Managed to hijack a trip to the seaside yesterday for 45 minutes. A couple of spots were unsuccessfully tried before I spotted a bunch of anglers fishing in a line off one of the many harbour walls. I'm so new to saltwater fishing that my main bit of watercraft is following the crowd, wherever possible. Of course, that is assuming that the crowd knows more than I do. At least it worked on this occasion as small pieces of ragworm bounced along the bottom found interest from a sea scorpion, and then the first of several goldsinny wrasse; a species of fish I had never taken before. Terrible fighters; they come in like a sycamore seed in reverse.
I then had another sea scorpion followed by a different species of wrasse. It was very small, but I believe it to have been my first ballan wrasse.
Then, just before it was time to go, I dropped in a bit further along the wall and connected with a fish which on my little rod felt more like the whomping willow than a sycamore seed. I had already lost one decent fish which buried itself in a snag. I tightened the drag right up after that and so heaved the next powerful adversary off the bottom as far as I could in one swift motion before even touching the reel. If my previous ID was awry, then I was sure that this fish, which appeared to be all of a pound, was a ballan wrasse. It was easily the biggest fish I have taken since my saltwater sorties began last August.
I also tried similar tactics this afternoon at West Bay, but all I could managed were a trio of unwelcome crabs. One of these was spawned from satan himself. I didn't think to grab a picture before I shook it off, but since returning home, I believe I have identified the culprit as a spiny spider crab, similar to that which can be seen, here.
The harbour was dead for everyone fishing it, in fact, with a solitary flounder all that anyone was admitting to. It might be worth giving the sea another month or two yet to fully warm up.