areas that much, but very welcome.
It appeared that it had some company and I kept getting more of them with the sizes getting better. All the bites were pretty hard to miss and positive, with the fish getting well hooked. Kinda reminiscent of perch.. Since there were a few about I changed lure to a Jackall Peke Ring on a 1.8g Decoy Rocket head as I wanted to see if they'd take a 'normal' sofplastic and I have to say it appeared equally effective. I got a decent one after a while that headed straight for the base of the rockwall and managed to cut me off (!) as I was standing further back... Even flounders crash-dive up here! 😲

Oh hello!

Camo...

Flounders are cool..

The lure of choice..

After spending about 30-40mins there, the bite started to slow down and I thought it best to move. I drove to a different harbour then but it seemed to be devoid of life thus I decided it was time for Neist Point and the new rod's test!
Once at Neist I hastily walked to my spot and set up. Tried a couple presentations but as the current was very strong a 25g cheburashka gave the solution, rigged with a 5" Jerkshad.
I paired the rod with the Shimano Stradic FK C3000 and it felt like a good much. Instantly I could feel more bumps and the bottom much more 'defined' than with my other rods. Despite its length it feels shorter and after a while I hooked into a nice pollock that pulled some drag and got the rod in a good shape! It subdued the fish in good time and the butt seems to hold a lot of power. In all very happy with my purchase!

Christened!

Looking forward to some guiding sessions this weekend and using the rod more. In addition Ill be trying to find more areas that might hold flounders up here and generally start using the LRF gear more as its sheer fun of course!

Tight Lines!

Gear used.

Rod: MajorCraft Crostage CRK-T782AJI, APIA Foojin'R Best Bower 96MLX
Reel: Shimano Stradic 1000Fc Shimano Stradic FK C3000
Mainline: Unitika Night Game PE 0.3, Unitika Shore Game X8 PE 1.2
Leader: Toray Excellent fluorocarbon 6.8lbs, Duel Hardcore Powerleader fluorocarbon 16lbs
Lures: Berkley 2" Sandworm, Jackall Peke Ring, Berkley Jerkshad