fragmeister

I guess so.. But there wasn't any sharks in my car last time I looked. (Sorry , couldn't help that!) I guess what I am looking for is other opinions to balance out what might be an irrational fear. Cars are clearly more dangerous but for most, sharks tap into some scary primal predator fear... well certainly into mine anyway. Cheers P.S I enjoy reading your posts and comments . You are a knowledgeable young fisho. Good to see!

You're not wrong there mate! I have caught (and lost) many a good fish on tackle designed for other species. One that sticks in my mind was a horse of dusky flathead that I caught off the spit in Port Hacking. I was fishing for whiting with nippers on 2Kg gear and I fought this fish for 20 minutes getting close to beaching it twice. I could see the red long shank hook was not quite clear of its mouth and was worried a head shake would cut the line. Well it did right on the edge. I leapt in and tried to grab it but I had no chance. The damn thing looked like a bloody croc! Bugger! I said... actually much worse than that. Cheers

Hi Fishraiders, I was wondering how the general Sydney fishing community felt about swimming in the harbour. I have been dioing it for 30 years or more ( mostly along the inner beaches on south head) but recently, I caught glimpse of a shark in the habour around sow and pigs reef and I am now getting a little paranoid. The statistic say that its very unlikely... more chance of dying in a car crash on the way to the harbour, not fatal attacks in 50 years... still... I am losing my confidence and I am beginning to hear the jaws music eveytime I take a dip! Many of you will have heard of the Bull Shark tagging program where more than 30 sharks are tagged and being tracked as they roam around Manly, the spit and up the river as far as Parramatta. Take a look at this map I wonder how many must be in the harbour becuse they can't have tagged them all. Could there be hundreds? It is clear that the fish life in the harbour has increased so I guess the shark numbers will follow and the risk will be increased. Let me know what you think

Interesting theory! I am sure something like this is happening. You see this sort in the wild all the time. The prey seem to know somehow whether they are in signifcant danger or not. Bit like me when the wife comes home after a rough day!

Hey Baldy, Interesting information about the movements of the kings. Can't agree more on the burley. I never burley for kings myself. I just find them on the sounder and drop either a live yakka or squid near them and because I am generally fishing the peak times they are already on the chew. My only problem is getting busted off by the ones that take me by surprise! Focussed feeding... again, I think you are spot on. I have a few posts about this as I a firm believer in the "match the hatch" principle of burleying.

Hi All, Interesting experience today which fueled my ongoing quest to understand the Sydney Harbour Kingies. Was fishing in the harbour today. It was heading towards midday and I was burleying with pilchards and catching some yakkas to freeze and keep for emergency bait and just to enyoy another day on the water really. There were a gazillion yakkas in the burley trail and then, all of a sudden, two or three rat kingies came into the trail and were picking up little pieces of pilchard. Now I have seen kingies in my burley trail before but the surprising thing is that the yakkas were hardly spooked at all. The moved out of the way of the kingies but not in a way that you would suggest they were panicked. It doesnt surprise me that the Kingies would be more interested in the burley than anything else because it fits with my exerience of fish being single minded when they get on the scent of food but how did the Yakka's know they weren't in any real danger? Any ideas anyone?

Burleying always helps. Just make sure you use a little at a time and use it often. Some fishos make the mistake of burleying for a while and then moving somewhere else. You have to give it some time particularly if the fishings a bit slow. Cheers

Good Job! I never really thought about luderick on fly... you learn something every day.

I fish a lot midweek early morning in the harbour when the boat traffic and other fisherman are minimal. What I often see in these conditions are fish coming right up in the burley trail into clear view. So I throw different baits at them and watch. (nice to have time to just sit and watch eh?) It doesn't matter whether they are yakkas, bream or kingfish they all respond much better when I burley with the same bait as I am fishing with. I think fish are pretty dumb, or at least very much driven by instinct and single mindedness. Burleying gets them focused on a smell/taste that they associate with food. They eat some burley and then start to look for that smell/taste as their main (sometimes only) food target often ignoring anything else that you put in front of them. Sometimes it is size,shape and movement that they look for. Just think about how many times we throw lures at a salmon schools monstering bait schools on the surface and they just ignore it because we are throwing lures that don't match the baitfish size or colour. It's the "match the hatch" principal that trout fisherman talk about.We swap lures, hook up and when the fish is in the boatand , lo and behold, they regurgitate some baitfish that look like our lure! If I am using pilchards as bait I would dip the pilchard bait in some tuna oil if I intended to burley with a mixture pilchards and tuna oil otherwise I would just burley with pilchards. Personally. I would do with out the tuna oil if I was fishing with pilchards. For me, it’s not so much a question of what to burley with because most concoctions will attract fish, its more about what to burley with that will make the fish commit unreservedly to taking the bait. If a fish ate half a dozen smaller pieces of pilchard and that went down ok its likely to snaffle a whole pilchard without hesitation but if your bait was squid, it might ignore it or at least not take the bait so enthusiastically. Of course, if the fish are hungry enough nothing will stop them but most times we want to increase the strike rate when the fish are not feeding so agressively ... and that’s my strategy.

Hi Adventureman I am not confident I know the brand of the hook but I reviewed my entire gear after that session. I think in reality I am fishing a little light for the size of fish and probably didn't have a much of a chance of stopping the first few runs on 10Kg gear anyway. The water depth is only 8 to 10 meters and if the king takes the bait 20 meters away and 5 meters down it won't take much for him to get into some structure and bust you off. I am moving up to 20 kg braid and a 30 kg leader terminated with a good strong live bait hook. I am going to quickly set my drag with some inline scales and make sure I have it loaded up enough and stop them in their tracks! And then... all prepared ... I won't get a single bite! ... but thats fishing.

Hi Jacko, Sounds like you would really like to get into some larger fish if possible. Heres a couple of options. I can't imagine how I would cope with a decent sized King off a Jetski but there are a few spots you could try that hold good numbers of Kings. Summertime is best as the higher as they like the higher water temperature...especially the more manageable ones around legal size. One of my favourites when I lived over that way and didn't have a boat was the deep water just off Lilli Pilli baths. Dozens of people get busted off by mysterious fish here while they are catching yakkas ... thats the kingfish who are hanging around the baitfish looking for a feed. The rock wall at Cooks River in Botany bay has also been a good spot for me using soft plastics. It also holds reasonable numbers of jewfish. I like live baits of squid and yakkas for kingies but fishing from a Jetski I guess you may be more inclined to use soft plastics. I fish all times of the day but all my best catches are the two hours after dawn. As for bread and butter species you can drift across the sandy weed areas in front of the Bonnievale spit for good flathead from the top of the tide for 2 or 3 hours. Bream whiting and flathead are in good numbers everywhere in Port Hacking. They respond really well to nippers and bloodworms but prawn baits also work well if you keep the bait moving slowly. Pick the edges of drop-offs from sand banks and you won't go far wrong. Good Luck

I was in two minds whether to go out Friday with rain and possible thunderstorms forecast but the warm water won't last forever and I haven't had my fill of Kingies yet this season. I went to Camp Cove to catch some squid but the wind was whipping up a bit of chop and I never seem catch squid there unless its calm so after 30 minutes without a hit and the dawn threatening to break I headed over to Clifton Gardens to burley up some Yakkas. Half an hour later I had just two large Yakkas and I was getting nervous. I had some squid I bought from a new bait shop and although frozen, the supplier guaranteed me that they were very fresh. They were individually packed in sealed bags with a good dose of ink mixed in with them so I thought I would try squid strips and settle for two livies. I motored across to the markers on the eastern side of the harbour and the scanner showed they were all holding a lot of good fish. It was daylight now and usually, and since the kings are most active for the first two hours I thought I would hang on to the yakkas for a while and cast squid strips at them without any luck. A couple of young guys in a tinnie were getting busted up on small yakkas.I tried to tell them they were too close to the markers and if anything they were going to have to wind the drag up to stop the kings busting them off on the structure. I reckon they got bust off half a dozen times before the Kingies went off the bite. I rigged up a yakka and tossed it over at near the marker where the sounder showed the kings were holding up. After 5 minutes or so I reeled the bait in and with the 10 metre leader just coming out of the water the Yakka was smashed by a Kingie. This was a good fish and , inspite of my advice to the young fellas I quickly found myself busted off by allowing it to run back into the structure. I rigged another live bait and cast off to the side of the marker and I could see that the yakka was on the surface. I was wondering whether the kings would be interested if the fish was not in the water column where they appeared to be feeding but as the thought popped in my head it was smashed on the surface by a king which I reckon would have been in the 10Kg class. I put the pressure on this on early and kept him away from the structure but after yet another hard run I felt the disappointment of a the line going slack only to find when I reeled it in that my hook had snapped half way down the shank! That was the end of my two yakkas so I raced over to Clifton Gardens to see if I could catch some more. I quickly got a dozen or so small ones but the kings had gone off the bite. They were still there on the sounder and they would appear in the burley trail every so often picking small pieces of pilchard but ignoring anything I dropped in front of them. I guess there are a few messages here. There are some larger kings around. They are taking live yakkas pretty freely, even the best frozen squid is a second rate bait and probably most importantly, wind up the drag and pay attention to your terminal tackle. Incidentally, it bucketed down later in the afternoon and I had to clean the boat up in the rain ... but it was worth it.

I bought an Elite 7 about 5 months ago. Had a few problems with the sounder mysteriously losing depth but still displaying the bottom. Basically the support crew at Lowrance said that the auto settings can struggle a bit while you are moving at more than 15 knots or so all depending on whether you have just gone over a bait school or through some wash or whatever. They recommended selecting the appropriate depth in circumstances like this rather than using the auto settings. Aside from that the unit a dream to use and the big display helps r those of us who would otherwise need to put their specs on.

The answers here are spot on. Under 10 knots ( and not a commercial passenger carrying vessel) and you can operate any sized vessel. Crazy rule really when you consider what damage you can do even under 10 knots with a reasonably sized vessel. My advice would be to get the handbook in Flathead's link and study the rules anyway so you are at least clear what you should do when someone who has a license confuses you by failing to observe the rules. Good Luck!

Hi Fellow Fisherfolk, My name is Jim. I have a wonderful wife and family who let me indulge my fishing fantasies. I am 54 and self employed and FINALLY! I have the flexibility to go fishing pretty much when I want. I have been a land based fisherman for 50 years ( mainly because I was the main supply of burley if I went on a boat if you know what I mean) but recently and mysteriously I got getter. So I bought a boat. Now I hit the harbour once or twice a week targeting mainly kingies in the summer and jewies in the winter.. oh and the big blue nose bream on soft plastics. I am enjoying transferring my land based fishing experience to boat fishing and even though I have only been a member here for a short time I have found lots of valuable information on this site and lots of people willing to help anyone interested in aspects of fishing that are new to them. I have a life outside fishing however. I still work pretty hard, hang out with the kids, I love my sports, I try to keep fit , I play guitar, go camping and I like nothing better than a swim on one of the inner south head beaches early on a Sunday morning with my wife ... although a part of me wonders whether the boats I see off the Rose bay tripod are getting any kings.... sorry darling ... what did you say? D'oh Fishing is a great leveller. If you see me on the harbour in a blue and white quintrex laze about stop for a chat. Cheers!

Until recently , I was never a boat fisherman. I would try every so often but I would get so sick it would take me days to recover. Recently though I showed a gradual improvement and now, I am fine in most conditions and Quell' s take care of the roffshore swells. So, I bought a brand new boat ( a 5.7 Metre Quintrex Lazeabout) and with no boat experience, I took her out on her maiden voyage in the Paramatta river. Well, it all seemed easy enough. I reversed the trailer in, pushed the boat off with a bow rope attached and guided her on to the pontoon where I tied off. I parked the car and went out for a day of boating. I was feeling pretty sure of myself. It was back at the ramp at the end of the day when I got into strife. 40 Knot winds gusts came up and the peak tidal run was at a cracking pace past the boat ramp. Remember that I had never docked a boat or loaded a boat on a trailer even on a calm day let alone in the worst of conditions. Well, I couldn't even get the boat close enough to the wharf to get off and tie her up! ... I had to toss a rope to another newbie boat owner ( just about to go out in these unfriendly conditions!) and get them to pull me along side the dock. I tied the boat up to the dock and went to get the car only to find when I got back that the wind waves had no trouble undoing my pathetic attempts at marine knots and the boat was just about loose of the mooring ready to go on its merry way up to Parramatta. I ran down the wharf to catch the boat before it got completely free and jumped aboard only to catch the activation chord of my life jacket (yes I was being safety consious) on the way through and it self inflated balooning like a boa constrictor around my neck. I am so glad no one was watching that one! So I am back in the water and I now have to line the boat up with the trailer in the strong current and near gale force winds assisting each other to blow me off course. All works fine when you are some pace but as soon as you slow down close to the trailer the current and wind take over and... well you all know the story. Unfortunately, ( or fortunately as it did save much embarrassment for me) there was no one around to witness this debacle or help me so after half a dozen attempts I decided the only way to do this was to come in a little faster, which I did and successfully got the boat back on the trailer... you were all expecting me to spear off the sode of my trailer weren't you. Call it luck but I hit dead center and the boat climbed up to the winch roller much to my relief. I learned some important lessons that day (and other days) and looking back on it I certainly could have been better prepared. Today, I am in and out of the ramp as fast as anyone with rarely a hitch ( and speaking of hitches, I have improved my knot tying too!) , but I always lend a hand to those who are struggling for what ever reason because not so long ago, that was me.