Seixal
Cove · Salt water · in Madeira
A small north-coast settlement under vertical cliffs, with black volcanic sand, a natural pool cut into the lava and rocky bays either side of the point.
Safety: cliffs and rock platforms — can cause serious injury or death.
FishingHQ describes what this place is, not whether you may fish it. Access, permits and who to ask.
What you can catch here
Documented at this place, grouped by how you would be fishing, with how strongly the sources support each one. This is what has been written down, not a forecast, and being listed is never permission to fish.
From the shore · 9
- BogueRegular local target1 placeSeixalOver cove
- DerbioRegular local target1 placeSeixalOver cove
- Mediterranean parrotfishRegular local target1 placeSeixalOver cove
- Red porgyRegular local target1 placeSeixalOver cove
- Saddled seabreamRegular local target1 placeSeixalOver cove
- Salema porgyRegular local target1 placeSeixalOver cove
- Dusky grouperRepeatedly reported1 placeSeixalOver cove
- Lesser weeverRecorded here1 placeSeixalOver coveAround Feb
Also documented from the shore: White seabream
Spearfishing · 1
What these strengths mean
- Regular local target
- Fishing sources describe this as a normal local target here, not merely as caught.
- Repeatedly reported
- Several independent public accounts. Enough to say it happens more than once; not enough to call it a fishery.
- Recorded here
- At least one credible public account of this species being caught here. That is all it means.
- How breadth is counted
- A fish documented at six marks is shown as six marks: breadth never raises the strength on its own. A fishery account describes the fishing; a recorded catch reports one specific catch. How evidence is weighed.
Also associated with this ground
Recorded as present here without a documented method or strength behind them.
Fish documented nearby, not here
Nothing below has been documented at Seixal itself. Each one has been documented at a named place on the same ground, and the places are listed with it. Treat this as what the water around here holds rather than as a catch list for this mark.
Also documented at neighbouring places
One or two accounts each, on the ground around here. Enough to know the fish is caught in these waters; not enough to say anything about this place.
From the shore
- Greater amberjack — documented at Porto Moniz; Câmara de Lobos
- Bluefish — documented at Porto Moniz
- Atlantic bonito — documented at Paul do Mar
- Atlantic mackerel — documented at Câmara de Lobos; Machico
- Atlantic chub mackerel — documented at Ribeira Brava, Madeira
- Atlantic lizardfish — documented at Porto Moniz
- Big-scale sand smelt — documented at Ribeira Brava, Madeira
- Canary damselfish — documented at Porto Moniz
- Common pandora — documented at Porto Novo, Madeira
- Diamond lizardfish — documented at Porto Moniz
- Great barracuda — documented at Paul do Mar
- Madeira rockfish — documented at Porto Moniz
- Ornate wrasse — documented at Porto Moniz
How people fish it
Practised here: Sea fishing, Spearfishing.
Methods the sources name for this ground. Each one is explained in full on its own page.
- Float fishing
Suspending a bait at a controlled depth beneath a buoyant indicator — the most visual, most controllable and most widely applicable method in angling.
- Spinning
Casting an artificial lure and retrieving it so that it moves like something alive — the most direct form of lure fishing.
- Ledgering
Fishing a bait on the bottom held by a weight, with no float — the simplest way to fish at distance, in depth, or in wind.
The ground and the water
- The ground
- A small north-coast settlement under vertical cliffs, with black volcanic sand, a natural pool cut into the lava and rocky bays either side of the point.
- Exposure
- North-facing under high cliffs, taking the prevailing wind and the Atlantic swell with the cliff offering no lee at water level.
Getting there
What public sources describe, last checked 2026-08-27. Car parks fill, services change and a path existing is not a path anybody may use — none of this is a guarantee of availability and none of it is permission to be anywhere.
- Getting to it
- A small north-coast settlement between Porto Moniz and São Vicente, with a harbour of refuge, a black sand beach and a second set of lava pools operated by the local naval club. The north coast road serves it.
- Public transport
- Rodoeste line 139 runs from Funchal to Santa by way of São Vicente and serves this coast; line 80 runs to Porto Moniz. The municipality falls in fare zone H. Times, fares and frequency are the operator's and change.
Where this access information comes from
- Câmara Municipal do Porto Moniz: the municipality's own bathing and transport records — Câmara Municipal do Porto Moniz, Madeira, 2026 (Local authority, harbour or protected-area body)Relied on for: The municipality's own record for the bathing places it operates and for the bus lines that reach them.States this directlyPassage read and verified
What is there
Public toilets
The municipality records showers and toilets both at the harbour-of-refuge beach and at the naval club's pools. The club's pools are open ten to seven and are free of charge.
Food or shelter
A bar operates at the naval club, and the municipality notes that the beach's bar is reached through the club next to it. Kayaks and diving equipment are for hire there.
Safety
Cliffs and rock platforms — Can cause serious injury or death
The north coast is cliff-bound and takes Atlantic swell with almost no shelf to dissipate it, so waves at exposed platforms are larger and less regular than the wind suggests. The sheltered south coast on the same day gives no warning of it.
What reduces it: Check swell rather than wind, and check it for the coast you are going to rather than for the island. Watch a platform for a sustained period before committing. Never fish a position you could not leave immediately.
Rules and access
FishingHQ does not know the current access position here. Madeira is an autonomous region of Portugal with its own fisheries administration, and recreational sea and underwater fishing are licensed regionally rather than by the mainland directorate. Species, size, quantity and gear measures apply and change, and marine protected areas around the archipelago constrain access independently. Check the current position with the regional fisheries directorate before going.
Who holds the answer:
- The Regional Directorate for Fisheries of Madeira, which licenses and regulates recreational sea and underwater fishing in the archipelago.
- The port authority, for access to harbour structures.
- The Regional Directorate for Fisheries of Madeira, for recreational licences, sizes and species rules
- The managing authority of any marine protected area or nature reserve, whose zoning governs what is permitted inside it
- The regional forestry and nature-conservation authority, for the levadas and the mountain streams
- Harbour and port authorities, for access to quays, moles and slipways
Nearby fishing
Other publicly documented places within about 40 km, by distance. Positions are approximate public geography and are never exact marks.
- Porto Moniz — 5–10 km · Rock platform
- Paul do Mar — 10–25 km · Rock platform
- Ribeira Brava, Madeira — 10–25 km · Harbour wall
- Câmara de Lobos — 10–25 km · Bay
- Porto da Cruz, Madeira — 25–40 km · Rock mark
- The Funchal waterfront — 25–40 km · Harbour wall
- Porto Novo, Madeira — 25–40 km · Pier
- Machico — 25–40 km · Bay
Sources for this place
- Sea Angler — Bauer Media (Specialist angling publication)Relied on for: Long-running published description of British sea angling practice by region, ground type and named mark.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Widely restated public descriptions of which places are conventionally fished and how, recorded as practitioner consensus rather than as scholarship, and not relied on for access, permission or any current rule.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Fishing Madeira, and jigging and popping the Azores islands — GT Fishing (Practitioner report)Relied on for: That the named Madeiran locations are fished from the shore or from a boat for the species given, and the technique and season the operator attaches to each.FishingHQ's interpretation of what it saysPassage read and verified
- Câmara Municipal do Porto Moniz: the municipality's own bathing and transport records — Câmara Municipal do Porto Moniz, Madeira, 2026 (Local authority, harbour or protected-area body)Relied on for: The municipality's own record for the bathing places at Seixal: the facilities, the hours, the charging position and the bus lines that reach them.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- More light game fun on Madeira — a February light-rock diary at named harbours — Something Fishy Going On (angling blog), 2017 (Practitioner report)Relied on for: A February light-tackle shore session at named Madeiran marks, and the species taken at each on drop-shot rigs and small jigs.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- Importance of recreational shore angling in the archipelago of Madeira (northeast Atlantic) — Scientia Marina (CSIC), vol. 84 no. 4, 2020 (Scientific literature)Relied on for: The catch composition of the Madeira archipelago's recreational shore fishery by species and by share of the estimated annual total, from a 2017 creel survey of 653 anglers.States this directlyPassage read and verified
How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy. Last reviewed 2026-08-16.