Byron

You are something else Pedro!! Too classic. As for your session David, I was hoping to hear of the powerhouse sambo you landed on the new Silstar HG. I guess I will have to wait for the next report to see you having blooded the new gear. Tight lines mate and still chuckling at pedro

Ausbream Social day on the Parra for me. I expect a few other Fishraiders will be involved. Good luck everyone and tightlines. Byron

That is a cracker Jethro!! Shame about the Clarence though mate. At least you were in there trying and as the saying goes "whatever doesn't kill me only makes me stronger". You will be a better angler for the experience. So tell us more about the PB bass mate. What did you get it on, circumstances, etc?? Cheers Byron

Awesome stuff Lee, Good to see that someone is getting out there and catching a few fish. Love the idea of working the Salt and the Fresh in one outing. Excellent pics as well, might need to pick your brains as to how you do that montage effect. Cheers Byron

I have been waiting for a photo of this fish Bob. Absolutely awesome!!

Are you serious mate?? it really is a small world!! Will definitely have to catch up soon and have a fish as well as reminisce about the good times in the Hills. Are you fishing the social this weekend?? Byron

G'day Brent, I grew up in the Hills district, Castle Hill to be precise and used to head up to Windsor/Richmond and put my little canoe in the water and cruise around. Also Wisemans and upstream from Berowra towards Crosslands. Did a littlle time fishing the Colo, Cattai and Nepean, but as I say it was a long time ago....approx 15-20 years now (holy smokes that makes me feel old ) When I lived up at Lennox head during my Uni days I used to fish the inland creeks up there as well from my canoe or shore. Some pristine waterways up that way if you are prepared to do some hiking. Most recent captures have been from Manly dam with Lizardboy, and it really whet my appetite again!! I have been mentioning to Mick R at ABA that I would love to get back into it. Especially now that I have a sweet boat to help in the quest. Let me know if you are looking for a side kick any time mate. I will be particularly keen to get your advice on lures etc. I feel I will need to invest a little cash in that department before I get out there. I have never used a spinnerbait in my life!! Cheers mate Byron

G'day Nightangel and You have chosen to check out a great boat. I have been a Poly owner for a year now and could not be happier with my little 4.1 Challenger. Not 100 % sure about the 5.99, but Ben at Yabbie Marine, or Mick at ABA should be able to help with your queries. They are both site sponsors and will be well placed to do you a fantastic deal if you do go down the Polycraft route. My personal opinion would be to have all options fitted ahead of taking delivery. It might cost a little bit more, but it will save you a lot of hassle running around getting little bits and pieces done. Polycraft may even be able to factory fit much of what you are after which would be the best situation of all. Good luck with your search and the awesome trip you have planned. Byron

Lovely work!! Damn fine effort Brent/Joe! I am super keen to dust off the bass fishing gear and get some runs on the board this season. It has been a long time between sessions....especially considering that it used to be my absolute favourite form of fishing. Go the Storm Wee Wart!!! Byron

Nice work mate, As a bit of a crab novice, what are some of your techniques; water depth, bottom, preferred bait, tide, etc. Hope you don't mind sharing a few of the secrets of your success. Cheers Byron

Nice work mate!! I will give that a go next time. Sounds like a good way to deal with the current/wind hassles. I expect that you go through a few Gulps though during a session??

Hi Grant, I own 2 capricorns and 1 stradic and would say the Capricorns are a better reel IMHO. Drag is excellent and they seem very well built!

Inspin, The rod you see in the photos is my absolute favourite stick. An Allen Glover custom job built up on a St Croix blank and suiting line classes from 4-6kg. (just ask Ken what he thinks of his St Croix). At 6'6" it is a perfect compromise between light tip and beefy gut section. To be honest, I reckon you could jump up in rod class to a 6-8kg stick for deep water work, and it would be a better balance with the 4000 size reel. NOTE: I use a 2500 Capricorn on mine which is an ideal match. The other advantage of going slightly heavier is that your ability to wrestle with kings etc will be improved. I guess in summary, a 4000 size reel would work at a pinch with 10lb fireline and a 4-6kg stick, but a better balanced outfit would be a slightly heavier rod. Go for a 7 footer to keep a light tip and it would be pretty perfect I think. Allen Glover might be one to ask. Cheers Byron P.S. Just put my mate Nick onto a Pflueger (PTSP 4770-1MFT SP M 1 2.10m/7'0" 3-6 8 + Tip $199.00 RRP (I am told these are available for less than $120 with a bit of shopping around. Check with Mick at ABA)

Hey Mark. I have a pretty good idea of the sink rates of various jig heads when matched to 4" or 5" plastics and try to count the lure down to within a few metres of the bottom. Depending on depth, wind and current this will require a variety of jig head weights to be sure you are getting down there. So far I have been fishing in depths from 15m to 25m, but am pretty sure that depths up to 40m can be successfully fished so long as the conditions/current allow. On the retrieve I try to keep the lure down at depth by freespooling if necessary and allowing for a short dropback after each twitch. As mentioned previously, all fish so far have hit on the drop. I am no expert mate, but these are my thoughts on fishing deeper waters. Cheers Byron

I have a preference for Berkley Bass Minnows in the 4" and the Saltwater Jerkbaits in 5". I have had success on Chartreuse (see latest report), Smelt Scales, Rainbow, and Bloodworm, but feel that colour is less important than the action you impart on the lure. I have been doing ok by using a slightly more aggressive bream style retrieve of twitch, twitch, twitch with the rod tip followed by letting the lure fall back on the drop as I slowly take up the slack. All fish have hit on the drop. As for jig heads I have been using Owner Darters, and TT Gamas in 1/4 to 1/2 oz depending on depth and current. The less weight the better in my view as it allows for a more natural drop. One final point, don't anchor! Just find a nice patch of broken ground (Gravel patches that border reef are superb spots) and simply drift across it casting out ahead of the boat in the direction of the drift. A sea anchor will come in handy if wind is an issue. I am no expert mate but this is what has been working for me recently. Good luck and stick at it. A good red on 8lb braid is a real treat!! Byron

No worries out of Port Stephens mate, so long as you pick your day and weather is good. A good mate of ours at Port fishes solo from a tinnie and catches plenty of great fish. Just not as comfortably as I would like!

Martin, My mate Nick lives near Port Stephens and owns a very handy Haines 445F - Sushi Bar. This is what I fish from when at Port and it does a tremendous job, despite not being the biggest offshore boat around. Cheers

Great stuff Andy!! Those Salmon must have cooked up a treat. Big fish too!! Byron

Hi all, First a big thanks to Joe for the re-size efforts. Great work mate. Well another trip to Port Stephens was planned for the weekend just gone and Saturday saw myself and good mate Nick aboard Sushi Bar and heading out of Port, and making the run up toward Broughton Island, our happy hunting ground for the soft plastic snapper. Unfortunately, the conditions were not as favourable as last trip, with 15-20 knots of SW winds greeting us as we cleared the Port. Not pleasant with a 1.5 metre sea and about 2 metres of swell from the south.....bloody freezing cold too!!! Anyway, not to be discouraged we called coast guard and were advised the winds would ease as the day progressed so we made our way up inside Cabbage Tree and headed north to Broughton. We quickly realised that any drift we attempted would need to be out of the wind and unfortunately many of our proven snapper spots were copping a healthy dose of wind and swell making fishing very uncomfortable as well as difficult. Our first few spots failed to deliver a snapper, however the Sgt Bakers were on fire!! At one stage I managed 4 Bakers in 4 casts!! Another quick move saw us fishing some lovely broken ground and Nick pulled the fantastic looking Goatfish above. It posed for a snapshot and was sent on its way. (We were not aware of its tremendous eating qualities until a review of Grants Guide back home.......prize of the reef was the comment much to our disappointment) Anwyay, with no sign of the wind easing we made another move and despite the fact that we did not have one keeper on board I kept my enthusiasm up and continued to cast and retrieve my plastic. Well what can I say but persistance payed off in the end and I managed to boat 2 nice Snapper, the one in the photo being the biggest of the two at 2kg + and another at about 1.5kg. Both beautiful fish for the pan !! In order to get a few fish for dinner we decided to head over to the ever reliable sand flattie drift and pulled 3 nice fish in no time at all. That saw us pull the pin on the day and head home a little disppointed but nonetheless pleased with a feed to show for our efforts. Taking a quick glance at the cleaning tables as we packed down the boat, we noticed a conspicuous absence of any frames or scales bar the odd Sgt Baker. I felt much better after seeing that we probably did better than most for the day. (We would have bagged a minimum of 30 bakers for the day!) Thoughts on the lack of success were largely focussed on the moon phase being in the middle of the cycle as well as the difficult conditions. Next trip will be planned around the full or new moon in September. Cheers Byron P.S. Hi Bluecod, as much as it does look a little like her crack it is actually Broughton

Hi all, I have just completed my response to the discussion paper and posted it off. It took no more than 20 mins to complete, including my numerous comments. As a point to note, the Snapper bag limit was originally planned to be reduced to 5, with the legal limit to be raised to 32cm. However, no proposal exists within the discussion paper. I have added my own views on this topic within the paper, that being a definite bag limit of 5 and an increase in the legal limit. Within the context of the final comments page I have taken the opportunity to address my disappointment with current DPI bias toward the Commercial sector. I have made sepcific mention of the following items: 1. Baitfish harvesting by pros 2. Striped marlin and the E & Y report 3. Licence buybacks and subsequent re-entry by Pros 4. Independant Audit of the Rec Fishing Licence pool of funds. I would encourage you all to take advantage of this paper to express your views on such items despite this not being the principal focus. Get to work Fishraiders and make your voice heard

I agree it is tough, but I would say that there are still opportunities to catch fish with persistance. Heard a story on the weekend about a bunch of fishos who spent last week up at Broughton Island. Basically they fished Mon-Wed solid for nothing of note. Then on Thursday a lick of warm water came in (17.5+ vs. 15) and they had an aesome session on the Snapper: Apparently, 3 fish better than 5kg each, 1 fish at 8kg and 1 fish at 11.5kg cleaned Right place at the right time it would seem, but definitely a case of persistance in the face of adversity. BTW, I had a pretty slow day at Port on Saturday but still managed a nice feed. report to follow. Regards Byron

Good stuff Sharkey, I think everyone is struggling at the moment. Look forward to more jewie reports from you mate

G'day Paggles, I reckon Clifton Gardens would be a sure bet for a few tasty leather jackets this weekend. Small long shank hook, pencil float and split shot and some prawn meat and you should easily get yourself a feed. Good luck Byron

Port Stephens beckons for more snapper on Soft plastics. Will be heading up Friday night for a dawn raid Saturday! 12kg fish appeared in the local paper at Port last week. I fancy a crack at something about half that size Tight lines all Byron

Hi Cameron, I am also a big fan of the Baitrunner, it is very versatile. See the Swap and Sell section, my mate Nick has a Baitrunner for sale at $120 ONO. It is in good condition and they certainly stand the test of time. Rgds Byron