It was a little after 8 in the morning when Ian and I trundled into the harbour. Rather unusually for NE Scotland the sun was shining and the wind minimal, although there was a slight but definite swell rolling in. We could see Trev and his Icelander 18 just offshore, launched a little earlier to beat the ebb tide. A quick phone call and we completed a rather hairy pickup from the bottom of a harbour ladder and headed out to sea.
I haven’t fished these grounds for a very long time and instead of the normal coddie bashing, we were after it’s tastier cousin, the haddock (IMHO, of course!). I haven’t had these in decent numbers for ages so it was music to my ears when Trev mentioned he was getting haddock nearby.
The marks are fairly loosely defined here, and we drifted over a mix of gritty sand and shell with only the odd snag. Not too far offshore, but in roughly 150 feet of water. After a slowish start we began to pick up fish in reasonable numbers – small codling, haddock and dabs.
We’d a bonus or two along the way – Ian pulled in the only mackerel of the day and a wee scorpian fish, whilst I was very happy to see a small plaice on the end of my line. None of the haddock were big although most made it above the size limit, unfortunately for them!
As the tide slackened off so did the fishing, so we headed a few miles down the coast to give a local wreck and some reefy ground a try.
Fishing here was slow but we managed a couple of decent codling mixed in with the small stuff. The best made about 5lb 12oz, although it looked a bit of a bruiser with its battered tail. Loads of tiny ling, as Trev demonstrated with a double at one point.
A shift back to our original marks as the tide ebbed had us hitting plenty more dab and haddock. I managed a haddock threesome and Ian brought three dab aboard to cement his reputation as the flattie king of the day.
We didn’t leave it too late to head in to harbour, as Trev had to retrieve the Icelander and Ian and I had a fair journey to get home.
Species for the day – cod, ling, haddock, scorpian fish, plaice, dab and mackerel – not bad for the east coast. We didn’t make it to 100 haddock for the day but were getting within striking distance of that number. Loads of dabs too, and a decent sprinkling of small codling and ling.
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Hi Doug, when you launch at Dunbar , Weymouth etc , do you have to pay to use the slips , if so how much please, I am currently selling up my assets and going to tour the uk coast in the spring with my Orkney LL , and need to plan ahead , any help will be appreciated , regards Bryn.
Hi Bryn,
It varies a lot, but Dunbar is £12 to launch. Not many places charge really, as most are well out of the way with no-one to collect money anyway. You’ll find most east coast harbours will charge, if the harbourmaster is around, but only a few on the west coast (marinas might sting you, if you use them). Small harbours also have parking problems in many cases. A problem you’ll find with some slips (apart from finding them in the first place) is that they can be quite exposed in certain wind directions. Some areas have few usable slips – NW Scotland for example – and asking on the Scotland forum of the World Sea Fishing site before you explore an area might be worthwhile.
Cheers,
Doug