pkat87

Date: Sunday 17th Feb Time: 3pm Decided to randomly check seabreeze to see what kind of 30knot+ winds might be blowing in the bay this afternoon. To my extreme shock it was actually forecast to stay under 10knots all arvo! Quickly made the call to setup the boat for a quick flick in the bay. First stop was in the middle of the bay for a drift.. few hits but no hookups. Motored over to Kurnell to try flicking some squidgies around the sand patches/ weed beds. After about 5mins, felt a hit and struck... ZZzzZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz the first run was a good one! After tightening the drag on my little Daiwa 2000 with 4lb leader the fight was on. It was a tense few minutes until we saw some colour, nice lizard!!.. After some careful net-play the first fish was in the boat, a PB for me smack bang on 60cm. Few snaps and then it was back to the fishing. After about 5mins got another hit and struck, this time it was a short fight, my first snapper on plastics, only 25cms so back in the drink it went. By this time we had drifted a fair way so motored back to the starting point. After another few casts I was on again! Very similar fight to the first lizard although this one measured in at 50cm. After that things went a little quiet so we made the call to head to Towra point. The sun was beginning to set and just before we decided to pack it in a 40cm model was landed. All in all a great little arvo session, very satisfying to finally get a feed using lures, I've spent my fair share of time reading posts on here and watching Paul Worsteling on IFISH but it was great to finally have a plan come together. All fish were caught between 2-3 metres of water. Thanks for reading!

Nobody eats fish caught from Iron Cove do they?

Hey there, I've got a hobie revo 11 that I'm pretty new to fishing out of as well, know a few spots around Botany bay that sometimes produce flathead but apart from that I'm up for some exploring new grounds too! PM me if interested. Cheers, Peter

WHAT'S WITH ALL THE SHOUTING AROUND IN HERE CALM DOWN EVERYONE

Forgot to add I'll be on a kayak

Planning on chucking a few squid jigs around Bare island this afternoon.. Does anyone know if I'll have much luck with low tide being at 2pm? Never tried around the weed beds at low tide so I'm not sure if I should bother trying or not... Cheers, Peter

Attempted drifting but with the current and 20knot winds blowing in the same direction it was almost impossible.. Ended up with one 37cm flathead

Currently anchored east of como bridge on the run out tide hoping for some jews or flatties.. Nothing yet.. Using soft plastics and prawns Any help on spots to try would be good!!

Scene: Tokoriki island resort, Mamanuca islands Fiji, June 2012 Event: 3-hour "light-tackle" trolling trip around the surrounding reefs Tools: 3 rods set up at the rear of the boat, 2 deep-divers and 1 dead bait (some type of mackeral) Results: After an hour of trolling without a bite, we realised the 2 deep-divers had entangled. So we reeled them in and spent at least 30mins trying to untangle the 2-braid lines... Inside my head I was thinking great what a waste of money we're going to waste the whole trip re-rigging these ro.... and then the best interruption to my thought occured... zzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ the reel with the trolling mackeral started screaming, it was between me and another fellow angler to take the first one, and after he hesitated I jumped at the opportunity and grabbed the rod... At first it was like reeling a big heavy dead weight, indicating it was probably swimming towards the boat. After about 15mins we started to see some colour, at which the fish decided to make a run for it, the first real sign of a fight.. this happened again a few times, once going underneath the boat and if it wasn't for throwing the throttle into neutral I'm sure we would've been busted off.. The deckhand was jumping for joy as he came from the local village and we had pre-arranged for any fish caught to be given to his village. He quickly grabbed the gaff and pulled the beast aboard... A new PB for me in any species... the deckhand estimated it to be 20kg plus, but judging by how heavy it felt I would've guessed nearly 30.. I saw the deckhand the next day, he said the mackeral fed 6 families for dinner and there was still plenty left over the following morning! Great way to end the honeymoon!

Master of the Bay strikes again! well done Trung nice mods and even better to see them paying off!

Hey mate awesome report, shame about the gull wouldve been funny to see though lol. where abouts were ya fishing?

Hey raiders thought I post up a quick report from Tuesday.. With the sun shining and not a breath of wind on Tuesday morning, decided to take the yak out for a little fish. After hosing down all the cobwebs off the yak, rigging up 2 rods, and getting all the gear ready I was ready to leave by 10.30am. On the water by 11.30, I knew I had a few hours free on the water to do a little exploring and see if I could find some fish. Launched off the beach at la perouse and the first idea was to troll a hardbody as I made my way out to the channel marker to see if any kings were around. Nothing on the troll and no kings to play with after dropping a jerk shad around the marker. After that I decided to head back over to Molli point to check for any action. This took a lot longer than I thought as I was fighting against a racing current and in the blistering heat of midday. Finally when I arrived I took a little break to have some lunch and a drink. Soon after I dropped the soft plastic down and hopped it around the container wall for zilch. There were a couple boats about which didn't seem to be producing much either. I started to get that dreaded feeling of possibly heading home with a donut, and the heat of the day was really sapping my enthusiasm, I knew I should've woke up earlier and head out at dawn.. Anyway I decided to troll back towards la perouse and see if any flatties were about off the beach. As I was peddling back I looked over my shoulder and noticed masses of dark grey clouds coming from the west, with the faintest sound of thunder coming.. Great. Anyway by this time I was about 500m off the beach so I decided to drop a Gulp grub down to the bottom, after flicking the bail arm back over I immediately felt some weight, then a bit of line stripping off at a rather slow pace.. Great another snag, but then after I started to reel I felt a few headshakes followed by a decent little run! I became so excited I didn't even notice the clouds were right above me and I was soon getting pelted by rain. A few minutes later a nice fat 46.5cm lizard came to the surface and after a few tense moments with the net it was in the live well!.. I would've loved to stay out there but I couldn't see a break in the rain so I decided to peddle back content with the fact I had some nice fillets to look forward to for dinner. Of course once I packed up and hopped into the car the rain had stopped and the sun was breaking out.. Oh well I was happy with the flattie and it was good to get out for once, hopefully might have a chance again on the weekend.. Tight lines!

Nice one mate where abouts in the bay did you hook up to it?

Nice catch there yowie! Did you berley up at all??

Ohh thats a shame mate I can definitely feel your pain.. Lucky you took some pics.. Havent heard of many whiting being caught on softies before? Which ones did you use if you dont mind me asking?

Hey there honk, I'm no expert by any means but I too have been fascinated by catching fish with plastics.. A couple things you might need to clarify are: 1) what main line/leader are you using? 2) How heavy are you going with the jig head? Sounds like your flicking around fairly shallow water, so you'd wana go pretty light with the jighead, i'd say around 1/12th-1/16th of an ounce, if your weight is too heavy the plastic will jus dart down to the bottom in an unnatural fashion, you want it to kinda float down after you've flicked it up to mimic an injured baitfish/prawn.. And one thing I learnt is using different strength line definitely makes a difference, on some days I'll get zero hits on 8lb line and then switch to 4lb next time and get hits on almost every cast. If you're after flathead I've had good success with the Gulps in pumpkinseed, but I know squidgys are pretty popular as well.. And hobie's are great fun, I wish I could be out on mine everyday Peter

Good stuff mate great to see.. Did you float the yakka or send it down?

Headed out after work on Friday night with a few mates at about 8pm... Launched at Kyeemagh which was nice and quiet for a change compared to the usual peak hours I like to fish during.. Short trip across the moonlit (or should I say Port Botany lit) bay across to Towra.. anchored up set up a berley trail and dropped our baits down.. Chicken breast and prawns were on the menu tonight... Noticed there was hardly any current which had me a little worried as I rarely get a boatful of mates to take out so I didn't want to disappoint.. After about 10 minutes first fish came on board, not sure what it was but it looked kind of like a bream with more of a snout for a nose? I've seen them before but haven't bothered to look up the species on the net. Sorry no photos this report everyone was to eager to get onto more fish.. Anyway not much more happened for the next 20mins so we headed around the corner closer towards Dolls point.. Spread out some berley and dropped the baits down again.. All rods were set up with light gear, 4-6lb leader with unweighted and very small sinkers. After a few minutes here couple of the boys got some decent hits and then first fish was landed, a nice 29cm bream which was very fat and healthy, onto the ice she goes.. Over the next half hour we landed another 3 of similar size and then it all went quiet.. Tried moving in a little closer to shore but no luck.. By this time it was about 11pm and we were getting closer to the slack low tide.. Tried motoring over to the runways more in hope of luck being on our side than anything else. Anchored off the 3rd and weariness was setting in, was not looking forward to pulling up the anchor again. After about 10mins or so we pulled up another keeper bream, then the rest of the time here was spent pulling up little reds which all went back in. Around 12am decided to head back towards the ramp and thought we'd give the 1st runway a try.. No berley this time just dropped the baits and relaxed enjoying some interesting conversation.. Pulled up a few horse-sized yakkas but that was it. Until I decided to reel my line back in before pulling the anchor up, only to notice there was some weight on the end of the line??.. kept reeling and then noticed I had finally caught my first squid!! and typical it was on a small longshank hook with prawn instead of one of my expensive squid jigs. Then had a rookie-error moment, lowered the net in front of the squid instead of behind, only to have it squirt a few times and then jump off the hook =(.. Quickly tied on a pink Ika squid jig and threw it back out there.. Got a few hits but didn't manage to land one, I guess my squidding technique needs some work.. So that's where it ended, headed back in rather smoothly, got home and pissed off the neighbours with a 2am flush, luckily for them I've upgraded to a 4-stroke as the old 2-stroke used to wake up everyone in a 5km radius. Ended up with 5 keeper bream, the bigger models were caught on chicken breast. Hope to get out there again soon, might try for a jew or 2 next time now that I've managed to find some squid! Cheers, Peter

Hi Tony, I have heard soaking squid in kiwi fruit is a magic tenderiser, just put the squid in a plastic bag with crushed kiwi fruit and mix it altogether let it sit for a few hours maybe even overnight.. Peter

Great detailed report, good to read details about line weight and casting info and congrats on the flatties

Hi Trung, As a sucker to different types of softies I was wondering where abouts you get the SLAMBAITS from?? Cheers, Peter

Yeah I agree I never seem to know how much is enough when berleying, especially when theres a fair bit of current it all just seems to float away in a couple minutes.. Some berley tips would be great!!

Thats a healthy lookin breambo mate, must've put up a decent fight

Yeah it was the first time I actually spent some time fishing there, I normally head to the typical spots chasing kings/trevs/bream like the runways and molli pt/oil wharf.. Maybe next time i'll spend a bit more time searching the eastern side.

Just a quick report from my outing today, sorry no pics, was too busy re-rigging and re-applying sunscreen although still managed to get burnt... Headed out from Kyeemagh boat ramp right on high tide, which was surprisingly not very busy.. Sped across to the 3rd runway, started drifting around till we got a few bites, then anchored up and put a couple rods out with peeled prawns on the end... Lots of pickers, managed to land one pinky which went back in the drink safely... After 30 odd minutes of getting out bait stolen, we pulled anchor and headed over to the drums.. I wanted to hurry up and head over to Towra to hunt some flathead so we didn't anchor at the drums, drifted around for about 15mins for zip.. So off we went to hit up the shallows Started drifting around the eastern side of Towra, hopping plastics around the edges of the weedbeds.. not much activity was to be seen, so we motored around to the western side.. Proved a good move, set up a couple rods with prawns again, and then continued hopping plastics off the bottom. After a few minutes I was onto a nice sized flatty, which managed to jump off the hook as I got him to the boat.. Cast back out and then one of the bait rods goes off, a nice sized whiting took one of the peeled prawns. As I was releasing the whiting, the rod with the Gulp 3-inch grub in pumpkinseed went off again, this time I was prepared with the net and landed a nice 40cm lizard that came home for dinner. Repeated the drift again but without any luck thanks to a jet-ski that came flying through the shallows.. Drifted a little further out and picked up 3 bream on prawns, which were also coming home for dinner. Went quiet after that, picked up a little ray on prawns before deciding to head back to the ramp. All in all not a bad few hours out on the bay, and the beer battered flatty fillets topped off a good afternoon. Again sorry for the lack of photos, will do my best to make time for pics next outing.