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Billy - I obviously fall into the Hack category too. I've had my fair share of donuts Jorg - not much to write home about is cool, just not when you're trying to show off to your mates! Greg

Well after bragging about how well the Parra has been fishing, my mate Thuan decide to fly up from Melbourne to have a crack at the yellowfin brims. He's pretty comfortable on the natural structure and flats, so we decided to fish tight into the manmade structure. Pontoons, marinas, jetties, boat hulls. He arrived early Saturday and we hit the parra in the wind and the rain just after lunch for a quick little session. First spot Thuan hooks up to a very good fish pretty quickly. After a long run, he pulled hooks - only to find a straightened rear treble and bent rear eyelet on his sinking stick minnow. At this point I'm sure he was thinking this is going to be easy... Not so at all. The wind was pretty strong, and holding the boat straight was quite a task, so we decided to make a move to Balmain and find some shelter. I managed to hook and lose a kingy pretty quickly on a moored boat, and we managed 3 small bream to 28cm. The weather was ordinary, so we decided to call it quits after a few hours. Sunday we were joined by my Brother Chris and hit the water at a very decent 7am. What a tough old day it turned out to be though. The first hour and a bit saw 1 undersize bream and a couple of small flathead come to the boat. A quick move, and I hooked a very good bream, only to pop the leader after a good run. Note to self - that small nick in the leader that you've been ignoring is always gonna come back to bite you! Not long after, Thuan hooks up to a nice trevally. The extended fight meant I could get few action pics and some Video Here A few more undersize fish followed by move up the Lane Cove saw more undersize fish come over the side. By now, the stomachs were grumbling, and the lure of food was more enticing than the fishing and we headed for the fishmarkets for a feed. A last ditch effort in Blackwattle Bay was fruitless so we pulled the pin. another short video We had a good couple of days on the water with a few laughs and a good feed, but the fishing was a disappointment - first Parra river donut in a long time... Cheers, Greg

I agree. I had a 72lb maxxum on my old 480 Top Ender. At first I thought it might be overkill, but I'm glad I went with a bigger motor in the end. Even in strong winds it could get hard to control. I would think 80lb would be the absolute minimum for your boat. Cheers, Greg

Congratulations. Nice Red Squid Hunter. Greg

LOL Justin - you're not feeling any pressure to perform are you

Thanks for the kind words. We both had a top arvo on the water, and she was proud as punch- as was I for that matter . Anja's a competent little fisho, and she isn't backward in telling me where and how we should be fishing - she's just lacked interest recently. After my ill fated Tassie trip this year, I've spent a bit more time fishing socially in the last few months to re-ignite the passion and this was the icing on the cake. As to a new tournie partner? Time will tell. I wouldn't mind fishing a couple of teams events with her when she's ready - it has already been a topic of conversation in the past. Klainz - Sorry mate I honestly didn't pay too much attention to the conditions. It was very impromptu trip. In general I do keep a fishing diary, but I'm not at all vigilant at keeping it up to date. i can tell you though, that the reason I fished these spots is based on a pattern that is pretty consistent for this time of year. This isn't the first time I've had a gem of a session there at this time. And, you're right, it could be any number of factors that switch them on or off, be it tide, pressure, wind direction etc. Tevoro, we hit a number of spots between Putney and North Sydney. Greg, LOL, I was wondering when it would happen... You've got my number Cheers, Greg

Nice work Greg! One can never be too proficient with the net. A very valuable skill to have Cheers, Greg

Had a quick 3 hour arvo session with my 8 year old daughter, Anja, the other day. It's been about 8 or 9 months since she's wanted to come out for a ride and a fish with her old man - something about Zac Effron being far more "interesting" LOL. Anyway started by casting 100mm squidgy wrigglers in bloodworm and wasabi on 1/8 jigheads around the boats and floating pontoons. At this stage Anja was more interested in reading her book and listening to the High School Musical soundtrack on the iPod, and I started picking up a few small fish which started to gain her interest. As usual, we could see the fish high in the water column, but a cast tight to structure was required to get the bites. They'd follow the lure down and take it either on the drop or pick it up off the bottom. After couple more small fish, I landed a nice 35cm followed by a 39 fork fish. This was to be the start of a great little session, and at this point I put out the teaser and asked if she wanted to land the next one which gained an uncommitted "OK". Couple of casts later I hooked up a smallish fish, which Anja proceeded to land. Next fish, was the same, I handed the rod over and watched with satisfaction as Anja played it out. Well, that was it. "Dad, where's my rod"? It didn't take her long to settle into a rhythm and find her casting range and before long she was smacking them, including a nice fish which she hooked tight to the structure and fought out like a pro. This ended up being her PB at 32cm fork. As most fathers would understand, I got more pleasure out of her excitement catching her PB, than I did out of the rest of the fishing that day, and we had a cracker! We ended up with about 11 legals, the best 5 going around 3.8kg. Cheers, Greg.

We hooked a king off the moored boats in IC today. Would have gone close to 70cm. Swam out from the moored boats straight at us and out the other side. once it realised it was hooked, 2 big head shakes and it was gooone. Fishing 3lb and without a bit of luck, we didn't stand a chance.

Great report Roberta. Tournie fishing is a totally different beast isn't it? Great fun but can be hard work too when it isn't all coming together. cheers, Greg

great stuff to catch them on your home made flies! Cheers, Greg

We got waved down on Sunday by a guy who'd gotten lost and disoriented in the fog in Cowan. He'd stopped and anchored a few hours earlier and thought he was in Pittwater. Nice pic Andrew. should have seen it from in the Fog. It was eerie with a strange blue hue to the light filtering through. Cheers, Greg

From what I have seen, the Humminbird side imaging is awesome. Given the style of fishing I do, it would open up a whole new world. when I have the $$, there will be one on my boat. Cheers, Greg

pmak, in devising your plan, firstly have a think about what the fish are doing (and why) at the particular stage of the tide that you are targeting them. No doubt, you've heard this before, but I think it is important to keep considering this idea. For example the couple of hours before a high, they'll be moving up onto the edges, onto the flats etc and most likely be actively feeding fish. So in this light, what are the fish doing at other stages of the tide? Time on the water will help you suss that and give you confidence. Another piece of advice is don't get too hung up on "spots". Sometimes they produce, and sometimes they don't - and often for no apparent reason. Don't get me wrong, I have a long list of spots that I fish on the harbour, but I think it is more important to start to identify patterns. For example, if a certain point that has characteristic structure (and by this I don't necessarily mean the structure you can see - ie use your sounder), cops the current on the run out tide, and is producing, I'd be thinking about similar structure in the system and having a look there. I think once you start identifying patterns, they will help you make higher percentage choices about which of your spots to hit up, at which stages of the tide. Hope that helps cheers, Greg

As I said, despite all the mishaps, I'd go and do it all again, it was a great experience and we got some great fish. And Roberta, you're absolutely right, Fishing as a boater was a massive step up, even from fishing in my boat in a teams event. The decisions I made were mine alone, right or wrong! I really admire the top guys who can consistently manage to finish at the top of the field across the country and even across different species. I learnt a lot from talking to those guys this last fortnight, and hopefully I've learnt from my own experiences as well. Fingers crossed that Andrew's right, and I've had all my bad luck for a couple of years. Darkhorse, mate take it from me and don't give up. I caught 2 fish in 3 days of fishing the Derwent his year after a great 2008, and I can tell you watching all of those 4+, 5+ and 6+ kg bags come in made me even more determined to get back out there again. - C'MON FISHING GODS, smile down on me... Cheers, Greg

My advice is, if you think it will be something you'll enjoy, give them a go. I jumped in the deep end and started fishing the comps as a non boater about 2 years ago, not long after I first started fishing. Though the comp thing is not for everyone, for me they are heaps of fun and satisfy that competitive streak. I've learnt heaps, fished some fantastic waterways and met some great people. Andrew, if your thinking about it, do it! I don't think Tassie fished nearly as well this year as last year - perhaps the fish are wising up? And as you've read,I had some disastrous moments. Even still, Chris and I had some awesome fishing and caught some great fish. I think the Yellowfin hit more agressively, but bar a few, the blacks we caught down there ran pretty hard - especially in a foot of water... Cheers, Greg

Following on from my previous post HERE, Chris and I left Ansons quite satisfied. Some cracking fish, some monumental bust offs and Chris had a monumental tussle with a seagull that took a fancy to his favouite Daiwa Dr Minnow lure... Unfortunately, for me anyway, the rest of the trip was to be a bit of a disaster. The 2.5 hour drive at dusk to Swansea saw me dodge a roo and a couple of rabbits at dusk. Unfortunately on arrival at our destination, we realised that one of the rabbits that i dodged wasn't quite so lucky and had had an encounter with the trailer. It was late, and by this time it was blowing a gale, and the temperature had dropped quite substantially. Fortunately for us, the guys we were staying with had food ready for us and we settled down to compare stories of the days fishing adventures. Our plan for the following day was to fish the Swan River with a couple of the other guys, but Chris and I made a decision in the morning based on the wind to try our luck further South at the more protected Prosser River near Orford. On the drive down we crossed Little Swanport River and the wind didn't look to be too bad and spontaneously decided to try our luck. Note, we had been warned that this system wasn't really viable when the wind was blowing, but the upper reaches didn't look too bad. We doubled back and eventually found the ramp to launch. It was located near the mouth of the river, and we were soon starting to understand the warnings. We pushed on nevertheless expecting that we would be able to find a sheltered bit of river to fish, but how wrong we were. We literally got blown off the water. The wind was so strong it was difficult to stand up, and near impossible to make a cast, even with the wind. We also nearly got stranded on several occasions when the water level quickly dropped from 3-4m into 200mm without warning - we quickly realised that the white sticks scattered throughout the system were very basic channel markers. After an hour on the water, we called it quits and moved on to the Prosser. The Prosser is a small water way the pushes up into a rocky gorge probably no more than 2.5km long. I'd fished this system landbased last year with the kids and definately wanted to explore it in the boat. I'd also heard reports of it holding some good fish. Chris scored a good fish of about 35cm on his 3rd or 4th cast t the end of the gorge and dropped another. After 30min or so I hadn't had a touch and decided to move further down towards the mouth where we'd seen some likely looking snags. Went to pull up the electric and the handle slipped out of my hand. Out of instinct I grabbed the head unit on the electric - bad move - the housing snapped in 2! Crap, Crap, Crap and numerous other expletives escaped my mouth. It was Wednesday 4.30pm and prefish for the Derwent was on Friday. My first thought was I can't afford to buy a new electric... Once I realised the housing could be replaced, this thought was replaced by "how the hell am I going to get parts here by tomorrow"? Desperate phone calls to BLA and a number of dealers confirmed I could have the parts sent direct to Hobart by Friday. CRAP! how was I going to prefish? As luck would have it, Steve Morgan carry's a spare electric for these kinds of mishaps and I could borrow this. Drove on to Hobart where we were staying with Leigh McKenzie. I mentioned earlier about the mates I had met on the same trip last year, and Leigh is the perfect case in point. I posted on another forum in 2008 asking for a prefish for the 2 rounds, and Leigh answered my call. We've since become good mates. He flew up earlier this year to fish the Aus Open with me, and our families only really came to St Helens this year to catch up again. Next day was spent on repairs and swapping electrics before the prefish Friday. Prefish day started with me crossing paths with a big black cat - an Omen maybe? With a mixture of anticipation and nervousness we hit the water early. For Chris it was an awful start. First cast into a tree and lost his leader. Retied his leader and dropped the jighead over the side. When he stod up, grabbed the rod and he'd snagged on the bottom. Lost his leader. Retied his leader another couple of times before he finally settled into the routine. On a bank further down river that I'd had success on the previous year, he pulled a nice 40cm specimen off a small point. I marked this spot and we moved on. I'd done some research on Google Earth, and in my discussions with Leigh, I planned to target the 4 main Marinas on the Derwent during the comp. I figured that these would be areas less likely to be targeted by the other competitors, and if they produced, hold good quality fish. Well it seemed I was wrong on 2 counts. They didn't seem to be holding many fish - I managed only 1 fish and quite a number of other competitors seemed to be prefishing with a similar plan in mind. Unfortunately at the end of the prefish, we had only caught the 2 fish, and I didn't have a game plan resolved. We got out of the water quite late and made our way back to Leigh's. The parts had turned up for my electric, but the lures and leader I ordered hadn't. We then somehow managed to get to the briefing 3min late - bad move because leigh and I were relegated to last starting position - A bad start to the tournament, and probably worse for Leigh, who being one of the favourites to take out the comp, his gameplan revolved around getting to his spots first. Day 1, in only my 2nd comp as a boater, and with my own electric back, I headed straight for the point we prefished and got smoked by a good fish on about the 5th cast. Fortunately, the fish must have throw the hooks and the lure floated back to the surface. I got out muscled twice more In the next hour,on the same bank by good fish, and a total of 4 times during that day. To make matters worse, whilst trying to retrieve a lure for my non boater, I jammed my electric hard into the rocks and the bearings in the main shaft exploded everywhere. Back to the weigh in with a big fat donut... Day 2 started earlier than normal, reinstalling Steve's spare electric again. Straight back to my point, and on the first drift my non boater scores a nice 39cm fish. Next drift I pull a 41.5cm fish from the same spot - no donuts today... and 2nd fish to my nonboater on the next drift over the same spot went 40cm. Then it all went quiet except for the flathead and trout, and that would be our tally for the day and the end of a disappointing comp on a fishery that has a massive reputation for quantity and quality. On the way back to the weighin in the wind chop, somehow the housing on Steve's electric cracks too - I must have Pi$$ed off the Fishing Gods somewhere in my travels this trip. And this wasn't to be the end of it. Before we left Tasmania the following afternoon, I had an encounter with a collapsed trailer bearing, having to replace the other trailer bearing, a snapped bolt on the brake callipers, oh and there was the rewiring of the sounder in there somewhere along the way. Are these excuses for my poor performances during the comps, absolutely not, however they did contribute to a really frustrating week away during which I nearly chucked in the towel on a couple of occasions, and nearly put the boat up for sale on more than one. So, After the ferry trip home, comparing stories over a few drinks with new mates I've asked myself, "will I go back in 2010"? The answer is simply "Absolutely"! So what did I learn from this trip? 1. I probably don't dislike flats fishing as much as I thought 2. Lure retrieves - Pauses, Pauses, LONG PAUSES 3. Black Bream vs Yellowfin Bream are very different entities 4. my mistakes and bad decisions are part of the huge learning curve that I'm on. I've been fishing for about 2.5 years and comp fishing for the best part of that. The experience I've gained in that time is miniscule compared to the lifetime of experience that guys who've been fishing their whole lives have. 5. Confidence is king! 6. Not only expensive Jap lures catch fish. Most of my fish were accounted for by sub $15 lures with treble and split ring upgrades. 7. Maintenance - although I'm pretty pedantic about my boat, there's always room to be a bit more vigilant especially with trailer maintenance, and especially on long trips. Apologies for the long winded report Cheers, Greg

As some would know, I've just returned from this year's ABT tour of Tassie. I'll preface this report with the fact that there were moments of magical fishing and others of complete and utter disaster. The comp fishing for me was a fizzle and a disapointment, nonetheless, now that I'm back, I'll say "bring on the 2010 tour"! I fished the tour last year as a non boater and have to say it was the best fishing experiecne I have ever had. The fishing was awesome, and the mates I made along the way ensured that there was never a question about whether I would go again this year, but rather, whether I would fly down and fish as a non-boater again, or if I could be bothered to tow the boat down and dive in the deep end. Well I decided on the latter, and now as they say, the rest is history. I travelled down with my Brother Chris, and left Sydney in the wee hours of Wednesday morning 25 Feb. The trip started badly, when the footpedal of my minkotta was rubbing on the boat cover and had worn a hole in it within the first hour of departure - I was spewing. We met up with another couple on the outskirts of Sydney to travel down in convoy. By Holbrook, we bumped in to the Berkley boys, Towner and Mango, and as you could imagine everyone was in really high spirits. We made the ferry and set sail for Tassie having met quite a few more guys travelling from SA, VIC and as far as WA. Thursday Morning saw us off the ferry at 7am and we made a bee line for Port Sorell with High hopes! 2008 saw several 5 fish bags weighing 10kg+ taken from this system. We only had a couple of hours to fish before we had to pick my family and Chris' girlfriend up from the airport at Launceston. We bumped into Steve Morgan on the water who had a 46 cm fork length fish in the well that weighed approx 2.25kg - what a monster fish. There were also stories from the previous day of Wayne Friebe's 46cm 2.27kg fish. Peteer Morgans 43cm 1.80kg and Steve Steers 45cm fish that went 1.98. However we went fishless - needing to be there about 2 hours later for the high tide. I'm sure Steve Morgan won't mind me posting his Pic taken from another forum. The first Comp was at St Helens on the east coast - a great flats fishery. I pre fished well, thought I'd cracked a bit a a pattern, and managed some really good fish. However, everything changed on the first day, with the wind swinging around from the opposite direction and my plans fell to pieces. Chris, fishing as a non boater did well though and absolutely smashed it on the second day,landing well over 20 fish and pusing him from about 20th position into 10th. After St Helen's, we dropped the family back to the airport and made our way to Anson's Bay just North of St Helen's. Again, we'd heard reports of great fishing up there with a fish around 1.9 kg being taken up there. Chris and I fished the flats on the incoming tide. It was cold and windy, but the fish came out to play. Chris got the first fish was 41.5cm and weighing in at 1.71kg was a chunk of a specimen and our biggest for the day. We managed to compile a 5 fish bag of 5.9kg in about 2 hours. Once the tide slowed, so did the bite and the size of the fish gradually got smaller. For me, this was to be the highlight of my trip. to be continued...HERE Cheers, Greg

No it doesn't work... But can you send me your unopened satchels...?

Congratulations Roberta. Re the Kayak fishing series, there's an advert in the latest edition of one of the fishing mags (the one printed in a large format). Cheers, Greg

Consistency... cheers, greg

Adzzy - very nice bream mate. There is absolutely no problem fishing the outside wall mate, though some of the gestapo will try to tell you that it is "private" on the outside of the marina too. I've been shoo'd away whilst fishing the outside walls of the marina at cabarita, though the security guard couldn't tell me how far the "private property"of the marina extended out from the outside pontoons. cheers, Greg

make sure the first couple of turns of the reel after you cast are retrieved with some tension on the line. With my shimano reels I make sure that I put the rod tip into the water when I start to retrieve. The tension created on the line seems to be enough to minimise the wind knots. Also make sure you keep an eye on the line on the spool. You can see a "wind knot" in the making. Usually a loose loop on the spool under the layers of line. If I spot one of these, I will pull the line off the reel by hand to clear the problem loop. If you leave the loop on the spool, guaranteed you will end up with a wind knot. Cheers, Greg

Hodgey - we fished it all, bar throwing a popper. I fished plastics from unweighted to 1/12, slow, fast, erratic you name it. threw hardbodies in various shapes and sizes and blades. They were just too good for us... In hindsight I actually think we should have stuck to the boats - sorry Justin. That's where I found them to be biting on Sunday. The lure of the big hightide on the flats was just to enticing though. Guys the boat traffic wasn't too much of a problem while we were fishing on Sunday, but the sheer number of boats about when we were moving between spots was just crazy. Greg, the ramp at Five Dock/Drummoyne is where I put in. At midday, the queue was just starting to build up. It amazes me the chaos that summer creates down there. when we came back in there were 3 boats beached on the ramp waiting for a car to be collected or parked, and they all had passengers on board - so there's really no excuse for it. There's no pontoon down there, but the tide was high enough for the boats to be pulled away to the side . Needless to say that no other boats could be launched or retrieved during this time. Then the number of people wanting to jump the queue and the guys that feel it's acceptable to pull up on the ramp and then get out to get their boats ready. I'm glad I got off the water when I did. The tempers were getting frayed and sounds like only would have got worse later in the day. Frankly, whether it's fishing spots, ramp etiquette or tourney etiquette, I guess it all comes down to having a bit of respect and common sense. Cheers, Greg

It's been some time since my last report. Personally, after a cracker Autumn, I've found the Parra has fished really tough this winter. The quality of the Brims has been good once you locate them, but they've been few and far between. Henceforth the motivation to get out there has waned a little in the last few months. With the big tides last week and the warmer weather, I had high expectations and plans were made last Friday to go and "smack them up" with JustinP. The conditions were perfect - big tide, slight breeze, water temp 20 degrees - Well how wrong we were! We struggled to find feeding fish and threw the proverbial tackle box at them for pretty poor results again. They weren't on the flats which really surprised me and I dropped what seemed to be a very good flaty out of the shallows. We saw them on the marina walls, and when I say "saw them", as far as the eye could see were Brims up on the surface slurping at the mussells off the wall - schools of them - in fact I've never seen them like that before, and they weren't at all interested in our lures. We finally found a few later in the day under the boats. Aside from the company it was a pretty disappointing day, oh and did I mention the sunburn on my arms??? Must remember to reapply that sunscreen. Not to be too disheartened, I headed out again on Sunday. Didn't revisit any of the same spots and did manage to crack a bit of a pattern, but again not a single one came off the flats. Found a few more fish than Friday but with no real size to them except for this one fish which went 37cm fork and weighed in at a surprising 1.36kg. I must check my scales, because I didn't think it would be that heavy even though it was a fat specimen. Anyway it took a gulp 2inch pepper prawn on 1/24 jighead fished slooooow under a boat. Off the water by midday because the boat traffic was getting unbearable. The chaos at the ramp was also a sight to behold. cheers, Greg