barnzey

Call Mark McGrouther, he's the collection manager for the Australian Museum. He'll be able to give a positive id. Where were you fishing by the way? NSW or up north in QLD? Either way that's a great find.

Possibly from the Zoarcidae family but it looks like something more like something from the pearlfish family (Carapidae). Not sure which species but. Do you still have it? As I've heard they're pretty rare and the museum probably would like it.

This is why it's important to try every fish you catch at least once. You'll probably find you like a lot of fish that most people label as rubbish. Most of these 'rubbish' fish are underfished so it would be more sustainable to be eating these than chasing after the more heavily sort after species such as jew, bream, flathead etc. Personally, salmon for me are perfect for fishcakes. Soft flesh and the right strength in flavour once the bloodline is removed. When cooked as a whole fillet I find I prefer other fish which have firmer flesh. Each to their own. Salmon is an interesting bycatch if you're chasing drummer?

Fish the wash on a rising tide from mid to high. The more whitewater usually the better. Use lightly weighted baits, simple rigs are the best. I use a small ball sinker running above a hook. Use cungee or green weed. Use bread as berley thrown into the wash helps bring in the fish if it is a bit quiet. Expect to be busted off often if fishing with gear under 10kg. When hooked these fish rush straight for the ledges, often under your feet.

You might have a bit of a problem trying to land those 45 pound jew on 1 lb fireline though

Those fish cakes look pretty tasty. But is there any reason for boiling the salmon? For the lazy people who don't want to put the effort in (errr me! ) you can make fishcakes with a food processor. There's two main ways of making them. There's the slack slack way and there's the slack way. Thai fish cakes the slack way Ingredients: Chilli Ginger Coriander Garlic Grated lime rind Lime juice from lime egg breadcrumbs or cooked potato Boneless fillet salmon, deboned, deblooded Breadcrumbs for covering fishcakes Finely chop chilli, ginger, garlic, coriander and place in food processor. Add rest of ingredients to food processor. Blend (don't puree the ingredients) Shape fishcakes and roll in breadcrumbs Shallow fry on medium heat Serve with coriander and salad And the slack slack way. Substitute 2 tbsp of red thai curry paste (or green thai curry paste) in place of chilli, ginger, garlic, lime. Saves you from cutting and grating. A food processor takes away all the effort...

Catchin Jack do you think this is because the lower salinity forces them out of the river or does it draw in jew from out of the area for a feed?

In Wollongong we've had a bit of heavy rain over the past few days which has caused the ocean to change from its usual blue-green to brown from all the water coming out of creeks and overflow areas. For those people who are more wise than I, does the release of large amounts of fresh water into the ocean cause an increase or decrease in fish activity over the following days? I could imagine salinity, food abundance and visibility would all be factors to fish behaviour. For events such as these do you have more success at river mouths or do you try avoid the brown water and fish outside the 'flood zone'?

Hi all, my name is Jared, I used to do a bit of fishing as a kid on the south coast around Batemans Bay but have since moved up to Wollongong for Uni. I'm only just getting back into the fishing scene and have been chasing bream and drummer off the rocks for the last few weeks but will be looking forward to targeting some of the larger fish at night. Unfortunately I don't know too much about jew so I'm here to learn a bit more. For the people who would like to target bream from the rocks I'll be happy to share a bit of knowledge on how to target them. Cheers, Jared