reubs

So the day was off to a good start with clear skies and an early morning to boot. had the day off work so decided to take a mate out for a fishing trip and see if we could land a keeper or 3.. Never fished botany bay so thought it might be a good move to have a crack and see how it goes! Got onto the water at about 7am launching just as the sun was coming up from the dover park boat ramp. Not a bad spot but the ramp is a bit steep for my tow rig especially when its a bit wet and slippery! but the good news is we didn't end up in the drink so I was happy about that. Headed across the bay and had a flick around the moored boats and put out some bread and tried to perhaps burley up some bait...there was action on the sounder bit not much on the bite other than the odd small snapper. Decided to move on and head out into the more open waters while it was calm and before the tide turned (so I wouldnt have to push the old motor too hard!) anchored up just past taren point bridge (i dont know what its called) where there were some tailor causing a bit of a stir in the water but only managed to pull one out..though it was a bit on the small side at about 23cm, so back into the drink he went.Had a bit of a drift session from the bridge back towards quibray bay and managed to boat a 23cm snapper and got a bit excited that a larger number might be lurking around so back he went but not much more. Anchored up near the drop off and soaked some prawns with no luck, onward we went when we see a guy out on his own wrestling with a fish of some description from his boat in the shallows around the first bay of carters island so we motor around close by to see what hes gonna bring up from the depths but it looked like he was using really light gear and was taking him a while and I was drifting inshore close to where the waves were starting to pick up a bit which is always a big NO NO in my shallow tinny! So off we went not knowing what he was fighting with but with a hope that there was something out there for us!.. So again we motored up to the green buoy off the first groyne and anchor up, chuck out some bread and some tuna oil but theres a bit of a current running so out go the baits and up comes a 30cm tarwhine so into the esky he goes! Saw another boat not too far off from us around the markers anchored up but didn't look like it was happening for them either so after a bit more of a wait and no bites decided it was time to move on again...I was keen to have a crack at heading to the runways or the tanker but my mate wasnt too keen on the idea so we decided to up anchor and move....Next spot is just off the sandringham baths got up close to the nets and just drifted with the current for a bit but nothing.. UNTIL I SAW A SQUID! and I just had to have it!.. Now I know what you are thinking...KINGY BAIT!..but alas I think it was actually the smallest squid known to man just having a gander at my boat...so I get a cut open plastic bottle and next thing I know hes in! My first squid and what a beauty! Measuring in at a whopping 15mm yep millimetres I think hes almost worthy of catch of the month.. so into a V can with some fresh sea water he went so I could take him home for show and tell haha.. Back to the bridge and nothing was on the bite so off to tom uglys it was! There was a school of tailor causing a stir in the water and about 10 people going hard land based so anchored up and got a small 10cm tailor to the boat but couldnt get anything else to bite after that not on prawn or squid or pilchard! by this time was dying for a leek so hijacked my way onto a private jetty just so i could get to the shore and do my business then we were back on our way to the rocky headland closest to tom uglies to anchor up in the hope of catching SOMETHING! but nope again no luck...and now theres some rainclouds not too far off and the clouds are moving from behind where I couldnt see off into the distance so it was time to move...back to ulgies and the winds had picked up putting some chop on the surface so decide to get the boat back to the ramp and get some shelter. No sooner than I had set foot on the jetty and BANG the rain was ON like donkey kong and we were getting soaked...as I fumbled the keys to the car and catch an older couple having a makeout sesh in their car about 20 meters away from me..who knows what they were upto but it was steamy in there and they looked like they were hiding something! haha anyway thats a story for later.. boat is on the trailer and out of the water and we are soaked already so I say stuff it im already soaked im taking the rods and the bait and going off the jetty...but there was nothing to be had haha shortly after though the rain stopped and up comes a double rainbow and the munchies had set in and it was now about 2pm.. off to get some chips and since its early in the afternoon and I had nothing better to do it was off to the georges river national park to see what the hype was all about on the georges...get there and theres a couple of blokes testing their jetski put the boat in the water amongst the rubbish and logs and trees and bucketloads of crap in the water and theres no joke a 20cm bream floating dead amongst the trash so I wasnt keen on eating anything out of here anyway but thought i'd go for a flick to have some fun and get rid of some bait.. headed up to the closest overpass with pylons hoping something was lurking in the depths but nothing was even having a crack at the bait.. went around to the next spot where there was a creek mouth with some rocks and mangroves around and a bunch of pylons but nothing was on the bite and nothing went for a SP or a hardbody at all so decided to call it a day and emptied a couple of packs of squid and bread into the water to feed whatever surviving fish population there might be in those waters and headed home with half a tank of fuel a 30 cm tarwhine and the smallest squid known to man! that is my report, twas a fun day none the less but I definitely need a deeper hull and a bigger motor! Reubs + TINY TIN!

Pretty sure that fish of yours is smiling!

that was the general plan....I'd be more than happy to register it if it was required but its borderline

mm its pretty damn slow...was maybe pumping 6hp outta the factory back in 79 but 30+ years on it still works but is by no means fast.. will have to try and get some sense out of the maritime guys.. no one can give me an answer

So with all this rain hanging about and a RDO on the cards for tomorrow, I'm brought to this point once again where I need advice on where to go.. This morning as I woke up I came up with the name of TINY TIN for my boat as its a 12footer and fairly shallow in its design and has a 6hp 1979 evinrude on the back (I dont know if I need to get it registered or not...any ideas? the website says over 5hp but this thing is an old tired motor so I dont know if it counts?) Not sure if the harbour would be a good move as I'm not sure if my hull would be suitable for it or not....or botany bay for that matter? or how far up pittwater it would be safe to take it.. Apparently the east side of pittwater fishes well but I've never been on that side...last time I went to pittwater I stuck to the west side and managed to wrestle with a 90+cm cobia which got away but have since invested in a gaf so that shouldnt be an issue any more...fingers crossed... Maybe if someone has a similar sized vessel and wants to attack the same body of water tomorrow we can meet up and head out together..Bait for tomorrow is bread rolls and Hans american hotdogs.. haha bring on the kings!!

Good work mate! Im yet to tangle with a flattie but fishin is fishin!

As promised the fishing report from todays travels....left home at about 6 in the AM and didnt end up returning until 10 in the PM! but it was quite an eventful day however I'm not really sure what I'm doing wrong...Anywho on with the report!...the day started out with a launch from the ramp at tunks park around 7:30 after which I motored my way around to balmoral beach! not a bad effort for a 12footer with a tired old evinrude 6hp I reckon...saw a large pleasure boat anchored up near the headland at balmoral with a couple of bloke on board catching some small fish off of it so decided to anchor up just around the point about 20 metres away from the rocks and soak some baits...Had the usual WA pillie on gang hanging out but no dice on that, also had a paternoster rig going with a squid and a pillie hanging off it dropped just next to the boat..but no luck there... there were a couple of largeish looking leatherjackets a couple of metres down having a nibble at the baits and poking around but didnt manage a catch other than a few very small snapper (under 10cm). The winds and the chop then decided to pick up a bit and since my rig cant handle any more than about 10cm of swell decided I would try and target some flatties over the sand between clontarf and balmoral...but to no avail again (this is where I come unstuck because Ive never actually hooked a flattie before so perhaps my flattie hunting skills just suck and are in need of some tuition!)had a pillie out on gang just incase something decided to swing past and had some baits just soaking but nothing for half an hour and we had drifted quite a bit...so we decided that it was time to perhaps head back in past the spit bridge and go for a motor up the waterway...stopped just under the bridge on the south side and tried casting into the channel a bit but really got nothing but snags which was a bit disappointing because I lost a bunch of stuff ...good to see plenty of juvenile bream and snapper in the shallows however..Decided to move on and ended up coasting all the way up to around the explosives reserve just north of sugarloaf bay..it was there anchored just about 10 meters south of the channel marker on the northen most point about 10 metres out from the rocks that we found some leatherjackets that seemed to be pretty hungry! We barely had to put any squid on out hooks (I'm talking less than a 1cm square chunk of squid) and they were on pretty much every cast...they weren't very big at all really but we took about 15 home for the pot between us because we hadn't caught anything else all day and it was kinda fun to just be catching SOMETHING!...by this time it was about 4 in the PM and I realised that we were actually pretty far away from tunks park and with no night lights and a whimpy motor it was time to set off to be closer to the ramp! So from memory there was a short stop off in sailors bay where we again were only met with baby snapper and whilst motoring over the sand in about a metre of water saw a small ray which took off...so it was time for one final stop for the boat on the way back in close to the ramp but someone was anchored up just off the point at long bay so I decided to anchor up on the opposite side on the north point of quakers hat bay about 5 metres or so from the rocks and to flick some baits around.. In went the pillie on gang to soak, and the paternoster whilst we had 2 lighter rods with a weight on the main line above a swivel and a wire trace with a clip so we could switch out our hooks on demand to accomodate the fish.. so we're flicking around some prawns and cut up squid on the lighter rods and only getting baby snapper and bream and small leather jackets again and then the pillie line decides to make some noise...so I drop the light rig and pick up the pillie rig and try to feel for some weight but nothing...then a hit and it was on! I reeled her in and mush to my surprise was greeted with a decent bream for the pot which I was quite happy with..measures up to about 35cm which is a PB and dont have a CAN for the COTM! I had a bottle but didnt realise until now that a bottle was also acceptable!! So with a bit of excitement a fresh pillie was loaded up and set out and there was fish activity all around us breaking the surface and my mate says he saw a school of something big go past (no idea what) So i put on a metal slice and have a flick around but nothing else for us from there!...back to the ramp just after dark had a heap of bait left so decided to hang around for a bit on the jetty and have a flick and my mate manages a 27cm bream and that was all that we caught today...Had a bit of fun though....beached the boat for a pitstop on quite a steep beach which was such a fail! the back end of the boat got dumped on by some waves breaking the shore and quarter filled the boat and I think has also managed to drown my netbook which was in my backpack onboard... so a little drain away later and a jump skip and a hop back in to the boat and a frantic paddle away from the shore and I think its time to call it a day!

Cheers for that guys! I figured the 6hp wouldnt have enough grunt to get around where all the big boys go with their fancy shmansy rigs and to be fair for the moment I cant really afford that so will have to make do and live in the real world but tunks sounds like it might be a goer for tomorrow and I may try and motor my way around to balmoral and see what I can pickup along the way... any good spots to catch some fresh squid? I have a couple of cheap jigs but havnt never actually used them so still getting used to it all on the budget ..I did take the boat to pittwater the other week where I had a wrestle with a cobia about halfway up but when I came out of the bay that I was in a little while later the chop had picked up and so had the wind and it was a bit of an effort to motor around! but I guess we'll see how we go tomorrow!

If I had landed it and measured it up it might've been a contender for your cobia record! There will be a gaf on board tomorrow thats for sure! thanks for the clarifications too guys, my mate that I got the boat off wasn't convinced and thought that it mightve been a catfish! but I wasnt gonna buy that!

I'll load up the vid on youtube tonight and post it on here...it was a beaut! I think where I came unstuck was with my tackle..I had a 3gang hook setup with the hooks snelled to the line (one of the cheapie neptune tackle rigs) when I got the fish to the boat I grabbed the line which i think was 40-50 lb off the top of my head and when I went to lift it up and out of the water the 2nd and 3rd hooks snapped clean off the line and old cobie got away...I'm still hurting on the inside because it was a great fish!

Evening all, So after a long weekend away in qld on the sunny coast where the fishing was miserable, I managed to have a 15cm poddy swim into my landing net with relative ease and that was about all that was caught all weekend! And it was released shortly after so no keepers for the weekend away. But thanks to the amazing rostering skills of the honchos at work I now have tomorrow off and with my recent acquisition of a 12ft tinny with a fart in a hurricane of a motor Im looking for somewhere to go tomorrow to catch me some fish.. so if you see a corolla sedan with a bonnet scoop towing a pretty dodge looking rig that would be me! Ive only had the boat for a couple of weeks and have only taken it out three times thus far myself, once on the parramatta river on its maiden, will it float?, voyage, second to the pittwater where I almost landed what I believe to be a decent sized cobia, and third to narrabeen lakes where nothing was caught while on the boat but just after dark when the mullet were jumping out of the water around the caravan park managed to land a few healthy looking but undersized bream and tarwhine and maybe a small whiting or two and that has been it to date. So tomorrow being my one day in the week off I'm planning to have a boat and rods ready to go tonight so I can get out and be easing my way into the water at dawns crack! And this is where the problem starts, I'm not allergic to travel and I'm at least looking for a fun day out hopefully with something to take home for mum to cook and maybe get some decent photos . So I was thinking about maybe the hawkesbury, or even upto the entrance, I live in parramatta but Im happy to go to where the fish are if they have been schooling somewhere that someone knows about and is willing to share I'd love to get amongst it. When it comes to the Hawkesbury though Im not sure where I should draw the boundaries for myself or where I should be going...should i dare venture out to flint and steel with only 6hp in tow or should I perhaps try my luck elsewhere? Im keen to attempt to get amongst some kingies or some jewies but with my limited boating skillz and lack of knowledge of the areas not really sure where I should be targetting or how i should setup my rigs so any help would be greatly appreciated and I will do my best to write up a kick butt fishing report should they be on the bite! Cheers! Reubs

hey fellow fishermen/women, I was out the other week in the pittwater north of scottland island soaking a WA pillie and chucking around some baits probably only in 4 metres of water when all of a sudden it was on like donkey kong with this badboy....the day i didnt bring the net along of course i got the final bit of the fight on video and will have to upload it to youtube and link it on here for you all to see my disappointment and how exhausted i was after the fight...anyway I suspect it was a cobia but am willing to accept that it may have been something else...can anyone give me a positive ID on this? that would be great it was a big fish and I'm still gutted that it got away! but not a bad effort for a 12ft tinny with a 6ish hp '79 evinrude motor on the back