March Update

Hello and welcome to the second update to my species hunting exploits, things started off much the same this month as I'm still re-learning the techniques I used to use and trying out a lot of new stuff at the same time.

As you may recall I had previously set my target for The Big Lerf winter league at ten species and I had finished the month on thirteen. Due to this I've decided to amend the target and make it fifteen, moving in increments of five until I either beat the target or the league ends, which of coarse it will have done by the time this post is released.

I started off this month, as I said doing a bit of the same here and there as I was at a bit of a loss locally on what to target, I began by fishing around the old lifeboat museum again on the Quay looking to catch a common goby, these once again proved elusive and I got distracted by some really nice small shanny.

I tried the same spot a couple of nights later this time to be distracted catching around a dozen tiny bass before deciding it would be a good idea to take some time away from that target as I was getting nowhere with it and that was mostly down to me not the fish!

I decided to move along to a much deeper part of the Quay than where I've been fishing for the common goby but it's much more sandy so thought there may be a chance of the target species. I swapped from a 1g to a 2g cheb and carried on with the tanago.

The main reason for the switch to 2g was to make sure I was fully in contact at all times as I was now fishing blind, something I do not like to do with small hooks if I can avoid it, this meant I'd have a better chance at feeling even the smallest bites so I could lift quicker and not run the risk of deep hooking any fish.

Unfortunately once again I wasn't able to pick up my common goby.

I did however manage my first ever painted goby. I struggled to get pictures of the fish but did the best I could, sent them into the guys on the Big Lerf messenger and sat down shaking waiting for the confirmation.

On receiving the confirmation that I had managed another brand new species I'd never seen before I packed up and headed for home. 

I was absolutely overjoyed at this capture as I had been talking to a friend of mine Toby who works at the Christchurch Angling Centre around two days before hand on areas I may pick one up. This one was definitely not on either of our lists but is now for sure!

After this capture I was left a bit lost for a target, as I said I wanted to give the common goby a break for a little while in the only real spot I know, it wasn't until a conversation with Nigel where he reminded me of the fact he had caught pouting on our last session and I hadn't.

It was set then and I was off to Weymouth with him again, I used up the last of the daylight hours on the stone pier trying to redeem myself on the baillon's wrasse to no avail.

Darkness came and I was still struggling to find anything new until I got a "they're over here" shout from Nigel.

Over the next thirty minutes I managed around a dozen pouting and one foul hooked whiting.

It was also here, whilst fishing for the pouting, I saw something I had not seen before, a flounder graciously swimming across the surface, I didn't really want to disturb it but the angler in me took over and I had to try, it showed zero interest in anything other than where ever it was heading and it sunk to the depths never to be seen again.

A few days past by without heading out fishing so I decided to turn my attention back to the common goby, I looked out the window to glorious sunshine and a very low wind I loudly declared 'today is the day' and off I went, on arrival to the Quay the tide was still a little high for what I wanted to do, so I made my way a little further along to try catch a sand goby or two while I waited for it to drop a little more.

This proved unsuccessful as I caught black goby after black goby but they kept me busy during my wait and certainly made the time go faster.

I popped back up to have a look and everything looked perfect, I noticed a small shanny and decided to try for it, I dropped my 3.5g cheb in to position, before it got hit by the shanny something else caught my eye, it was the target!

I moved the cheb slowly along the wall and lifted it out, changed down to a 1g cheb and a tanago, doing my best to keep my eye on the goby. 

I dropped back in as slow as possible and it was nailed instantly, definitely not what I was expecting but I wasn't about to complain!

Species sixteen acquired and I could not have been happier!

After this the guys from The Big Lerf announced a short competition, to capture as many goby and blenny species as possible.

I decided to turn my attention to this for a few days.

First session out I managed to pick up a shanny, a two spotted goby and a black goby.

Later that evening I met up with Steve and Mark from The Big Lerf group in Weymouth and after some advice from Steve, I got to work targeting a leopard spotted goby, this unfortunately didn't materialise, however Jen did manage a nice rock goby. Steve also caught a nice guilthead bream which was great to see.

After a little while other members of the group Tristan and Tyler came along to where we were fishing and stayed for a chat too. One of the best things about this group so far is the great people I've met!

Second and final session for the #gobyslayer competition seen me back out on the stone pier at Weymouth, here I met a number of new guys from the group again and had a good time chatting and fishing. First of all I met Paul and whilst talking to him I hooked one of my favourite species the tompot blenny.

Soon after dropping this fish back a few other members made their way up the pier, Alex, Chris and Ryan. We fished together here for a little while before heading into the harbour where Chris helped me out a lot with trying to find a dragonette which unfortunately I spooked.

I stopped off back where Steve had shown me for the leopard spotted goby just on the off chance it'd be hungry in the daytime but no luck so off I went on the next adventure for the day.

Jen had never been to Chesil beach before so we couldn't leave with fixing that!

Mason absolutely loved it there too, although I expect he liked it more because he got carried up the shingle instead of walking like myself and his mum!

Luckily the few species I had managed over these two trips were enough to see me win the short competition!

That was almost it I had one last trip planned before the end of the month and the winter league. I planned to go to Swanage pier now that the lower section had finally opened. After speaking to Steve again, Nigel and I planned to meet him there early before heading to Weymouth after the pier closed.

On arrival I met Al for the first time who had travelled up from Plymouth, Steven himself had travelled two and half hours to get there as well, it really made me realise how lucky I am living so close.

Before I started fishing it was very apparent the water clarity was dreadful which left me feeling not so optimistic about the hours ahead.

After a few drops in on a 2g jig head with a shirasu looking to catch my first long-spined sea scorpion I had a large pull down and quite a good fight leading me to exclaim to everybody it definitely wasn't the scorp I was after, before grabbing hold of a nice little pollack.

Next drop down I got three really quick taps followed by a pull and then nothing, I reeled in to find the tail of my lure bitten off. I changed it over, dropped back down and quickly hooked a tompot.

During this time Steve managed to pick up a scorp for himself and wow, the colours on the underside were amazing! Shimmering gold with white and black stripes on its fins made it easily the best looking of the species I'd ever seen.

After this we were joined by Martin and Steph, unfortunate timing for them as the fishing seemed to completely die. I think Steph had the best of the fishing for the next hour or so with a corkwing and another little scorp, followed by Nigel starting to get into a few ballan wrasse. Martin picked up a nice tompot and I managed a pair of velvet swimming crabs.... these were absolutely ravenous on the day and all of us had a few, Nigel was counting his and ended up with ten of them in total.

I did manage a lovely rock goby off the left hand side once the city cruises boat had left.

Steve had a few small corkwing wrasse over the wall near to his car and that was that. Unfortunately fishing was even worse once we had arrived in Weymouth so it didn't take long to pack up and head for home which not only marked the end of the day's fishing, it marked the end of the league for me and that also marks the end of this post.

Thank you very much for reading I hope you enjoyed following along with my species hunting exploits. To Ben, Rich and Joe if any of you guys every see this I'd like to say a massive thank you for running such an incredible league it has been so much fun joining in, meeting loads of really nice lerfers and it was exactly what I needed to help get my mental health back on track!

Return To LRF

Hello and welcome to the first post on my new blog, this will be where I post updates on my species hunting exploits, with as much info I possibly can give on each species I catch and tips and tricks I pick up along the way on how to target them. This will be monthly updates on my fishing throughout the year, with the possibility of extra posts about any competitions I enter as and when I do.

The journey here starts in February as I didn't fish at all through January. I have started LRF species hunting again after a long few years out, the decision to do so comes after stumbling across The Big Lerf group on social media, since doing so I've set myself a few targets for the year as well as a target for winter league that is run by the guys over at The Big Lerf.

My targets for the year are six fold, I have 5 target species, some of which are fish I've caught in the past but not on lures, these are flounder and gurnard, (any species will do, locally most likely tub), also fish I've not managed to catch at all, these being sandeel, mackerel and leopard spotted goby. The sixth and final target for the year is to find and catch twenty-five total species.

My target for the winter league was set at 10 species. This may seem low but as stated previously its been years since picking up an LRF rod and I was unsure what species I'd find in the winter and I only have two months to fish before the end of the competition.

To start my fishing I went back to what I knew fairly well and headed to Poole Quay, with a very minimal amount of tackle in my bag, enough to set up a split shot rig and a drop shot rig which used to be my go to rigs for most fishing there before.

Starting off on the drop shot at the old lifting bridge end I managed to pick up a black goby quite quickly, this had my confidence level flying high, after this fish I made the decision to move along to an old shed type building which my son Kieran named goby City years ago due to the number of them that used to be present there.

I switched to a split shot rig as I seemed to remember we used to pick up a few sand goby here. Once again it didn't take too long to find a few fish, starting off I had a couple of bites I didn't connect with, followed by a couple more black goby, after which I decided to cast a little further away from the harbour wall and this did the job.

I decided after this fish to switch back over to the drop shot to see if I could connect with whatever was biting that I couldn't hook at the start in this spot, after a few more rattly bites that I wasn't connecting with, I scaled everything down and finally manage to get attached to the fish which turned out to be a micro bass.

This was a great end to my first day returning to LRF. I made the decision on the way home that I would head back down in the morning to the old lifeboat museum end and see if I could tick off a rock goby. 

I always used to find a few of them around the stairs near the ramp down to pontoon where a lot of anglers board fishing boats before heading out for their day trips. I had to wait a little while on arrival as I had slightly miss timed the tide but I didn't waste the time. I spent it looking around for snags and also any little holes that may hold fish.

Once there was enough water I set about fishing a drop shot rig for my quarry which thankfully I hooked on the second drop as the weather took a turn for the worse.

With the fish photographed and safely returned back to its watery home I decided to call it a day and head home before I got too wet and cold.

On returning home I spent the rest of the day looking around for local marks, researching new rigs and potential species to target in the future.

Later on that evening I decided to head back down the Quay with a sand smelt in mind, this one turned out very tough going, I managed one eventually on a split shot rig once again.

My next few trips were spent fishing down a mark known as the dogleg groyne at Midway Path in Sandbanks. 

This is somewhere I've fished a few times in the past although only with beach rods and bait.

First trip down there I dropped a split shot rig in amongst the rocks, there was no target in mind, it was more just to see what was around if anything at all.

A really nicely marked corkwing wrasse was the first fish out and species number six for my tally this year. 

It was later this evening I discovered the existence of The Big Lerf podcast which I ended up listening to around a dozen episodes back to back. I took various note on different species and techniques. I also heard of a few good LRF tackle dealers and placed a few orders.

Later in the week I set off back down the dogleg groyne, this time armed with a bag full of fresh tackle and a brain full of new ideas.

I started off fishing a 3.5g cheb to a size 12 jig hook, as per recent trips the first three fish out were black goby along with a rock goby, these were followed up by species number seven and one of my all time favourites the tompot blenny.

These fish are unmistakable to me, the swift bite followed by the fastest dash into cover, I don't think any other fish has ever snagged me more!

I then had another flurry of various goby species not adding anything new until I bumped into a fish not too dissimilar in size but hugely more aggressive. This fish known as the shanny (common blenny) was a very welcome break to goby species, that is until it bit me haha!

After this I decided to head to the next groyne down the beach towards the Sandbanks chain ferry.

This move proved to be a very good choice as the first drop in resulted in a nice little pollack, elated I carried on fishing catching numerous more tompots before heading home.

Later on this evening I had a phone from my brother in law Nigel to see if I wanted to head to Poole Quay to which I of course said yes, this turned out to be another good decision as I picked up an beautifully marked ballan wrasse.

After this fish I decided to give fishing a metal jig a go for the first time and after a fair few cast, I finally hooked into a fish, after a very fun battle a really nice bar of silver slipped over my landing net.

Definitely not the biggest bass I've ever caught but for my first ever fish on a metal I left for home a very happy angler.

The following morning seen me up early and on my way back down to Poole Quay, this time armed with nothing more than a pouch of one and two gram chebs, a few packets of tanagos and a pot of isome, the target a common goby.

I didn't manage the target as I allowed myself to get distracted by a different goby species all together, I managed to put a couple of lovely looking two spotted goby in the viewing tank or in this case an empty Ferrero Rocher pot (I didn't eat them all myself I promise haha).

Elated off this capture as once again it was my first ever of the species I decided to head home and end the session on a high note.

A few days past and I recieved word from Nigel that he'd caught a couple of goldsinny wrasse in the Quay, as soon as he had told me I knew exactly where to head for them as I used to only really find them around the ladders near the yellow harbour tour boats.

I went down that evening with Nigel and his partner Sarah, we started off fishing near the old bridge and worked our way towards where I thought my quarry would be. It didn't take long however for Sarah to catch a few of my target in a completely different area. 

At this point I couldn't hold my excitement anymore, I loudly announced that 'I'd be right back' and off I went to the bright yellow boats. I dropped my snooded drop shot rig into the edge right against the first ladder I came too, the weight hit the bottom, I tightened up and.... nothing, at least for a few minutes before a really fast pull down, that was it I was connected to my target for the evening.

After photographing this fish with my winter league card I admired it for a moment and sent it back to its watery home. This is by far my favourite species of wrasse that we get regularly in the area.

It did however get me thinking of another species that we do get in the Quay but are much less common, although with an hour long drive we usually find plenty of them, this being the baillon's wrasse. 

Nigel didn't take too much convincing at all about organising a trip there that coming weekend. 

Over the next few days we sent numerous messages back and forth and the odd phone call too and had a complete plan of action in place ready for when the day finally came. (It was only three days but felt much longer). 

On arrival to the Pavilion carpark we got all our gear ready and set out on the walk to the stone pier near Nothe Fort, this was where I intended to catch my next Wrasse species, the idea was to fish there until dark for the baillon's wrasse then on dark target some pouting before heading into the harbour to try for a flounder, well for me none of those three species showed themselves.

Nigel on the other hand managed a baillon's and a few pouting. Next stop was back to the carpark to try over the wall tarwards the beach for some whiting, first cast I hooked and lost one at the wall and by this point I was thinking it was not going to be my night. 

I took a minute to compose myself and laugh it off with Nigel and made my second cast, there it was again the same tap, tap, tap and pull, once again I was connected to my whiting although this time I got it up and over the wall ready to have a picture with my card.

This was my last trip of February and the capture seen me finish on thirteen species, I could not be any happier with how well the first month of my return to LRF has gone to be honest!

I hope this was an enjoyable read for you guys and I hope to see you back again next month. I'm planning on getting monthly round up posts done on the 1st of each following month, (this one is a bit late as the decision to start the blog was made quite late in the month), this will be sporadically supplemented with other posts about rigs and species as I learn enough to pass on.