A hunter fish
If the majority of flatfish are looking for worms and mollusks on the sandy bottom, the turbot has this particularity to come out of the sandy carpet to hunt like a bass. It tracks sand eels and other small fishes that it seizes with a large mouth. They are mobile fish. I mean that they do not position themselves on the same spot throughout the year. They look for food and change area during the season. They are not afraid of the miles to reach a school of sandeel on a riden. The biggest ones also hunt mackerel. Indeed, this fish can exceed 10 kg. I was able to observe in 2021, two fish of 7 and 9.5 kg on the stalls of professionals, proof that there are some great specimens!
Turbot fishing spots
Turbot are often found around the ridens. These are underwater dunes made of more or less coarse sediments. That is to say that we can find fine sand, coarse sand, silt or pebbles. The best turbot ridens are composed of a mixture of sand and gravel. The mimicry of turbot on sandy and gravelly bottoms is perfect! The back of the turbot is indeed speckled with black and sandy grains that blend into the scenery.
Turbot feeds on fish, but also on mollusks. Thus, the ridens made of shells are to be watched closely. Bottoms rich in brittle stars, such as the one in our picture, are also good spots. On a chart, a sandy bottom is marked by the letter S, a gravelly bottom by the abbreviation G and the presence of shells can be marked by the abbreviation bkSh or SSh.
