BillH

I've seen some nice size schools running of the south coast for a couple of weeks now, and have taken some very nice fish. Bill

Cam, if you are looking at a new reel and intend to hit the beach more often, may I suggest you look at an Alvey around the 650 class. They are ideal reels to work the beaches and near on indestructable, of course this may mean looking at a new beach rod as well, but you should be able to pick up a wilson 12' surf rod for about 70 bucks. But IMHO the Alvey is the way to go off the beach, far easier to keep clean . BTW I concur with Dave paternoster rig off the beach, although I use a snapper lead '6 of 1, 1/2 dozen of the other' Bill

I fish off the beach at Culburra/Warrain which is just round the corner and it is clear. Haven't had the chance to check out Callala for a couple of months, but lastime I did the weed was still on the beach and pretty smelly. If I get the chance, I shall keep you posted, unless someone else has been out there recently. Bill

with some selective editing no doubt, just to reinforce your method, hehehe good luck. Bill

I thought I could spin a yarn, but mine are fiction, nothing compared to the real thing. Great stuff. Bill (ps us Bills must stick together)

Hey Tricks, I just finished rebuilding my old beach rod. It was my 1st attempt at rod building, there is a lot of information out there so take the time to read up as much as you can. One thing I can pass on, is it dosen't have to be expensive if you have access to basic tools. For my rod wrapper I just made a simple V notch affair (sorry I couldn't attach the file too big)Do a search on rod wrappers. For the rod dryer I used the rottisery off my BBQ or you can pick one up at Bunnings for about $20 2x 'D' size batteries as well as the other hardware needed. Experienced rod builders like Kingpig will offer you more advice. However I had fun with it and was pleased with the result although I feel I could have done a better job, anyway good luck with your project. Bill ps try this web site http://www.rodbuildingtutorials.com

Good report Pete, as usual. I see Syd is still wearing his obligitory blue and white striped shirt, hmmmm has he got a birthday coming up soon.....? Bill

says a lot about bamboo poles Bill

Well another weekend is upon us (pity about the days in between, work yuk). So I'm off to get me some beach worms this arvo for a bit of a session later this evening, all going well. Had a bit of a bash last Monday at Culburra, with 4 nice salmon in the morning and one in the evening. I took my camera just in case, and wouldn't you know it, the batteries were flat (bugger). As I was only catching and releasing I had nothing to show for my efforts (a pity). There were however, quite a few people walking the beach at about 8 am so it was good to put a bit of a show on for them, for those that were near me at least, as Ifought the fish through the shore break with it putting on the usual display leaving the water and head shaking gills flared, very impressive. By the time I had him on the beach there must have been about 5 or so people standing around (No I didn't get any applauses). For the un-initiated there I explained to them that it was not an Atlantic Salmon but an Australian Salmon. I guess to them a salmon is a salmon, they were pretty impressed when they saw me put it back in the water. Some people just don't get it. Bill

Hmmmmm, what's the cost of fuel these days? or charter boat.. what charter boat?

I find the best way is to take a small wad (no crust)of bread and pop it your mouth, get it nice and moist but not too wet, and just mold it onto your hook, Ive been doing it for years and it seems to work ok for me. Bill

Thanks John, just a bit of light fun. I hope a few other people enjoyed it, especially if you read trouthunter's encounter in the reports forum Bill

nice fish Al, and let me guess...none of your mates were an engineer or from transport. Man it must have been cold how were your hands? Just as well there was a medic close by huh. Bill

'Over The Wall' I was swimming around with the lads the other morning, there must have been about ten us, school was out so we broke away from the rest of the class to do some investigating, as young curious bream do, so we headed off to our favourite spot. This place is really cool, especially early in the morning, you know just before ‘the great light in the sky’ gets to bright. This one place where we always like to hide is near a place we call ‘the wall’ we call it this because we can’t get past it and it’s really high and smooth and every one knows that on the other side, the water is cool and sweet with heaps of food just sitting there waiting to be eaten. It has all these big poles coming from the sky right down into our home, on top of these poles is a roof that keeps the whole area shady and protects us from ‘the great light in the sky’. Anyway this particular day we could hear movement above us and tiny morsels of food came floating down towards us, my favourite food is prawns but this stuff smelled really nice, it was like nothing I’ve seen before little white bead things with a mixture of other yummy things with it, thousands of them just kept falling from above, so me and the lads would dart out and just help our selves. There were other lesser fish there as well, gar with their long beaks and dumb mullet, but because we are faster and smarter we got to eat most of it. Then a weird thing happened, once the beads stopped falling these other strange things started plopping down to us, it was a bit scary and they didn’t smell very nice, this lasted for a few minutes, but no one was really interested in them, we wanted those white things again. Then this other stuff, bigger, kind of white and brown this time, started floating down to us. Fins, who is one of the bigger kids told us to leave it, so we just watched as the dumb mullet fought each other over the funny floating stuff. Fins said he has tried it before and said that it was ok but a bit tasteless, we were happy just to watch the show, some fish are so stupid. Mullet even look dumb, they don’t even know that if you swim so high up in the water ‘the great light in the sky’ can cause skin damage, that’s what our teacher says anyway. Our school teacher told us that the food dropped down is from the ‘Anglers’ and that we should avoid these offerings at all costs, but all us kids know they are just saying that to scare us (ha what do they know). We have heard, that some really lucky fish can actually get to the other side of ‘the wall’ by these ‘Anglers’. When I asked my teacher (who we all believe is pretty smart) she said it was all just make believe and told us again not to go there. The next day a few of us went back to the same spot. Fins was with us, he is such a show off because he is so much bigger. We were sitting there wandering if we were going to get that white stuff again, because we could hear something on the roof. There were a few other species there as well, one was a squire (I hate them they think they are so much better than us) suddenly, plop……. a small piece of what smelled like mullet, I know some of the adults and bigger fish love it, but I still prefer prawns, we were all kind of hanging around wandering what to do when that upstart, the squire raced out and gulped the whole lot down (what a pig). Then whoooosh gone, straight up, whoa what happened there? We all kind of looked at each other for a while, Fins was the first to express our thoughts “The wall, he has gone over the wall” this got us all a little excited. Then we heard a “splaaa…sh” the squire suddenly fell back in and just took off. He obviously didn’t make it over ‘the wall’. We were discussing what we thought happened when again……plop.. another piece of mullet drops down, Fins pushes one of the smaller guys back and dives on the mullet tid bit, whoooosh gone, straight up. The rest of us hung around for a few minutes expecting Fins to come flying back down, but nothing. By this stage the excitement was too much, Fins must have made it over ‘the wall’ then …plop…one of the smaller guys had a turn, he too went straight up, followed by a two more, before anyone else had a turn we went over to the ‘wall’ to see if we could hear them on the other side. We all hung around really close to the wall straining to hear something from the other side. Maybe they’re just having too much fun or the wall is too thick and we just can’t hear them some thought. I, on the other hand suspect my teacher could be right and we shouldn’t hang around there anymore. Because we were smaller than the other guys we decided to head back to the safety of the school, but still ………… I’m still undecided if it is a good thing or a bad thing to be carried over ‘the wall’ if that in fact is the case. I might just give that place a miss for a while, wait until I’m a bit older. There are still a few more places I want to visit. I have heard tell of places near the beach where worms just litter the sea bed and are there just for the picking or where oysters just grow in rows and rows and rows and all you have to do is swim up to them and help yourself, that sounds like fun. At least you don’t have to worry about ‘Anglers’ in those places. Bill

Must have got the same magazine, hard to catch squid from the surf though Bill

Wow, very emotive, sounds like your dad and grandad were watching over you. It is an exhilerating experience losing line at a great rate of knots. Good job, I only hope I'm that lucky this weekend down here. Bill

What a great past time fishing is, regardless whether you fish from a boat, a jetty or sitting on the bank of your favourite river. We have all experienced the feeling of anticipation waiting for that first tug, the twitch of your rod or the sight of your float being sucked under, little indicators that tell us the fish are there and are ready to play. And play they do, remember the times when you get your first touch of the session, you immediately go into hunter mode, you cock your head slightly as if you can actually hear the fish stalking your bait, you wait…., seconds stretch into minutes then nothing. Now a period of doubt has set in “Have I been baited”? “Should I wind in”? This of course is just a ploy by the fish to undermine our confidence. What the fish don’t realise, we are passionate about what we do we thrive on the challenges they set us. After all we’re smarter than them, aren’t we? My passion, is fishing the surf, I imagine we have all tried it at same stage in our fishing lives , and sure, I’ve spent my time fishing from a boat, chasing the pelagics in FNQ, hauling big Spaniards over the side, dragging spangled emperor and coral trout from the reefs, and it’s great fun. To be honest there seems to me, something pure about fishing from the beach. Finding a high point from which you can look down onto the beach to find your gutters or holes, wading out up to your waist trying to get that extra few metres from your cast. What could be better than standing on a beach just before day break watching the sun rise, or late afternoon watching as it slowly fades, and then as if somebody flicked a switch is gone. I am always amazed at how quickly it happens, when the sun does actually go down, you watch as it slowly disappears behind a hill or mountain, you get a little glow, then nothing, one minute you have no problem seeing your hook at the end of your line while baiting it, the next your holding it up or swinging it into the moonlight or nearest light source to see where it is. There are just so many good things that can be said about fishing from the beach, but that is only how I feel about it, rock hoppers and boaties no doubt are just as passionate about their style and rightly so. So long as we have fun, be safe and look after our favourite fishing spots so that others can enjoy them as well. I think Ray R has encapsulated a lot of that essence in his amazing holiday with outstanding photos and the fact that he has been going back to the same place for near on 30 years. Bill Ps love to hear from any other passionate beach fishos

Thanks guys, and I definatley will keep you posted of my success or lack there of. The good thing about these days is how easy it is now to take photos, I'll have to make sure I throw my camera in my bag next time I hit the beach (this weekend). In the past it has never been a priority for me, the only person who got to see my catch was the wife, but with a forum like this, where we all share a common interest it adds that element of self acheivement, and lets face it we all like a bit of praise now and then from our peers. That's one thing I have noticed about this site as opposed to other sites I've seen, the ammount of encouragement and shared knowledge is a theme that runs throughout the whole forum. The 'Mentoring' concept is great, and I'm looking forward to be able to contribute in some way. Bill ps as soon as I can figure out how to add my posts and replies properly

Hi guys, as you can see I'm new to this site and might I add what a great venue. Reading Roberta's tutorial (excellent)on the subtle art of Blackfish fishing has really got me interested in giving it another attemmpt. I was first introduced to fishing for black fish by my dad in the late 60s early 70's when he used to take us to Bruswick Heads on school holidays, he would head off every morning with his blackfish rod to fish the south wall while us kids would catch poddy mullet from the foot bridge, every day he would come back with a bag full of fish for mum to cook up for breakfast. Of course we would head down to see how he was doing, and I remember the first time I saw him lift one out and into his net it was awesome, I was about 12 then. We ended up moving from Sydney to Terrigal in the mid 70's by this stage I was more interested in fishing the beach or the river systems. Going through all dad's fishing gear for extra tackle I came across his old blackfish rod and what I thought at the time a little Alvey sidecast (well it was an Alvey and I had never heard of a centre pin). The rod was long and very "whippy" much different to the big surf rods and estuary rods I was used to. I had a basic idea about blackfish fishing, you used a float and they liked weed, how hard could it be. Armed with that I headed off to the Skillion, worked my way round onto the rocks picking up some weed as I went, to where two other guys were fishing. I noticed they both had floats out so I figured they too were after black fish. I started to get my rig set up "hmmmm what kind of reel is this....it doesn't even swivel, bugger must be a fly reel of some sort" Feeling like a right twit I started putting it together, float, stopper, swivel trace No. 8 hook, weed........ now what? How the hell am I going to cast this thing? Ok I thoght, if it's a fly reel cast it like a fly, so I strip some line get a bit of swing happening and let it go.... well I go it in the water. I couldn't figure out why I was getting weird looks from the old gents to my left. Needles to say I didn't catch any fish that day, or the next or the next or the next,this went on for two weeks, yes I was pesistant. The two old guys were there also for many of those days but I was to emabarresed to ask their advice 1st mistake. Finally one day, one of the guys was there by himself so I finally plucked up the courage to ask his help, and was pleasantly surprised that he was more than happy to help showing me how to put split shot on adjusting my float even how to hold my mouth the right way, and guess what. You guessed it still no damned fish, I was either striking to early or to late or to hard meanwhile he was just lifting them out one after the other. When I asked my father he would just say you have to have the right feel.....what the? I then started reading every thing I could about the subject, I persisted for about 2 maybe 3 months before giving it away without ever having caught one. I know it's not long but hey fishing from the beach I always (nearlly)got results. And do you know I have never really attempted them since those early days. But now that I am in the Shoalhaven area and there a some good places to go I maybe just maybe tempted to give the old blackfish a go, especially with graet articles you have here. Sorry for being long winded, I hope it was appropriate. Bill