Jimmy C

Hey fishlexic Remember how hot and sticky it was on Wednesday? Days like that where it turns into a storm in the afternoon I've found to be really productive in estuaries. So the weather report should say something like: "hot and humid today with a late southerly change" - and I'm racing to get out there... Just my experience though I hope you get some good fish tomorrow.. Jimmy

No more fiddly to clean than any other fish with a good sharp fillet knife. Wear fishing or garden gloves for protection and just fillet them like you would any other fish that size. The flesh has a consistency that is a hybrid between quality white fish and lobster flesh, I guess thats why theyre nicknamed poor mans lobster. Just fry the fillets in a pan any which way and they'll come up really nice. I'm quite happy for people to put them back... More for us!!

Thanks guys - will definitely be grabbing a pair now!

Hey all Thinking about getting a pair of polaroid sunglasses for flats fishing this summer. Wondering if any raiders have a strong opinion either way on how much difference they make to your visibility for that kind of fishing, as compared with standard decent sunnies that don't have polaroid lenses. Any experience shared would be helpful Cheers, Jimmy

DOH!!!

Try days around the new moon, with high tide at dawn or dusk. Fish around this time and you should pick up squid. If you fish these times and don't get one within a few casts, try moving around to other spots, because if they are there and hungry, they normally hit your jigs as soon as they touch the water. The mix of a rocky outcrop and kelp bed sounds like prime squid real estate, you just need to crack that first one and you'll be on your way. But note - if you can, don't spend 4 hrs in the one spot once a fortnight plugging away at it. Spend 30 mins each time and go more often (and try different spots), and you will get much better results.

The twilight zone over the next month will be prime for morning sessions! I can feel that daylight savings excitement coming on as well....

Hundgie, sounds like a fun day out but cold in that water!! I do a fair bit of flats wading in the same general area for whiting/bream/flatties but have never had any luck on the whiting with soft plastics (no probs with live nippers or worms). I've given the storm soft plastic nippers a flogging looking for a whiting and come up with nothing before in the past but possibly poppers might be worth a go. Question - Are you casting blind or spotting the whiting first? Have thought it might be good to try throwing some flies at them.... Especially if I find out the poppers are working...

Nice work!

Nice work mate

IFishSick and Fishlexic: Land based on the ocean side Squidboy: On the barometric pressure thing, I'm no expert but I think that the barometer and weather patterns have a bit to do with the feeding behaviour of fish and that you can get times when they are biting a lot more aggressively due to these variables. I'm still working it out though.... Perhaps there is a resident biologist on Fishraider who can shed some light for us all. I suspect that if there is a barometer effect it would be valid for a lot of the species in the food chain including squid. Penguin: A few for the table and some for bait. Roberta: That jig is now my favourite. Good luck on your trip down to Sydney - I hope you get a few.

BEST EVER DAY'S FISHING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Absolute gold fellas

Went for a quick squidding session last week at Cronulla but only just got the photos together. Thought I'd post a late report - there are a few around... Yo Zuri 2.5 in pink did most of the damage. Cheers, Jimmy

That is a really nice salmon Davy - Well done!

Yeah we were teahing my sister to cast one day and didn't have any bait on the hook - the result - a little flatty on the bare hook!

That helps for sure jewgaffer. Cheers mate

Jewgaffer does it again.... Great tips there and heaps of detail Good luck on the jewies everyone... This has got me fired up to try some new spots!

Jewgaffer - forward it on to the skipper by all means... And I will keep in touch for sure and I'll take you up on going for a fish so we can put it into practice. I can't make it to the social on sat night as the GF has picked up some tickets to the Live Earth concert but keep it in mind for another time as definitely keen to talk more. Can't help feeling there's a lot more to uncover on the subject!!

I went out on MV Julian back in 2003 - the two guys that work on that boat are top knock-around blokes - if you are going up with a bunch of mates I'm sure they'll show you a good time and hopefully a few fish.

G'day Jewgaffer, I realise this is a huge post but the words just keep rolling out when your thinking about fishing!! Mate I enjoyed your post as I too try to come up with all sorts of weird and wonderful theories on when to fish. Also, you hear experts say the barometer is important but none of them go any further into how it works for the layman so I applaud you for your posts and for the insight you provide. I've had a lot of success in estuaries on an intra-day change in weather conditions. The classic for me is the balmy stinking hot summer’s day where the high humidity leads to an eventual downpour in the mid-afternoon. Quite often the cloud cover and rain lasts for an hour or so and then the sky clears up for the rest of the evening. During the change, the temperature might have fluctuated from 33 degrees plus back to maybe the mid twenties or less and then back again into the 30's. Many of the most successful times have been when the wind remains relatively still during this change, rather than the sudden flare-up of strong southerlies that you describe are good for jewies (which I do not doubt whatsoever). In those periods of high weather and temperature volatility I have found the fishing to be particularly frenzied. Despite knowing little about barometric pressure, I have always thought that this volatile weather pattern constituted a change in the barometer and that I had successfully manipulated the weather variables in order to achieve success. So I have tried to see through the eyes of the barometer - although I don't actually check measurements, so one can't be sure the pressure has in fact changed! Rather than just noting a change in the weather (obviously we can't visually distinguish a change in pressure), I am trying to make a calculated guess that the pressure has changed. Maybe you can tell me whether or not that type of weather pattern and quick temperature drop/recovery does characterise an actual change in pressure and your estimates of by how much. I saw you mention mathematics before... Perhaps I can draw some type of mathematical parallel to aid in developing this a little further. Now I'm not sure what type of mathematics you are into but I deal stock options for a living so I find economics logical. Spikes in volatility create frenzied activity in the markets. Smaller buyers and sellers see rapid movements in prices as a limited opportunity and enter quickly with little time to evaluate scarce information. As such, smaller players find pricing can be difficult and as a result bigger (predatory) traders move in to exploit these arbitrage (or miss-pricing) opportunities. If there was a piscatorial version of this it would be a confused bait ball surrounded by sharks!! But I guess what I'm getting at is that there are prey and predators in both environments and that a spike in volatility is what creates action. The size and the frequency of the fluctuations dictate the level of volatility and thus interest. Both situations are characterised by confusion and interest which creates predatory opportunity and then action that leaves all opportunities exploited fairly quickly - think traders bringing markets back to parity through exploiting miss-pricings until they no longer exist versus a pack of predatory fish engulfing and exhausting a crowded school of bait until there is nothing left to eat. The situation then goes flat again and there is less action until the next set of opportunities arises. So in looking deeper for some kind of hashed-up theory (perhaps you will think I'm smoking hash!! ): In times of high volatility, the bottom end of the food chain is possibly at their most active and confused. Bait too are looking to feed and situations such as quick spikes of rain or wind may mean that there is less visibility from above the water, so possible protection from birds might be a limited opportunity for bait to feed without the added danger from above for instance. Or possibly it means that the temperature or pressure change forces bait schools to leave previously ideal columns or areas of water in search of more ideal environments, which leaves schools vulnerable to being attacked while they are on the move. The most important variable that I can see is that frenzied activity stems from the opportunity being deemed as limited. Any prevailing continuity in the weather pattern or barometric pressure either means that there will no longer be any opportunities or at the other end of the scale that the opportunities are so many that there is time to rationally assess information and no longer the urgency to act quickly, and thus no feeding frenzies. I don't know what you think of this last point regarding an abundance of opportunities, but I have found at times that you can locate a lot of bait all over the place, but that there are not necessarily predators in tow. Frenzied activity occurs when resources are scarce. So from all angles that I look at it, the most profitable opportunities arise during a spike in volatility, but of course you have to be quick before they dry up... Obviously, this runs with what you are saying in terms of getting out there as soon as the pressure changes. Of course we know it’s possible to catch fish at all times but our minds seem to always have us searching for order and cause-and-effect relationships to score the best results. Thanks for your insights jewgaffer - and I hope this adds something for you or at least provides you with a slightly mathematical or economic twist!! At least it might serve to promote that while they may have small brains; fish are driven by a type of underwater economics of the most basic kind. Although humans are complex, one can see in many aspects of our everyday lives that we too are often driven by the most simple of economic objectives also. Drawing similarities between the ways both species think under these circumstances could lead to a better understanding of how a fish's environment impacts on their decision making. Interested in your thoughts.... Cheers and thanks for listening, Jimmy

G'day Mick Try the rock bars across the other side of the river from Lakewood reserve at Bonnet Bay. There is a bit of a bay that stretches about 350 metres, at each tip there are rock bars surrounded by deeper water. Towards the middle of the bay on the bangor side there is another rock bar exposed at low tide. I fished the area hard for the best part 20 years, though mainly I targeted bream and flathead on hard bodies (back when soft plastics meant Mister Twisters..). Have had them smashing live bloodworms many a time at all these spots while fishing for bream. There are often die-hards there targeting them and I have watched plenty being pulled out over the years. I never used weed but if you berley up and used a standard rig at these spots with green weed they do hold fish so with a bit of time and effort you should definitely get a few. The middle rock bar is good for everything at all times of the tide. As far as tides go I preferred bigger tides and fishing a few hours into dusk but have caught fish at all times and all tides. Any areas that are rocky with suitable depth and covered with shadow would be well worth a try.

My mate pinned one off the gravel grounds near Belambi recently. About 1.5 kilo mark. Absolute by-catch though while fishing for reddies. This area is 25m depth BTW

G'day raiders Anyone had any luck searching for Kings in Port Hacking, and more specifically Gunamatta or Burraneer Bays in the past or recently? I was thinking about trying around the yacht clubs and moorings in these bays. Only have a small craft so I would stick to these areas - would anchor up and fish with live squid (fortunately not a problem to find) or could probably slow troll. If slow trolling is the go - how could I keep the bait down without a conventional downrigger? No need to give away spots at all either - any insights as to previous success/methods/general areas would be appreciated.... Cheers, Jimmy

In case they are in a picky mood, keep some really small hooks on you and only use the smallest thin slither of bait (like peeled prawn/pilchard or yakka itself) on the hook, in a fine berley trail. Its only a small bait but they will have no trouble finding it and when they do you will increase your chances of a hook-up. I actually use fly hooks that are only as big as the "J" on your keyboard. Because they are so small the yakka has to mouth it near the barb and then presto they either hook themselves or you can jag them. I use this method as just get frustrated with bigger baits - they are good at nudging them off the hook. Hope you get plenty.... Jimmy

Nice work Dave - its taking a bit of effort to find a decent feed around there at the moment. Well done