Still A Goby Desert?...30/07/2013

We’re still on our way back from the Waveney Ruffe Hunt, in the rain, when I tell Paul I’m going to see if the Gobies have arrived yet before I drop him off. So a quick diversion down to my top secret goby mark at the bottom of Harbour Road on Lake Lothing and we jump out to walk the shore. I couldn’t see the other night in the wind and at low water so this seemed more promising. As we walked the shoreline I started to see the familiar dart and drop of my splendidly amusing summertime quarry. Forget the rain; yak off. I launched the Tetra after tying on a size 24 hook. Hook to nylon I hasten to add, that’s just far too fine a point to miss out. LOL as the kids say. Then I paddled out the single yard to the mark and set up a slow drift with the tiniest pinch of worm on the hook. I drifted quite a way before I found the first fish, almost thirty yards in fact. I dropped down. It swam to the shot, knocked it about, darted for the bait, battered it, picked it up, mouthed it, bit, I struk, lifted, it flew through the air, and dropped off just out of reach of my hand…damn. Try again…same again, same routine, same result…try once more…YES! In my hand…That’s my common goby caught for the species tournament. An easy point for those who know how and as large a point as a tope or skate. Job done. It was perhaps 1.5cm long at most. Well, Paul was laughing his head off. He’s never fished for them himself. We swapped over, him in the yak and me on shore…and sure enough he managed his first ever goby too. Perhaps he’ll lift the bream curse from me now. I got back aboard. I’d seen a lot of fry and decided I’d try for one of those too. Perhaps they were mullet though they may have been smelt or bass. The former two would have been points. Nope, they didn’t fall for my ruse, bar one that tried taking the worm…but if I went midwater (max depth I fished was eighteen inches, this is sight fishing) then the gobies came off the bottom for them. If I kept the worm in the water while drifting it kept it steady before reaching the fry…lights came on and I went for the ultimate in stupidity and invented a new sport: SMALL GAME FISHING! Yep, Snapper decided to try trolling for gobies…well it worked well for me with tuna in South Africa… …and I did it!!! I’m still grinning now. Trolled gobies. Who’d have thought it? That’s twenty species in a month from East Anglia; there’s not that many accessible ones left.