Steve Mc

Somewhere on this site I have read a good article on servicing reel drag washers but I can't find it anymore. Does anyone know the link?

What lure worked the best?

Great fish and great team!

Has anyone fished Windamere lately or know of anyone who has?

4" squidgy fish in Killer Tomato

Went down to Devlins with my little fishing pal this morning. All the talk on Fishraider lately must be having an effect because i have never seen so many kayaks down there as I did today. I went down quite a lot last year and most days we would see one or two others at the most. Anyway I wouldn't say it was a hot bite but it was enough to have a bit of fun. All up we caught 4 fish (2 each) and missed another 6 hits. No great size, the biggest was the one I am showing which only went 29cm and you can see (if you lean towards the computer screen) the smallest one that Scotty is holding up. I am looking forward to daylight saving. We were on the water at 5.45 and it felt like 10am. I would like to know how some of the others down there went. There must have been a few Raiders amongst them.

Has anyone fished Lake Lyell of late? The family and I might head up there tomorrow.

They do look tasty. I wish fish like that would come into the bay.

You won't be able to stop now. Got to love those surface hits.

Thanks everyone for the kind words. It really was great fun. Lurespinner, get your nippers over at Tea Gardens. The best bet is to boat or paddle if you have a kayak across to the islands straight in front of the boat ramp. Nippers everywhere. In the whole week we were there, I only saw one other person pumping for nippers. Go for flatties near the shortcut from the Myall heading into the main bay. I don't know why but we only ever picked up fish when there was very little or no wind. Time of day didn't seem to matter. For beach fishing we simply found the first gutter from the golf club entrance to the beach. On the beach we did well on the rising tides but that was perhaps just luck. We were going fishing at those times regardless of the tides. I can tell you though that I saw a few others that were using baits other than nippers and they didn't do as well, but I didn't see them burley either so maybe that was the difference. If you can get some weed, there are heaps of blackfish under the bridge too, but with the strong water movement you will have to pick between tides for that one. Good luck and if you get any big girls, and I know of at least one out there, put them back.

G'day all. Just had a great week up at beautiful Hawks Nest fishing pretty much every day. The first half of the week started off quite slow. We (2 boys and wife) started the week mainly hoping for a few flatties by throwing SP's around. One day we got nothing and the others we got a few here and there. Jen managed a PB flattie at 48cm so she was quite happy with that one. We decided to give the beach a go for a few salmon. Took down the pillies and a few metals but went home empty handed. The back half of the week proved to be better than the start. I changed plans for the beach and targeted bream and any early whiting that might have showed up. We took down our freshly pumped nippers and tossed them in to a well burleyed gutter. Well there seemed to be bream and dart everywhere. In the last 3 days of the holiday we managed just under 30 keepers which is pretty good for us. Along with the bream and dart I managed 2 nice tailor with a 50 gram raider and my youngest managed a nice 61cm salmon on a nipper! For a while I thought he had the worlds biggest bream until it flew out of the water. On our last evening we decided to go for one more flattie spin, and I am glad we did. We were all throwing 4" killer tomato squidgee fish when again the youngest yells "got a good one dad!". He was fishing with the 4 pound gear so the drag was set accordingly but the way this fish took line off the reel I knew he did have a good one. After a few minutes of winning and losing he finally brought this beautiful big girl to the sand. I could barely believe my eyes when I saw her. I grabbed the lip grip and gave her a measure, right on 80cm. "I got my PB" he says to me. All week he was telling me how he wanted to beat his 49cm PB. The fun wasn't over though because I forgot the bloody camera. I take that camera everywhere even if there is an outside chance I might have a fish and somehow on this occasion I left it at home. I did the only thing I could think of and Jen held her in the water while I raced back in the boat to get the camera. All ended well because after the photos she swam off back to the depths. I was so pleased for Scott (8 years) because he had put in a thousand casts over the week for that fish. When it comes to fishing in our family he has most of the luck but he does have the eye of the tiger when it comes to fishing. Anyway lastly Matt (10) who isn't quite as keen on fishing as Scott but still enjoys it had some luck of his own. This week he actually learnt to cast on his own and with his own casting he managed a nice PB flattie of 38cm. I was very proud of him. Now that I am back at work I am suffering badly, 10 weeks to xmas, thats what I keep telling myself.

Is that land locked or do the fish have access to the myall river?

Yes there is heaps of water. Last year there was a spot up river that by tinnie started to bottom out because of shallow water; that spot is now 9m deep. The lake looks much wider than before the rains. It really looks good except for one thing, blue green algae. It is unbelievable at the moment. THEY say that it doesn't affect fish but something is affecting them at the moment. I went up last weekend and trolled every lure I had for about 9 hours over 2 days and got one nice brown but that was it. My mate was up there in his kayak also and he got zilch. I also tried knocking them on the head jigging lures for nothing. Another mate of mine went up yesterday and got zilch. There are plenty of fish showing up on the sounder but they are all stuck to the bottom. If the water is 24m deep in a spot then the fish were sitting at 23m. My mate who went up yesterday, on a beautiful sunny Saturday, said there was one other boat out all morning. I don't know if the locals know something that I don't but I would have expected many more. Don't know if I have helped you out Bucket but atleast you can get up there and have a go. Just so you know I got my one fish on a yellow wing tassie devil with black and red spots. Cheers.

Mate you can definitely fish any part of it once they arrive. If you fish towards Yarramundi it will mostly be on surface lures. Once the water warms up the weed starts to grow below and anything but a surface lure gets caught up. Not necessarily a bad thing though, as there is nothing like surface strikes.

Thanks for the replies. I think I have got it now.

I have just been reading jewgaffers excellent words of wisdom and it has made me think about this initial reel question that I had. The consensus seems to be that i should go for a Shimano Baitrunner but is that because it is a tough reel that will handle these fish or is it also because of the baitrunner function? If so, under what circumstances would I be using the baitrunner drag? Thanks, Steve

Does anyone know where I can get info on the max drag pressure that the Okuma reels can put on? Okuma website doesn't seem to.

Thanks for the comments. Sounds like the baitrunner is going to be the way to go.

Thanks for the opinions. While the 6500 baitrunner sounds like a great option from your commenst, it does stretch the budget out a fair bit. No one has commented on lines. What would you suggest? CaineS this might be a stupid question but why wouldn't you use the 6500 baitrunner for plastics? Steve

Hi Raiders, do you think a 4000 size threadline is big enough for jews and kings. I don't mean monster kings, just those that you would find in Botany Bay throughout the summer. If so what strength line would you recommend? I am thinking about a Shimano Symetre or Sedona. Any comments on those reels? Cheers, Steve

Did you try tossing any metals at them as well or just bait fishing? I reckon they are a great sports fish and I am getting annoyed at all the negative publicity they are getting recently. Top catch.

I wouldn't be as worried about the total towing capacity as the ability to pull the weight up a slippery ramp. In an ideal world you wouldn't have to ever get your rear wheels wet but that just isn't always possible with the change in tides and the different slopes on ramps. Even if you managed to find one ramp that was steep enough to always keep your rear wheels dry, the ramp could be wet by rain. I don't know but are they rear wheel drive or front. If they are front wheel drive I would be more nervous. I am no expert but that is how I would see it. Cheers

Yep. make sure the flash is off and focus on the sunset. The camera will select the correct exposure for the brighter background which will then underexpose the darker foreground.

G'day all. Thought you might like to see the photo that I recently had blown up to 110cm x 60cm. I had it professionally framed and it now hangs on our living room wall. The photo was taken at Hawks Nest and it is of my two boys.

I am no gourmet chef. Just topped with tomato, onion and a bit of garlic then put in the oven. They are actually easy for the kids to eat as they don't have all the small bones of a bream or whiting.