Longfish

Hi all, haven't posted anything in a while but i have been fishing a bit of late, decided to have my first crack at some drummer this weekend. I know the swell was a little too small (half meter) for them but i took this as a bonus as i am not an experienced rock fisho and my fishing buddy was on mrs duty so i was solo...still wore a pdf despite basic flat calm before anyone asks! Anyway...i headed to the little bay on Saturday and there was a bit of wash about in certain areas which was encouraging...bait was liquidised bread burley and bread on the hook...found a nice area with consistent wash and flow and fished for a few hours...result...hooked two lost two...one of which must have been a good fish as there was no stopping it on 20lb and a very tight clutch on my shimmy 4500B...did me on the rocks. Anyway, the experience gave me confidence to head back Sunday but unfortunately there was basically no swell or wash at all down there so didn't get a touch...will have to wait for a swell of around 1m and go again (wouldn't fancy it much bigger than that!)...reckon i will get one next time. Cheers all. Sent from my Windows Phone using Tapatalk

There were some nice and very easily located gutters at the northern end of narrabeen (near where the lakes comes out) the last time I was there about 2 weeks ago.... very easily seen they were so well defined... maybe try up that way.

I think with the second rig you may have issues with the hooks catching each other during the cast... maybe if you add another length of line and a second swivel running off the middle swivel to the lower sinker and hook to keep them away from each other (the concept is similar to a rig used in the UK called a pulley rig... you could Google it... it has many variations such as the up and over rig etc etc). I would say however that this is all good fun but very unnecessary.... be wary of thinking that the running sinker is the rig that offers the least resistance... not necessarily the case... the current will almost always pull the hook bait off to 90 degrees from the sinker opening meaning the line will not 'run' through the sinker well after a bite anyway.... often a paternoster (or especially a running paternoster...that one would be worth Googling also) will offer the fish far less resistance as the fish is only pulling against the bow in the mainline (most the time) and not the lead... also bear in mind that any bow in the mainline against the lead will massively reduce the amount of resistance applied by the lead as it will help 'critically balance' it (to use an old carp fishing term)... another reason why the presentation of the bait is dramatically improved by using just enough lead to hold on in the current... as soon as the fish so much as touches the bait the combined effect of the fish pull and the current will move the lead... essentially meaning the fish will feel next to no resistance at all. A well balanced rig in the tide/current = almost no resistance felt by fish... the ultimate stealth presentation. A better way to make a running rig is to have the lead attached to a very short line of thick stiff fluoro (to stop tangles) and then have this connected to a large eyed swivel that is running on the mainline... this means that even when the hook bait is pulled around at 90 degrees to the sinker the line will still run through the swivel eye with little resistance... the old faithful Aussie ball sinker is not so hot for this in my opinion (not that the whiting care 99% of the time!)... if you wanted to tie another hook to this rig simply tie it above the sinker as a paternoster either off a 3 way swivel or just of a back to back grinner knot etc etc...then you have a running sinker and a paternoster all in one... best of both worlds! Food for thought any My 2 pence worth!

Hi all, I was just wondering if anyone has ever tried using an old pair of cricket or running spikes on the rocks?... seem pretty much the same thing as the ice style slip over cleats... but I have old spikes so would be cheaper. Cheers.

Hey mate, as Linc said I would go with a proper yak anchor...or at least a heavy length of drag chain if you want to slowly drift (if its legal...don't know). The problem with sea anchors in tidal areas is that if the wind is less strong than the tide or in the opposite direction to the tide the sea anchor becomes next to useless as it won't 'fill' and provide drag...somebody with more experience using sea anchors (aka drogues) may be able to clarify this as I have never bought one for tidal fishing for the stated reasons.

It is a big help to install a full hull length anchor trolly, this enables you to: 1. Anchor wherever you want, and 2. Position the kayak better as you can alter the point that the anchor attaches to the hull by pulling the trolly in or out, this enables you to point the kayak in far more practical directions when trying to work a feature with lures...otherwise you can spend an awfull lot of time trying to twist around uncomfortably...and repositioning the kayak to face the right direction. p.s. Last time I was at spit bridge in the yak I also scored an almighty blank.

I always though a fresh flatty fillet would make a very nice compact and castable jewie bait...could never bring myself to do it due to the same reasons as the whiting! food for thought though...my only issue with it would be that the jewies might know the smell of flathead as a 'spikey' thing to eat and avoid it.

Cheers, guys...I will google that fly (very slow morning in the office...i will probably have time to tie a couple aswell!)... Mark...I can't find that old thread of yours, even by viewing your old posts from your profile?!..any idea what the thread was called?

Might be easier to catch whiting, or salmon... I have found plenty on the northern beaches of late...a whiting livey? (I am no Jewish expert by the way).

Liked using that little alvey 40B so much I bought a 'proper' one today as well...a little 45B...the difference in quality between the two is really quite distinct! But the 40B is made for kids after all, with the 45B being much more heavily engineered and more precisely made... but being a lot heavier in the hand as a result...I am sure I will manage the extra 100g however, if not I need to man the hell up!

Fish as light a leader, with as light a sinker as you can get away with... and use live beach worms... job done.

Anybody had a go at it?...anybody any good at it? Going to give it a go at some point and was looking for a few pointers from anyone who is in the know...sounds pretty tricky.

Nice mate, I heard rushcutters can fish well so it makes sense rose bay would aswell. I have been getting a few of the northern beaches of late aswell, gotta love whiting.

yes mate, I have had one for about 12 months now...very good yaks, very comfy seats...plenty of storage, very stable with the seat in the low position...slightly less so in the high position if a beginner...track well with the rudder, reasonably quick. I think if I had the choice again however I might have gone for a pedal drive option...maybe a native mariner as the ability to fish hands free while holding yourself in the current via pedal power is nice...with the cuda 12 the installation of an anchor trolly system is a must...but that is the case with all none pedal drive yaks and not a cuda specific issue, its a great allround yak. They market it as a stand up and fish yak...do-able, I stood up in it first time and I was a complete beginner but I wouldn't want to fish from it like that as it is pretty wobbly while standing...unless your seriously pro...I installed the hoby sidekick outriggers for stand up fishing and then its fine. The hull is also light enough to easily be handled by one person and carried down banks, put on the car roof etc etc...well I say easily, still a pain on the arse cos your carrying a 12 foot canoe...but you know what I mean, very do-able.

I did think about the rolling pin... but very pricey for the salt...I did bring a few of my centrepin reels over with me that will go well for blackish, a couple of j w youngs, an allcocks match aerial... a Fred crouch remake of a wide drummed aerial, and even an old speedia wide drum deluxe... but no side casters. I used to do a lot of barbel fishing in the Uk, even met ray Walton once (I think it was him anyway), which is what the rolling pin was made for... but I remember reading some reviews on the barbel fishing website I used to frequent about the side cast mechanism going lose and you ended up with a wobbly reel, not great for the best part of 300 quid! Mate those Bruce and walker cane rods are classics... people pay big money for those back home... so keep it safe on the rocks! (my rod is also a 1lb test curve... lovely in those close gutters! I also have a 1 and three quarter test curve rod for slightly heavier work on bigger swells and longer casts, none of these rods have anything like the 'art' factor of a hexagraph though) This may be worth a new thread... to see how much pommy coarse fishing kit has managed to sneak down under! I even brought 4 of my 2 3/4lb test curve carp rods down with me as they are just so versatile.

I am sure the big ones go well, the advantage of the overhead however is that the line comes of the reel straight, this eliminates a lot of the friction of the line slapping on the inside of the first eye... slowing the lead less... having said that in reality on the beach with wind and bait it probably makes little difference, however all the serious tournament casters in the UK use magnetically braked overheads (or multipliers as we call them, lots of different names for the same things in both countries!) to achieve 300yrd plus casts! So they must be onto something! Can't wait to get out and use my little alvey again though... at the price I might buy a couple more as spare 'bring a mate' reels... they will eliminate the issues of my rookie friends that like to come with me from time to time dropping my nice rareniums and stradics in the sand and surf! I took a mate fishing the other day, briefed him extensively on what not to do to the reel (I had lent him a new stradic), I turn around to find him unhooking a whiting with the butt of the rod on the sand, every time a wave came in the spray kicking off the but was drenching the reel (it was a short butt spin stick), so I shouted at him 'watch that reel in the salt mate.' he says ok so I go back to watching my rod tip, I look back 10 seconds later to find him washing the reel in the surf! I shout 'mate, what the hell are you doing?' he says that I just told him to 'wash that reel in the salt'...idiot! Right after I had spent about twenty minutes in the car park explaining to him exactly why the reel can't be put in the sand or the salt... in one ear and out the other, what can you do! Rest of the afternoon spent stripping it down, cleaning and regreasing. He did catch a whiting that went nearly 40cm though and was thrilled... every cloud and all that.

Yeah they certainly are nice to use, I don't think they will ever replace my overheads for distance work however, hard to beat an overhead and the pendulum style cast for out and out distance... or for when heavy leads and big baits are required... but they certainly beat the fixed spool when a more sensitive approach is required at short range, not that I have really had to do any long distance casting since leaving the UK and moving to Oz... probably wouldn't remember how to use my big UK beach rods and overhead reels now!

Went out at dawn today after the whiting, caught a few but nothing very big, swell was probably pumping a bit too much and then weed became an issue... loved the reel though... casts perfectly and gives me so much more feel and control than my fixed spools, really happy with it, cheers for all the help!

Cheers mate, I will be out around the northern beaches at dawn on christmas eve so will let you know how it goes...the 'plasticyness' does have its advantages though....the reel is light as a feather...just noticed of their website that the 40A1S with the higher build quality aslo weights virtually twice as much!

Thanks for the info guys...I actually did pick up a '40B' after work today... it was $25...cant argue with that, spooled it with 4kg lo-stretch and will give it a bash... if I like it on the rod I will get a better quality version... hopefully it will go alright... does feel a bit tacky though but what can you expect for $25!

Hi guys, I have a long 12' very thin and light carbon 'avon' style rod from the UK, I guess if it was to be given an aus style line rating it would be about 2-4kg and will cast about a max of 1.5oz (optimum 0.5-1oz). It is an absolutely mint close gutter whiting rod...literally perfect, ultra-light weight, snappy actioned yet with a parabolic 'C' curve under load...due to the light weights I like to use with it I have recently been thinking about putting an alvey on it (always used to use centrepin reels in the UK as I find them much better than eggbeaters for keeping in contact with very light weights), however, the first eye is relatively small (3cm diameter) and is set quite close to the butt/reel seat (as you can imagine with this style of rod the reel seat is at the top of the long cork handle). I therefore would imagine that it would only be suitable with very narrow diameter alveys (the 4") models...as otherwise the narrow close eye would 'choke' the line too much during the side cast method (I always used the 'wallis' style cast in the UK but it would not be a good style for beach fishing...not enough range when needed) I am also a left hand winder and the only 4" alvey they make for a left hand winder is the '40B' or '40BXL' which are marketed as kids reels and are very plasticy...does anybody know of any other higher quality alveys that would suite my requirements...can I buy a right hand wind reel (like a 40A1S) and convert it to a left hand...if so how do i get hold of the parts needed? HELP!!! would love to get this sorted for a few beach sessions over the holidays!

Cheers guys, the wriggler was green, i think the colour is called grenade but I'm not 100%...it was green anyway.

Headed out to Iron cove again today following the success of my last trip out during my last roster off. Caught several undersize fish from the flats and moorings before sighting this fish sipping something off the surface out in 'no-mans-land' (which turned out to be a nice weedy rocky bottomed area of about 1/1.5m, perfect for some attention with the hard bodies next time I head out). Anyway I had just taken off my little PX45 topper as I hadn't had a follow on the surface for a while and I had tied on a squidgy wriggler 65mm on a 1/32 oz and was heading out to fish the hulls when I sighted it, flicked the wriggler to the rings it had just created hoping it would hit it on the drop and that it did! nailed it before I had even reconnected with the lure. Nice fight, not a monster but a nice fish at about 32 to the fork (estimated). Not much landed after that other than the inevitable choppers, and a whiting of the top which was nice.

yes mate the px-45 is a little shrimp top water lure...I caught that fish on SP though, I actually trust SPs over hard bodies to get the bites in most circumstances, I feel they are more versatile, however I have found times when they only want to hit hard bodies...no expert however, maybe one of the more seasoned guys could lend their opinion.

Fished iron cove at dawn yesterday. Initially the fishing was slow in the area I had chosen to attack, tight up against the mangroves with only a couple of fish moving to my PX 45 (apart from hoards of choppers) but no takers. Ended up deciding the cold south westerly wind that was blowing had probably pushed the fish off the shallows, so went to fish amongst the markers and moorings and scored this beauty (a PB bream for me at 36 cm to the fork...haven't been breaming for very long though). Pretty chuffed with it...caught on a small squidgee wriggler (lava I think) on a 3g head. Great fight on the 3lb braid and 6lb fluoro. New(ish) Lox Yoshi 1-3Kg and rarenium 1000 outfit finally bent into the stamp of fish it was purchased for and performed beautifully as the fish went on some powerful runs, lovely smooth clutch and fighting curve...hopefully more to come soon as the summer is finally coming to us...just wish I didn't have to spend so much time in middle of nowhere QLD for work purposes...this is the first time I have managed to get the canoe out in about three months, that is the longest ive gone without going fishing since I was about 12! Anyway, should be getting back into it now and with any luck get a few more of those blue nose bream under my belt...fingers crossed. Only one other undersized bream caught...hooked squarely up the arse! lord knows how he managed that! I do have a short video off the gopro but cant work out how to upload it.