A new nemesis?

I had another session at Drumtassie Coarse Fishery on Wednesday, targeting the small Siberian sturgeon that are in their coarse pond again. Chopped worm was the bait of choice, and this was fished over a bed of 2mm halibut pellets. Fishing with two rods for ten hours, I was fairly optimistic I’d catch what I was after, my first ever sturgeon, and coincidently my 96th fish species in Scotland. Things were pretty lively to begin with, when a few small F1 carp and a common carp picked up my bait and got hooked.  

There were quite a few of these little F1 carp in my swim,…

…and this nice common carp too. 

In the afternoon, things went very quiet for a few hours. There were two other anglers fishing and they both packed up and left. Eventually a few fish started biting again, and I caught a couple of bream and a few more F1 carp. 

Mid-flip. This bream didn’t want to lay still for a photo. 

Happy to pose. Some of the F1 carp I caught had a lovely golden colouration.

Just before I used up the last of my bait, I caught another couple of fish. Both were the same species, but sadly not the one I was after. 

The last two fish of the day were both ide. 

The second ide ate my last section of lob worm about thirty minutes before the fishery closed. So, I didn’t end up catching a Siberian sturgeon, and will just have to keep trying until I do. They have been getting caught recently, so I’m sure eventually I’ll get lucky and get one myself. There’s also a solitary large Siberian sturgeon, called Maisie, up in the fishery’s specimen pond that I might have a go at catching. Either way, I won’t be giving up until I catch one!

Tight lines, Scott.

The Environment Agency are aware.

When I saw a post on Instagram recently of a topmouth gudgeon caught in the UK, I’ll be honest, I was quite excited. They’re a pretty nasty little invasive species that have found their way into several waters in England and Wales since the Eighties. They breed four times a year and eat the eggs of native fish, so they’re not a welcome addition to any body of water. Anyway, I’ve always wanted to catch one, so I quickly made some enquiries. Before too long I’d started a conversation with a fellow species hunter named Donny who told me that the Environment Agency are aware of their presence, that the angling association responsible for the water were still permitted to fish the venue, but were no longer allowed to fish matches or use keepnets. Day tickets were available, so we arranged to meet up last Wednesday to go and catch some. As an added unexpected bonus Donny told me that the pond also contained a population of motherless minnow, also known as sunbleak, another non-native species, but one I have caught previously, many years ago.

After driving south on Tuesday night, we visited a local tackle shop the following morning to buy our permits. A short drive later, we arrived at the pond and set about catching some diminutive invaders. It didn’t take us long to start catching lots of them. 

A tiny piece of pinkie on a tanago hook was the presentation of choice, fished under a tiny float. Perfect for small fish with small mouths. 

The topmouth gudgeon seemed to prefer hanging out under floating debris. 

Donny focuses on his tiny float, looking for any sign of movement. Sometimes the float didn’t go under but slowly moved sideways, indicating a fish had taken the bait. 

Before too long, I'd caught my first ever topmouth gudgeon! Also known as the stone moroko.

It was soon followed by a few more. They seem to come in two colourations. One, like my first, with green and purple hues with a lovely pearlescent sheen. The second has silver scales with a black edge, like the one above in my little photo tank.

We fished for a few hours before Donny had to head off, and I fished on for another hour before I called it a day. As well as a few dozen topmouth gudgeon, I also caught a few small rudd, perch and about a dozen motherless minnow.

My first rudd of 2024.

The biggest motherless minnow of the session. I last caught one of these about ten years ago!

I caught my largest topmouth gudgeon of my session shortly after Donny left.

I really enjoyed meeting Donny and fishing together, I was very happy with the way the session had gone, and pleased to have met another tanago rod owner too!

Later in the day, I set off across England in preparation for a visit to a coarse fishery in Lincolnshire the following day. Whilst talking with Donny before the trip, he had mentioned to me there were populations of Prussian carp in a few fisheries there. Yet another non-native species, also known as the Gibel carp and a close relative of both the crucian and the goldfish. The Environment Agency are aware of their presence in the venue I was going to fish, and have also studied specimens gathered from it, confirming their identity. The venue in question is a members only water, but when I spoke to their committee they generously agreed to allow me a one-off visit to target their stock of Prussian carp.

When I arrived last Thursday morning, I was welcomed warmly, told a bit about the history of the venue, taken to a peg that regularly produces Prussian carp, and given a few pointers to help me catch them. I started off fishing maggots on the bottom under a waggler. This produced a few roach, rudd, perch and gudgeon. I love catching gudgeon!

The swim in front of peg nine. Up the left was where I was told to fish.

Plain old gudgeon. Still one of my favourite little fish.

After about three hours it started raining, and I was feeling quite hungry, so I had a break, sitting in the car whilst I ate some lunch. Returning to the peg, I decided to switch over to fishing colourful wafters on a method feeder with 2mm pellets. 

Yummy. Who doesn't like banoffee?

Hair rigged on a bait band. Simple but very effective.

There's something satisfying about a nicely loaded feeder.

Any second now...

I was expecting to have to build up a bed of groundbait before I drew some fish into the area, but on only the second cast, my rod tip twitched a couple of times before being pulled round. A short scrap later, I netted the culprit and began carefully examining it. 

Large scales? Check.
29–33 scales along the lateral line? I counted 31. Check.

Stubby nose? Check.
No barbules? Check.
Silver halo around the pupil? Check.

First ray strongly serrated? Check.
Almost straight or slightly concave dorsal fin. Check.

Anal fin has five and a half soft rays. Check.

A deeply forked tail. Check.

I’d caught my first Prussian carp! Over the next few hours, I caught a few more and a solitary common carp that did its best to get into the vegetation to my left, but I managed to turn it away from them a few times before drawing it over my waiting net. 

A golden common carp.

After catching my twelfth Prussian carp, things went very quiet. I persevered for a while but with a third long drive to do in as many days to get back up the road, I packed up, thanked the guys at the fishery for allowing me the opportunity to fish at their lovely venue for the day, and hit the road. I’m on a bit of a roll at the moment. Adding a Siberian sturgeon to my Scottish Species Tally is my next objective. 

Tight lines, Scott.

Winter woes.

Well, the weather over the past couple of months has pretty much brought my species hunting for the year to a shuddering halt. I have made a couple of attempts at catching grayling on the River Clyde, but sadly I blanked on both occasions. Despite trying various stretches of the water, I just couldn't locate a shoal of fish. In addition, I have visited Drumtassie Coarse Fishery for a couple of sessions, hoping to pick up either my first Scottish barbel or my first every sturgeon. The fishing there was also very hard going. One solitary roach was all I caught on my first outing! I did slightly better during my second trip, catching a few small carp and a perch using both float ledger and method feeder tactics.

One of three common carp I caught. Not the fish I was hoping would munch my maggots and dendrobaena worms!

In amongst the common carp I also caught this little mirror carp. 

I'm not sure if I'm going to manage to add any more species to this years tally given yet another storm system is on its way. I might have another go at catching a grayling if the weather allows it, and I did also fancy a trip down south to target zander. I’m not sure if I’ll manage to squeeze that in before the end of 2023 if I'm honest. We shall see.

Tight lines, Scott.

Species hunting road trip: Northbound pit stop.

Driving back up to Scotland, I had some pinkies left to use up and decided to make another fishing “pit stop”. Whilst out on Flamer IV, Jack had told me about fishery when I mentioned I’d like to catch some pumpkinseed. The fishery he told me about is located in Berkshire, so it did require a bit of a detour, but I left Cornwall early enough to allow a three hour session there and still be back in Edinburgh at a reasonable time. Upon arrival, I spoke to the owner, got a small amount of tackle out of the car and picked a peg that was out of the wind. 

Amazingly, these pinkies had been in the boot of my car for a week and were still going strong!

Setting up an ultralight rod and a reel loaded with 2lb mainline and an insert waggler and a #20 hook at the business end, I was fishing in the margins in no time. It didn’t take too long before a few pinkies being fed into the swim attracted some roach. 

The first species to show interest in my fluoro pinkies. 

After catching about a dozen small roach and some small perch, a shoal of pumpkinseed arrived and after that I caught quite a few of the pretty little member of the sunfish family. Mission accomplished!

Pumpkinseed are so cool! I always think they’re like a freshwater wrasse!

After a while, my float went under and slowly slid away from me. Lifting into the fish, I immediately knew it was something bigger. After about ten minutes of putting the drag on my Legalis LT 2000 reel through its paces and pushing my 1.5lb hooklength to its limit, a nice common carp was on the surface and drawn over my net. 

It was bound to happen when I was fishing with such light tackle!

As you'd expect, all the commotion the carp had made had spooked the smaller fish from my swim, and I didn’t catch anything for a while. It was almost time to hit the road again when my float registered the return of some fish and after a couple more pumpkinseed I got a pleasant surprise when I hooked something slightly larger and a goldfish came to the surface. 

A nice bonus and the last fish of the trip. 

So, my adventure was over, at least the fishing anyway, and it had been both very enjoyable and productive too. I’d added seventeen species to my 2023 tally. In the order I caught them, and with new species in bold, here’s what they were …

1. Greater sandeel/Launce
   
2. Tub gurnard
3. Tompot blenny
4. Black seabream
5. Butterfly blenny
6. Starry smoothhound
7. Baillon’s wrasse
8. Gilthead seabream
9. Common goby
10. Shore clingfish/Cornish sucker
    
11. Lesser weever
12. Giant goby
13. Montagu’s blenny*
14. Atlantic horse mackerel/Scad
15. Blackspot seabream/Red seabream*
16. Pumpkinseed
17. Goldfish

*the first time I've caught this species in the UK.

I've already decided I want to head back down to the south coast next year. There are a few species I've never caught before that I'd like to target down there. I might see if some of my mates want to join me next time. It would be good to share out the driving!

Tight lines, Scott.

The grass is always greener...

I visited Parkview Coarse Fishery again earlier this week to have another attempt at catching my first Scottish barbel. Maggots, hard on the deck, under a waggler float was the approach taken, fished over some halibut and hot tuna ground bait. 

My bait of choice for the session. 

The fishing was very slow. To be fair, I was prewarned it would be when I paid for my day ticket. The only fish that seemed interested in my wriggling hookbait were tiny perch and the odd blue orfe. After several hours I finally hooked something a bit bigger in the shape of a small common carp. It may have been relatively small, but it actually put up a decent little scrap on my 10ft float rod.

Another nice looking carp from the venue. 

Just after returning the carp, the owner of the venue came around and asked me how the fishing had been. I told him it had been tough going and that I was after a barbel. He quickly checked some records on his phone and told me that eighty seven had been stocked into the pond in total, of various different sizes. He also happened to mentioned that some grass carp had also been stocked into the venue as well. I thought he might have been somehow mistaken about that, but didn’t say anything. A few hours later I was pleasantly surprised when I caught, you guessed it, a juvenile grass carp! 

Small but perfectly formed. My first ever grass carp!

Not the fish I was after but a most unexpected and welcome addition to my Scottish species list nevertheless, edging me one closer to my target of one hundred! Also, it was my 100th new species of 2023 so that target, set at the start of the year, has successfully been reached with several months to spare! I ended the session not long after catching the grass carp. The fishing might have been difficult, but I’ll be no doubt be back again soon for yet another session targeting barbel. 

Tight lines, Scott.

My new Scottish nemesis?

Having caught a Scottish three bearded rockling earlier this year, a species I spent many years unsuccessfully targetting around Scotland, I think I might have potentially discovered my new Scottish nemesis. The barbel. I've had a few attempts over the years to catch one at various coarse fisheries in Scotland, and have failed to catch one every single time. I recently had another attempt at Parkview Coarse Fishery in Fife and failed yet again. On the bright side, I did catch my first tench of the year, on a method feeder baited with double sweetcorn and loaded with Sonubaits' Fin Perfect 2 mm pellets.

I love tench. One of my favourite UK freshwater fish species.

I also caught several bream, some also on double sweetcorn fished on a method feeder and some on triple maggot fished on a float ledger rig. For some reason I thought I'd caught bream already this year, so I didn't take any photos of those. When I got home and checked my records, it turns out they were also my first of 2023, so in one respect it was actually a successful session. I also caught, but didn't take any pictures of, dozens of tiny perch, roach, blue orfe, ide, or a hybrid either. I did take a photo of the only carp I caught. With its chunky shape it looked a little bit like an F1 carp but upon inspection after it unhooked itself in the net, it had four barbules around its mouth which F1s lack.

Just a chunky little common carp.

Another fish with four barbules was my target.

Of course, I realise that whilst fishing at coarse fisheries that have stocked them, catching a barbel is more or less just a numbers game. Apart from fishing on the bottom it’s lucky dip really and usually the numbers are heavily stacked against you. All things considered, it’s still got to be easier than catching one from the River Clyde? Surely?

Tight lines, Scott.

These aren't the cyprinid you're looking for.

My mate Callum caught a small barbel recently at Parkview Coarse Fishery near Cupar in Fife. It's a fairly new venue and on Tuesday last week I headed there to try and get one myself. It would have been a new addition to my Scottish life list, but unfortunately I didn't manage to catch one. Fishing maggots under a waggler for the majority of the day I did catch lots of small perch and a few roach. I also caught ide and their ornamental variants, blue and golden orfe.

My first Scottish golden orfe that didn't involve fishing in a corporate headquarter's ponds.

Likewise, the blue orfe I caught were my first from an actual fishery in Scotland.

The backs of the blue orfe had a lovely deep blue colour to them.

I also fished double sweetcorn and 2mm pellets on a small method feeder for a few hours but surprisingly this only produced one small common carp.

A lovely pristine little fish.

Speaking to one of the guys who works at the fishery shortly before I left, he told me that fifty barbel have been stocked into it. I'll certainly be returning soon for another go at catching my first Scottish barbel.

Tight lines, Scott.

Golden warrior.

In June, I turned my attention to catching my first Scottish crucian. After doing a bit of research, I identified two venues that I was confident had some true crucian in them. The first being Loch Dunmore situated in Faskally Forest near Pitlochry and the second Greenhill Fishery near Dalbeattie in Dumfries & Galloway. The first venue is a member's only water, so I joined Dunmore Angling Club and drove up there to have a go. Loch Dunmore is a very picturesque water, it has many large reed and lily beds and lots of pond weed in it too, which I thought might be problematic in terms of locating a swim. When I arrived the first time, I had a walk all the way around the loch to check out the various angling platforms before deciding on one at the northern end of the water opposite the old boat house. It was fairly deep, had a large fishable gap in the aquatic flora and proved to be a good choice as it produced some nice fish. I fished three separate sessions from it over the next month or so, using a very sensitive float and a small piece of corn or single maggot on the hook.

The loch's old boathouse.

The biggest roach that I caught.

The loch has a large head of perch too. Maggot didn't even get to the bottom when a shoal moved into my swim.

The venue has been stocked with tench and I caught a lot of those too over the three sessions, mainly on small corn hook baits.

I then decided to pay Greenhill Fishery a visit, so I spoke to the owner before travelling down. He told me that the crucian had been stocked in 2013, and that it had been a few years since he'd heard of anyone catching one. He also told me that most anglers fishing the coarse pond were targeting the carp and tench on mostly method feeder tactics and would be unlikely to catch any crucian still in there. I decided to go and try my luck with tackle more suited to the shy biting fish. The day ticket Lily Pad Pool turned out to be a lovely little venue, only three-quarters of an acre in size and tucked away in a valley. After a quick walk round and listening to a bit more advice from the owner, I opted to fish a peg that had a nice bed of lily pads in the margin just to the left of it. A sensitive float rig was lowered in just out past them and I soon started catching some cracking tench on small pieces of corn that were great fun on my light float rod.

All the fish were in lovely condition.

Over the next month or so I made four trips down there and also did some feeder fishing as well for the resident carp, which I caught a few of over the sessions. The biggest one however was caught on my light float rod, which resulted in quite a lengthy battle. I had to take my time playing the fish, as applying any kind of pressure would no doubt have resulted in it breaking me off. Great sport though!

Patience was key in landing this lovely double figure common carp. It took a single maggot on a #18 hook tied to 2lb nylon!

About two hours into my fourth session, my Drennan No.1 glow tip antenna float slowly slipped under, I gently lifted into the bite and hooked the culprit. It didn't fight terribly hard and came to the surface reasonably quickly. When I got sight of what it was, I started screaming to my mate Ryan, who had joined me for the session, "Get the net! Get the net!". After a brief nervous moment, when the fish thrashed on the surface as it came towards the net, my first Scottish crucian was drawn over it.

Jackpot! A bit of an old warrior, missing a few scales, but still a beautiful fish nonetheless.

I was absolutely buzzing. It's incredibly satisfying when you set out to catch and then get a tricky target species. Especially one as elusive as a Scottish crucian! By this point, I'd already formulated a plan to get me to my goal of one hundred Scottish species. Having moved one closer, I was ready to shift my focus to a small bottom feeding fish that lives in rocky streams and only comes out to feed after dark, the stone loach.

Tight lines, Scott.

More species hunting fun in Japan : Kumamoto, Kagoshima and Aburatsu.

After arriving in Kumamoto late in the afternoon we went out to explore a bit and ended up going for a walk around the castle's grounds. Kumamoto castle and many of the surrounding buildings and walls were badly damaged by a magnitude 6.2 earthquake in 2016 and are still being rebuilt. Afterwards we found a sushi bar and had a great meal, the gizzard shad nigiri was great but the standout dish was the Japanese omlette topped with tiny sardines. We also had a few beers and spent a couple of hours in a karaoke venue murdering various songs whilst consuming even more beer before eventually stumbling back to our hotel.

Kumamoto Castle being rebuilt.

Gizzard shad or Kohada in Japanese. Very tasty indeed.

Japanese sweet omlette topped with hundreds of tiny sardine fry.

The next morning we didn't have an alarm set but when we did wake up it was to the sound of rain battering against our hotel room window. Undeterred, we were keen to stick to our plan for the day and whilst it might have been wet it was still very humid so we dressed accordingly. Catching a tram, the main mode of transport in the city, we went to explore the Suizen-ji Jōju-en Gardens. Like the gardens we visited in Hiroshima they were very nice indeed being immaculately maintained. One tree in particular had been there for quite some time.

Umbrella and t-shirt weather.

This tree is over a thousand years old.

Later in the evening we visited a restaurant that specialises in horse dishes, something that Kumamoto is famous for. I tried raw horse the last time we visited Japan and thoroughly enjoyed it so we were keen to have some more. Strangely the establishment was named Mutsugoro which is Japanese for mudskipper so I asked one the chefs why this was the case and he explained that when it first opened that was the main food they specialised in. Once again several beers were consumed and a second evening was concluded with a drunken karaoke session.

I had basashi (raw horse) again and I also tried the horse tripe stew as well. Lillian opted to have the grilled horse which was also excellent.

The next morning we hired a car and drove east to visit the Aso-Kuju National Park. As we approached Mount Aso, the active volcano in the centre of the park, we could see huge plumes of smoke rising into the sky and weren't sure if this was something to be concerned about. It turned out that whilst the activity levels were indeed high and a 1km exclusion zone was in effect, this had been the case for some time and the ash clouds were nothing to worry about. Unfortunately however the raised activity levels meant we could not go up any further to see the crater itself. After taking a few photos from a safe distance and visiting the Aso Volcano Museum we hit the road again.

Mount Aso smoking away behind me. This is fairly normal.

For our next stop we drove south west to visit the small town of Takachiho. The gorge running through it was formed by the Gokase River slowly eroding a deep narrow chasm into the volcanic basalt columns that formed from lava that poured from Mount Aso during a very active period in its ancient history. Parking the car we walked along a nice trail following the gorge until we reached the boat hire area, on the way passing a pond that had lots of sturgeon in it.

Visitors row boats in Takachiho gorge close to a waterfall.

No fishing allowed sadly.

Down in the gorge the scenery was stunning.

After hiring a boat ourselves and rowing up and down the gorge we walked back the way we'd came to the car and drove to the final stop of our road trip going north again to visit the picturesque Nabegataki Falls, a waterfall that you can walk behind.

This photo really doesn't do the falls justice. They get lit up after dark too but sadly we had to get the hire car back by 19:00.

Driving back to Kumamoto we were making good time but as we got further into the city the traffic got heavier and soon almost ground to a halt. By the time we had reached the petrol station that was closest to the car hire centre and filled the tank we were already overdue so I had to put the foot down and do a bit of drifting around corners to make it back before the staff left. Luckily we just caught them as they were turning off their office's lights. For dinner that evening we treated ourself to another superb dining experience in the shape of teppanyaki beef.

Watching the chef carefully taking his time cooking our dinner to perfection right in front of us was torture but the mouth watering beef practically dissolving in our mouths made it more than worthwhile.

The next day we were leaving Kumamoto in the afternoon and incredibly I had managed to go over seventy two hours without fishing. Suffering from withdrawl symptoms we spent a couple of hours looking for a likely place that I could fish for tanago in drainage ditches near our hotel but sadly we didn't find one. Determined to catch something before we left the city I ended up freelining some bread to some carp that we spotted skulking around in a piece of slack water at the edge of the Shirakawa River.

My only fish in Kumamoto. Great fun on my Rock Rover though!

Before leaving I bought a Kumamon hat. He is the mascot for the city. The Japanese do love a mascot.

After a short bullet train ride we arrived in Kagoshima and caught a tram to our hotel. After dropping off our luggage we headed out again, catching a second tram to visit the city's aquarium and have a wander around the harbour area. Mainly so I could check out its fishing potential.

Like Nagasaki and Kumamoto, trams are the main mode of transport in Kagoshima. Both old...

...and new.

After visiting the aquarium and sadly finding out that the harbour seemed to be a no fishing zone, we went for some sushi in a very busy conveyor belt restaurant nearby. It was a lively establishment with its chefs constantly shouting orders out in a theatrical manner. It also had lots of cool fish prints on the walls.

An uni (sea urchin) and ikura (salmon roe) gunkan combo was a perfect treat to finish off our sushi feast.

I overindulged myself again.

I love these gyotaku fish prints. Made by covering your catch in ink and then pressing paper onto it they were originally a way to record catches but are also an artform too.

The following day we headed back down to the port area and caught a ferry across the bay to Sakurajima, Japan's most active volcano. Sakarujima used to be an island but large scale eruptions in 1914 created new land that reached the mainland so its now a peninsula. From a distance we could see grey clouds of ash covering the volcano's peak. Once we disembarked from the ferry our first stop was the visitor centre where we spotted a rather unique snow globe.

Ash clouds being spewed from one of the craters on Sakurajima.

Very apt.

We then went for a walk along a coastal lava trail path that followed the shoreline. I had my fishing gear with me but there were "Fishing Prohibited" signs at the side of the path almost everywhere access to the sea was possible. Towards the end of the walk we came to a small harbour and as there was no signs that we could see we stopped for an hour or so and I wet a line. It was a fish every cast due to the incredible numbers of Nagasaki damsels in the area. After switching tactics from drop shotting sections of isome to fishing a lure on a jighead I caught a small wrasse.

I wasn't sure if I was allowed to fish here or not.

These Nagasaki damsel were loving small sections of pink isome.

An Ecogear Shirasu jighead with a Tict Brilliant lure was taken by what I'd later identify as juvenile red naped wrasse.

We then carried on walking along the trail and reaching the end we then caught a tour bus which took us up to an observation platform located further up the side of the volcano where we enjoyed the views it offered. Near the ferry terminal there is a free public hot spring foot spa and a fishing park so when we got back on the tour bus again and headed back down to the coast that's where we went to relax. 

Lillian made the most of the volcanic hot spring foot spa whilst I fished at the fishing park nearby. Perfect!

The fishing park was pretty good and only cost a few hundred yen. This payment granted access to a purpose built pier and also included the loan of a life vest. The pier was manned and also had facilities to clean any fish caught should you wish to take them home to eat, which most Japanese do. I soon discovered, but wasn't surprised given where I was, that the bottom was very snaggy due to being volcanic rock. The fishing was pretty good though and despite loosing some rigs I caught some grass puffer, a few marbled rockfish, some star bambooleaf wrasse and fairly large red naped wrasse.

A nice colourful red naped wrasse.

After a while I thought it had started raining very lightly until a few drops landed in my mouth and had a dreadful taste. It turned out the wind had changed direction and it was ash from the volcano behind me that was falling from the sky. Looking down I discovered my clothes and tackle were quickly getting covered with a fine dusting so I packed up and headed to join Lillian at the foot spa. Soaking my feet for ten minutes or so was a nice way to finish the visit to Sakurajima and afterwards we caught a ferry back to Kagoshima.

Raining ash!

The following day it was raining rather heavily but we grabbed umbrellas from the hotel and went for a walk. At one point there was a relatively small moat at the side of the pavement that had a few koi carp in it! After ambling about for a while we then went for a ride on the massive ferris wheel that has been built on top of the shopping centre next to the train station before catching a tram so we could visit the Kagoshima City Sea Fishing Park. Once there I paid the small fee and I spent a couple of hours getting soaked and adding a few more species to my trip's tally while Lillian took advantage of one of the shelters on the pier.

Swimming in the rain. These koi carp were in a small moat in front of the Kagoshima City Museum of Art.

It was a pretty grim day so the views from this massive ferris wheel weren't great unfortunately.

What better way to spend another grey day in Kagoshima than fishing in the rain. I much prefer the wet variety to the grey powdered kind.

This was my third cardinalfish species of the trip. It is a candystripe cardinalfish.

It was soon followed by my forth, Apogonichthyoides cathetogramma. It does not have an English common name. In Japanese it is called a Yokosujiishimochi. Quite big as cardinalfish go.

Just before we left I caught this small areolate grouper.

On the way back to the tram stop we visited another tackle shop where once again I exercised remarkable restraint yet again aided by Lillian's watchful eye.

Point tackle shop in Kagoshima. I really should have taken some photos of the interior but I didn't want to get drool on my iPhone.

It had been a wet cold day so after a hot shower back at our hotel we rewarded ourselves with a visit to a restaurant nearby that had some amazing black pork tonkatsu. The name refers to the colour of the pigs.

Crispy fried panko breadcrumbs surround thickly cut succulent black pork. Add a generous amount of tonkatsu sauce and some mustard for a truely amazing meal!

On our final day staying in Kagoshima we hired a car again and drove east to visit a few places of interest. Our first stop was a rather large statue of the animated fantasy film character Totoro that an airbnb owner has built outside their property in a clever piece of marketing.

I like fishing. Lillian likes Totoro. Fair's fair.

The second stop on our road trip was the small island of Aoshima to see some interesting rock formations and visit the island's shrine. The island is connected to the mainland by a bridge so that it can be accessed at all states of the tide.

Hundreds of tilted layers of rock form the "Devil's washboard" formations that surround Aoshima.

The shrine itself was very busy indeed and there were lots of tables inside covered with a multitude of things for sale. Too many in my opinion which I felt spoiled the shrine a bit. One thing I did love though was the ornate dragon fountain at the entrance.

One of the coolest fountains I've ever seen.

The third and final stop for the day was Udo Shrine which was a little further south down the coast. There are several shrines at the site and whilst there you can also test your skill throwing small clay pebbles into a depression in a large rock. Sucessful throws are supposed to bring good fortune and I managed to get three out of five inside it. With our sightseeing done for the day I had been looking forward to doing a spot of fishing from some rocks nearby but the sea was way too rough. 

The people on the left are trying to throw their clay pebbles into the ringed hole on the large boulder below them. I was planning on fishing from the rocks nearby but not in that swell!

With fishing on that part of the coast out of question Plan B was quickly formulated with the aid of Google Maps. We drove further south to Aburatsu's Harbour so I could take advantage of the sheltered nature of its location. After trying a few different spots that didn't hold any fish I eventually found a productive area and caught a few fish including a couple of new species. One was my fifth cardinalfish species of the trip and the other was a nice little jack.

This chap is a Doederlein's cardinalfish.

I would later discovered this was my first big eye trevally.

Before long we had to begin the drive back to Kagoshima to return the hire car. It took a little longer than expected but luckily there was no need to repeat the fast and furious manouvers that I'd pulled in Kumamoto! With only four days left of our trip our last stop was the coastal hot spring city of Beppu where I'd booked us into a nice traditional Japanese hotel right next to the sea. With access to a private onsen in the hotel we were looking forward to winding down a bit and slowing down the pace of our trip. I was still hopeful that I could catch a few more fish though.

Tight lines, Scott.