Flattie hunt

It was end of the September when couple of friends of mine managed to find few juvenile Turbots from the south coast of Finland. Turbot is not very common species in Finland. There’s few areas where every 20^th flatfish or so could be a Turbot. On the other hand because of their rarity no one is really fishing for them. So it’s hard to tell how much you really could catch them if you would target specifically Turbot.

With a small hint of hot spot from my friend I finally headed for flatfish hunt at October. I started from the small beach they had caught their specimens couple of weeks ago. With a help of my headlamp I was scouring the beach and looking of any signs of the juvenile Turbot. After three hours or so I had not seen any flatties. All I caught was a Three-spined stickleback (only cause it was quicker than me) and I also scooped up couple of Straightnose pipefishes with my bare hands.

Straightnose pipefish (Nerophis ophidion).

I hopped to my car and drove to the next potential beach. I had been there about fifteen minutes and I was just at the end of the beach when I saw a flat and round little fish lying on the bottom. There it was, a Turbot (small one but still a Turbot). When I dropped my little piece of worm first time right in front of it, it took a short sprint away from me. Well, I followed it and tried again. There were absolutely no reactions to my bait. I had decided that I will catch that fish even thought I had to spend whole night trying it. I changed my bait to a red pinkie and offered it to the fish. It tried to taste it immediately but I could not hook it. So I kept trying and finally after few minutes (which by the way felt like hours) it bit again and finally it was mine! How it can feel so good to catch a fish that can fit completely to your palm?

A juvenile Turbot (Scophthalmus maximus or Psetta maxima).

I tried couple of more places in hope of the Flounder but all I could catch was one Sand goby. So I headed back home and was able to go sleeping at six o’clock at the morning.

Turbot on its own element.

Few days later I headed to another small beach in search of the Common goby. The first looks to the water showed that there were plenty of gobies to fish. In this point I have to mention that I was fishing at bright day light. Most of the people hunting for smallest goby species are fishing in dark. I tried to concentrate to the smaller specimens because the “bigger” ones would be most likely Sand gobies. I managed to catch over twenty gobies and at home I found out that there were two Common gobies among them.

Common goby (Pomatoschistus microps).

After these two trips my year count is now on 44 hooked species from Finnish waters plus one “hand picked” species (Straightnose pipefish). Also my all times species count raised to 121 thanks to my first ever Turbot.

100 species from British waters in two years

A Brit angler Trevor Cozens set a challence to catch 100 different fish species from the British waters in three years period. Now, after two and a half years he is finally completed his quest.

What a great achievement. Congratulations Trevor!

You can find one article about his story from here: www.dailymail.co.uk

Mr. Cozens also has his own blog: specieshunter.blogspot.fi

In the last couple of weeks I have been reading his blog so intensively that I haven't updated my own blog at all. Hopefully I can write something new soon.

Late summer carping

After those few trips hunting small species I finally decided to focus on bigger fish. At the southeasterly Finland is one small and really nice looking day-ticket water stocked with Carp.

We drove there with Viljami in the middle of the last week of August. We started with ground baiting and loose feeding, set our boilie rods out and started to fish with match rods baited with sweetcorn. I had my first and only bite almost immediately and landed a nice Crucian carp of 740 grams.

The rest of the evening and whole night were quiet. When the darkness had moved off and we were able to see our floats again we dropped our sweetcorns to the water. I had nothing happening at my swim but Viljami had constant bubbling at his swim. He had several bites but it took few hours until he finally hooked a fish. It was his first ever Carp. Not a massive fish but a nice specimen of over three kilos. And about ten minutes later he hooked another one a nice looking fully scaled mirror carp of bit over two kilos.

Viljami is playing with his first ever Carp

And here's his second fish. What a nice looking creature.

We tried a while more and I even moved to Viljami’s swim in a hope of Carp too. But nothing else happened. We headed back home but on the way we decided that we will come back as soon as possible. Viljami had been bitten by Carp fly and I was still missing my Carp of the year.

About four weeks later we were there again. This time we concentrated more to fish with boilies. The dam has a bit deeper area and I had got some tips that the fish had moved there. We had our first run about five minutes later we had casted our baits in. Well, this Carp was smarter than we did and didn’t hooked itself.

Hours went by and we had the next run in the total darkness at then thirty. I missed this fish too but about half an hour later I woke up when two bite alarms were singing together. When I got to the rods there was only one reel running so I hit it and the fight was on. When we got the fish to the landing net was the other reel still giving some line out. So, Viljami grabbed to the rod. First the line was stuck to somewhere but soon it loosened and the fish was still on. We left the second Carp to the landing net, weighed (it was a six kilos mirror), photographed and released my fish and then made the same meneuvers to the other fish. Viljami’s third ever Carp weighed 5,5 kilos.

First fish of the second trip. A nice six kilos mirror carp.

Viljami with a 5,5 kilos Carp.

Quite soon after we got back to the tent came next run. It was my turn again but somehow I lost this fish as well. It felt a good sized fish too. So, back to the tent again. I didn’t sleep at all because everything was soaking wet and it was freezing cold out (and in a tent too) there. At three o’clock at the morning was time again to dash to the rods. This time I hooked the fish and after a short fight a really nice looking common carp was lying at the landing net. It weighed a bit over seven kilos and was released unharmed.

7,14kg.

Our last run came about two hours later. Now it was Viljami’s turn but unfortynately he lost this very good sized fish (of course all the big fish are getting away, always).

At the morning I still managed to hook and land a nice little Carp of 3,2 kilos with a sweetcorn. This was one really successful trip even it was raining all the time and at night there was freezing cold. But the Carp were feeding though we had something wrong at our rigs. We lost more fish that we could land, was it because too small hooks, too short hair-rigs or what? It’s hard to say but something has to be changed for our next trip after this magnificent species.

The mighty Carp was my species number 42 of the year. Next there’s something totally different coming again…

Big Cods and odd little critters (Norway part 2)

Day 4

After an long trip yesterday we decided to make a “short” trip to the nearby waters. Again we started with Cod in our minds. We had a small issue with the weather at the start. There was no wind nor tide current at all so our boat didn’t drift like it should do. Still I managed to catch a Cod over seven kilos and soon after that something big hit my jig. I had changed to my light rod so the fight was quite interesting. It was Cod again and this time my scales was showing numbers as 15 kilos sharp. Wow, what a fish. This was something we came here for. After that the wind rose and we started to get more bites. I caught one more Cod over seven kilos.

15kg Cod with a light rod was fun!

At some point we drove close to shore to catch some baitfish. But instead of Coalfish we found a small (or very fast) school of Mackerel. I caught one and lost another and Jarno caught two of them. After some more Cod fishing we headed back “home” but on the way we stopped to one shallow and sandy bay to some flatfish hunt. From there I caught my second ever Halibut (600 grams beast) and lost another flattie that I didn’t identified. Jarno caught one Dab from there as well. Our mates had caught some nice Cod and Shakey had his small Halibut too. So, now we had caught at least one Halibut each.

Day 5

It was about nine o’clock next evening when we headed back to the sea again. The wind was quite ruff and driving a boat was not a pleasure but we decided still to head to that small bay again. This was our last chance to make a hole days fishing trip until leaving back home. On the way we stopped at one narrow sound that had a nice sandy bottom. While fishing Coalfish for bait I caught one mackerel too. We were actually quite disappointed when we didn’t get any contact with Halibut from there.

It was a quite cloudy when we left from the house.

So, “our” bay was calling again. We started with live baits and flounder rigs but all we could catch was one Dab each and some small Cod and Haddock. At some point I changed my flounder rig to a small pirk and hooked a small Halibut almost immediately. I think it was the same drift when something bit bigger hit my pirk. And soon I lifted a Wolffish of over four kilos to the boat.

Wolffish of bit over four kilos.

It was 7am and because this trip hadn’t been a success so we were leaving back. But what then happens. The sea calmed down totally and sun was showed up for the first time in a while. And we haven’t try to find any little critters from the depths yet. We found a nice looking place. There was about 150 meters of water under us and just next to us it was dropping all the way to 330 meters.

Jarno got his small fish rig ready before I did and soon he hooked something small. What ever it was it belonged to a cod family for sure. Quite soon after I got my rig to the depths I caught the same species too. Later at the cabin we identified those as Norway pout (Trisopterus esmarkii). Jarno caught couple of nice Haddock too. Biggest weighed over two kilos and there was another almost as big as well. I had my heavier gear at the water too and at some point I had a double of a Tusk and a Rose fish. Yippii, my second new species of the day.

Norway pout, my first new species of the day.

The Rose fish (Sebastes marinus).

I didn’t catch anything special anymore, just couple of Cods. But Jarno hooked again something small and when he was reeling it in something much bigger was suddenly on. We thought that a big Cod had taken the small fish at the hook but no. If you wanna see what happened, here’s a video for you…

6,6 kilos Halibut hit a piece of shrimp on a size 12 hook! It was hooked just from the tip of upper lip. The small fish on the other hook got away but for some reason Jarno was not so upset about that. Then it got windier again and I decided to change back to big shads in a hope of Halibut again. First I got only few careful bites from the small Cod but then my rod bended much heavier. The fish took about 20 meters of line on its first run and within the fight it took several other runs too. We both were sure that I had hooked a Halibut. After a long fight I finally gaffed my biggest ever COD. It weighed 18,1 kilos and although it was a big fish it was still a small disappointment as I believed it was a Halibut.

Fighting a Cod, notice my really relaxed facial expression.

Result of the fight, my PB Cod of 18,1kg.

After my big Cod we took couple of more drifts until we headed back to sleep. On the way back we met Darren and Pete who had just came back to fish after a good nights (or days) sleep. At this point is good to know that we had been out pretty much 20 hours nonstop. At their first trip they had caught seven Cod over seven kilos topped on 9,9 kilos.

Day 6

After a short nap of thirteen and half hours I woke up, looked out a window and saw Jarno at the car getting his whip rods ready for some mini species hunt. I ate a quick breakfast and went after him. We ended up to a nearby harbor where was really good looking rocky shore.

After few Shorthorn sculpin I caught a small sculpin that looked somehow different. It had longer spines on the gill covers. There was no other option than Longspined bullhead. Jarno had shouted to me bit earlier that he had probably caught one as well.

My first ever Taurulus bubalis.

I had caught few more sculpins (shorthorned ones) when Jarno again shouted that he had a Lumpfish just in front of him. He offered his mormuska with a maggot to fish and it hit it immediately. Sadly the fish got loose right away and swam further. But about half an hour later Jarno found it again and this time he got it. What a weird looking but somehow beautiful fish it was.

Jarno and his Lumpfish (Cyclopterus lumpus).

At night when all the other went to sleep I left out and went to shore for one more try. I caught a small sculpin right away and soon after that a small and dark head appeared under a rock and swallowed my maggot. Finally a Butterfish (or Rock gunnel) I thought. But when I got it to my hands I noticed that it was not a Butterfish. It was some kind of Blenny with a tentacles above the eyes. Yes, it was still a new species. I continued fishing and soon another kind of long and wiggly fish slithered on my hands. And this time it was a Butterfish. What a dream session this was. I was out about an hour and caught two new species. At the house I found the Blenny from my identification book. It was a Yarrell's blenny (Chirolophis ascanii).

A real surprise, Yarrell's blenny

Species number 120. Butterfish (Pholis gunnellus).

Next morning we headed back south and after seventeen and half hour drive we finally got to sleep to our own beds. This was one awesome fishing trip. Seven new species from Norway plus the Alpine bullhead on the way was much more than I expected. We didn’t caught any big Coalfish but the amount of big Cod surprised us all.

There’s still many species to catch at Arctic Ocean but still I think my next trip to Norway will head much more south…..