Captain Spanner

Howard, can i ask what line weight and capacity you fish on your ultegra 5500? Which model it is and your comments on it. I have the 14000 XTC as one of my beach jewie reels and am happy with how smooth the gears and drag are but the format of the drag i can find a little annoying. It's a bit fiddly to operate as a baitrunner as i find the preset drag can get effected when you adjust the larger dial for the quick drag. I fish with a truckload of 65lb braid on my 14000 XTC but am seriously considering getting the 5500 to run as a lighter outfit in many cases (probably 30lb braid). Are you able to give your opinion and or line recommendations on how you think the 5500 goes as a jewie reel (will it be up to scratch on the off chance i hook a big fella amongst the school fish). I will probably fish it on a 12-13' rod line a prevail or aerowave but more in the 10kg range rods. I have a 13' heavy (3 piece 8-15kg) graphite aerowave which is great but am thinking maybe next model down. Steve, If you are able to give us a tiny bit of guidance as to your budget ($ range including line) we can probably give you a bit more help as to what rods/reels you might consider.

I did it. But i would suggest that when they ask the question about your last trip out on the water that you answer the question relating to your most common style of trip out on the water as this question leads into very detailed questions which is what they want to know. I answered truthfully which meant i answered a heap of detailed questions about fishing in a river from a kayak which i would be lucky to do once a year, if that. This means that all of my answers are not really indicative of the majority of my use of waterways which would be launching a power boat in a river to fish the river and ocean, with a different number of people, whole heap of different safety gear and procedures and alot more time spent on the water. The questions lead into safety procedures, equipment, timelines, launching etc.

It's not the solution that you asked for, but why dont you try running a braid to leader knot (rod length of leader) and running the pea sinker straight to the hook. You might find that in the surf it doesn't effect your bite/catch rate much at all. It will decrease your tangles, increase your casting and eliminate a swivel. You would need to test it a few times. maybe give it a test when you are catching a few fish to see if they stop biting, if they don't stop biting on a couple of occassions i would be tempted to adopt the rig in many circumstances. Once the small ball sinker gets any bigger than a pea you might want to separate it from the bait with the trace and swivel like you do now. In answer to your length/strength of the windon/shock leader, start around 10-12lb of whatever mono you have. Start with about a rod length, I have mine so the leader knot doesn't go into the spool for casting, it sits just above my casting finger.

What weight is the braid? Does it only snap off under a bit of tension, even as little as a bite? With the sinker running straight on the braid i would have thought the braid would give up on occasion too, especially with the sand. Anyway, here is my theory. as the sinker and swivel sit/roll in the sand and the bait washes and swings around the line twists around the sinker/swivel as a pivot point and the twists work their way up the line (sounds like about 50-75mm up the line). When you get a bite, fish or otherwise and there is a bit of tension put through the system, the braid and fluro in the twists are pulled against each other and the braid wins, cutting through the 6lb fluro. You could try a tying a mono or fluro shock leader (about a rod length and preferably one that is a little stiff, maybe 10lb fluro or hard nylon) direct to the braid with an albright or double uni or similar. The sinker will run on this and not the braid. The leader being stiffer than the braid might not tangle with the 6lb trace as much. And if the leader is thicker than the 6lb trace it should be less likely to cut through it. I get similar problems with my jewie rigs, sometimes it is just a bit tricky to prevent. I have star sinker on ezy rig clips and it still happens. I did find that softer shock leaders let it happen more than stiff ones but i just use jinkai (it is soft) above the swivel and fluro below the swivel as fluro leader knots in 60lb dont like going through guides and it is expensive.

If you have a spare at home can you get someone to express post it to you. You should get it the next day.

When my batteries were out of date on my last epirb I looked into the official battery replacement and it was almost the same price as a new one except the new one came with a longer warranty, and warranty on the whole unit, not just the new battery. If you try to fix it the cheap way and it doesn't quite work out when you need it to you can always hold up the $100 note you saved at the time to use as a sail to get home. I have the same opinion for the GPS vs non GPS models. A couple of hundred bucks in price difference will seem much less if you ever need to use the thing.

I think Ballina is a pretty brutal wall structure and bar (big waves hitting the wall hard) so the longer rods help with controlling baits and fish at your feet there. I would imagine most of those guys would run 50lb or 60lb mono straight through (or with 60-100lb leaders) instead of braid for abrasion insurance too. Bruns wall is generally a lot friendlier to fish and you can get away with a shorter rod so i guess think about where you will be using these things the most. It's a pity this conversation/scenario didn't pop up over christmas when i was in Byron and you could have strapped the reel onto a couple of my rods and had a cast and a feel with line through them as the action can feel quite different loaded up with line running through the guides to just grabbing the tip and loading the rod that way. I think 12ft is a comfortable all round length for casting, lifting, holding and leverage. The Prevails, especially the 14'6" have large stripper guides from memory, possibly to use with alveys or big spin reels and the action would probably suit you for bait fishing but you wouldn't want to be spinning with it. I had a look at some Assassin rods from South Africa a few years ago, I think there was one with a medium tip and a heavy tip that you could change depending on what weight you were casting, but these rods are setup a bit differently for slide baiting. I would love a rod on an FSU5144 blank for jewies but i can only find them as one piece rods which is too painful for me to transport. I have felt a few rods built on them and they are a great action for bait fishing for jewies i reckon.

That is a wind knot and there a few things that can cause them. When you cast, the jig head or lure is travelling pretty quickly as it leaves the rod tip, the line is also leaving the reel and travelling through the guides (in coils) at the same speed. A light jig head, especially with a larger plastic with more wind resistance will slow down quicker, especially casting into the wind. There is a short period of time where the lure slows down but the line is still going fast. This causes a traffic jam as the coils of line catch up to each other and tangle, sometimes in the guides of the rod, sometimes coming out of the reel. This can be caused by a few different things including wind resistance on the lure and a leader knot clunking through the guides. It can also occur from the spool being overfilled so the lip of the spool is not feathering and controlling the release of line form the spool when casting and also when you have been retrieving slack line which happens fishing a twitching action, especially with light jig heads. Hard bodies are generally heavier and carry more momentum to drag the line through the guides, they have constant tension on the line as you retrieve so it goes on the spool tighter and does not have this problem as much. If you are getting a problem with slack line on the spool you may need to do a flat retrieve every few casts to re-tension the line on the spool or every few casts pinch the line with your fingers to create tension as you retrieve. I find that new braid can be worse until it wears in a little bit.

I agree with this comment and i wouldn't buy a 13ft rod as a metal throwing rod but 13ft is handy if you are wrestling with misbehaving livebaits around rocks and breakwalls, which it sounds like is a priority. CJay, I have the same scenario with the old nostalgic rod. I have my grandfather's original Butterworth that i have caught my first big landbased and biggest jewies on that is heavy with a timber butt that can get uncomfortable if you don't take a belt or butt cap, it is beautiful under load on a fish. I got the heavy rod because i didn't want to risk snapping the old rod fishing inappropriate braids and drags through it off the breakwalls. I like to fish 60lb jinkai shock leader and 50lb or 60lb Fluro leader to the hooks for jewies of the beach and wall and as you would be well aware off the breakwalls you spend alot of time being spooled by big rays and sharks. So i fish 65lb braid so that when i get spooled off the beach or breakwall i know when i grab the spool there is a better chance that the shock leader or trace will probably break before the braid. Meaning that I haven't lost 300m of braid and left with an empty spool (expensive and can end your session if you dont have a spare spool loaded ready with you) and there isn't a fish towing 300m of braid behind it. I haven't fished for groper or pigs with the Aerowave so i cant comment based on experience but i think it would be fast enough and would easily cast the bait with a pea sinker where you need it to with the right cast. The firing range for big metals on the Aerowave is good but it is obviously a little heavier spinning with a 13footer for a period of time than a 9 or 10 footer. Both casting and winding. I am taking a guess here but is assume you want to throw the metals for a combination of Mackerel, Longtail in season and when they swim past but probably primarily to catch tailor to use as livies/bait for jewies. I think if you want a rod to have a more even balance of spinning metals and livebaiting you may want to go down to somewhere in the 11-12ft range. The Penn Prevails have a few options around this range and the actions aren't too dissimilar in the blanks. From memory the 12ft + models I think they have a little slower, more old school bend than the Aerowave but you would need to test each model in the shop. I'm not sure on your budget or timeframe of what you need immediately but If fishing breakwalls, beaches etc, I take a 9ft 8-15kg spin rod (Revolution Shore Spin) for throwing metals for tailor and i have my big rod with a livie rig tied on and standing next to me ready to roll so when i get my tailor i can take him off the metal, straight onto the big rod livie rig and straight back into the water so i'm not trying to madly re-rig with a big livebait flapping around on a rock or in a bucket. It also means if i am fishing with the big rod and a school of fish (working birds) come within range i can quickly fire some casts out. When i was fishing Bruns south wall at christmas i could hit the north wall with the 9ft rod with a metal. I can also easily dead lift the legal tailor with that 8-15kg rod which is important if you are trying to catch them for live bait and need to get them in quickly with no gaff or net. If i bought a dedicated breakwall/rock spinning rod today i would probably go 10ft or 10'6" for reach around my feet. I think there are a few old threads on this site that have touched on similar topics if you do a search for beach or rock spin rods or similar, or even Aerowave or prevail.

I have the heavy version of the Aerowave Graphite and think it is great. It's 3 piece which is handy for the car, light in the hand, has K series Guides, has enough grunt to cast large baits and live baits but also has a sharp enough action in the tip to cast squid strips with smaller leads. You could easily cast chromies and large divers on it off breakwalls etc. I have fished mine with 6500B baitrunners, 12000D baitrunner, 14000 Ultegra, 8000 Stradic and they are all fine on it. Other rods to consider in a similar range are the Penn Prevails, there are a few models to choose from. Also the Shimano Revolution Coastals. I also have the extra heavy 15' sensor surf which is fantastic for casting house bricks but it's a bit heavy for anything under a BIG fish. I don't recommend it for your purposes. I have caught quite a few salmon, tailor and soapies on it off the beach and you have to stop winding to check the fish is still on. The first fish i caught on it was a baby eagle ray off a breakwall and i basically surfed it tot the wall. The butt is very long, i haven't cut mine down, it is awkward to fish with normally. I have made a belt with a PVC end cap that hangs down between my knees that i put the butt in to get the leverage down low and it helps alot and is good to rest the rod in.

A few questions. Does your livebait tank pump water in and overflow water out or is it just a tank with an aerator and you change the water. How big is the tank? Is it overcrowded? Does the water get warm in the sun? I have had squid eat yakkas and slimies in the tank and also had yakkas and slimies kill squid in the tank but they normally play nice. Like Omally says, Is your live bait tank large enough to put a fence (some type of barrier) in it to seperate the squid and fish? The water should be able to flow through/around/under/over it. So any mesh or board or anything might do. Keep in mind the fish will still need enough room so swim around.

I don't know the story with the Travacalm, I haven't used them for years. We now use ETs Sea sickness pills. They are now done by Nile Compounding who do post them. I think if you have a read you will find they are similar, we just prefer the ETs.

Nice one, It sounds like there was quite a bit going on in your gutter. Do you have any more trips planned this week?

Great fish. It looks like you have started to figure out the beach. Did you get many other bites/fish/rays last night?

They do have a tendency to get pinched. We generally stay in the area of ours and check and move them every hour or two. Another thing that does happen occasionally that people dont always think of is that they drift with the current in areas of strong tidal flow, especially if the water is deeper than you think and the rope isn't long enough. In areas like Towra they do get pinched and ropes and floats do get run over and traps lost but if you don't have a long enough rope the float can also have enough buoyancy to drag the trap and once the water is deep enough that the trap isnt sitting in the bottom it takes off pretty quickly

Im not an authority on this sorry, I've never kept them in a slurry for that long but i imagine it would want to be straight sea water and not diluted with melted freshwater ice. Do we have any pro guys on here that can shed some light? You could probably go a crab depth of sea water in the bottom and bombard it with frozen bottles to keep the temp down. I just get worried that the water will eventually get into the meat if it is soaking in it.

If you are going to eat them cooked cold anyway then i would cook them straight away, let them cool/let steam and drips out, then wrap them in in glad wrap so air/water can't get at them. Eskies stay alot colder than the fridge which is regulated at about 4 degrees. This is what i would do because i have good eskies and a freezer with uncountable bottles. I would put them in a good esky that is in a cool, permanently shady spot and lock it if people are going to want to keep opening the lid and look at them. I would fill the bottom half of the esky with frozen bottles (at least a couple of hours before the crabs are going in), put the crabs in, fill the rest of the esky with frozen bottles and close the lid. I know that my esky can go the distance for 3 days with this type of application so its ok. If you are going to use ice you want to have the crabs on some type of bridge, frozen bottles, upside down dish rack etc. to keep them out of the water when the ice has melted. I know some guys leave the bung of the esky out so the water can drip out and keep topping the esky up with bags of ice each day so that way the crabs are buried in the ice and there is much less risk of them ending up in water. Once again they should be up off the floor of the esky.

Personally i would not want to be undoing those bits at sea to reconnect another fuel tank to drive home. Unless you can get an easier connection fitted so you are only swapping a clip but i'm not sure how that works with fuel flow in your motor. I would be more inclined to take more jerry cans or use your portable tank as a jerry. If you do not want to pick it up and pour it look at getting a good jiggle siphon to get it from the spare tank to the main tank. It is likely that when you go mucking around with those hose connections you will get some spillage and possibly some issues re-priming the line to get started. I would also be very surprised if the conditions (sea and location) that you needed to perform that fuel tank conversion in were convenient.

If we are fishing for mulloway i don't use true circles, i use gamakatsu octopus circles. People will argue that they are no better than standard octopus hooks but i disagree. They do get more gut hooks than a true circle but definitely less than an normal octopus hook. True circle hooks i use Owner Inline Circles or Mutu Circles but not for Mulloway. If you are specifically targeting the rays then you could argue you need a heavier gauge hook because they can crush them with their mouth but i have only seen it a handful of times and they crushed it shut, not open. A lighter gauge hook like the Octopus Circles will penetrate easier and are very strong for their gauge. You just need to make sure you only just put the circle hook through the tip of the bait and allow the ray time to swallow the bait. Then just gradually wind on the pressure.

The crushed barb will make it easier to get out if you can grab it but it still wont prevent it from getting stuck down his throat to begin with. The circle hook will hopefully have a better chance of setting in the hard part of the opening of his mouth and not catching in his throat. If you are in Bunbury and there are Mulloway where you are fishing then i would specifically target Mulloway and you will catch just as many Rays but at least you'll be ready for the Mulloway and be learning as you go. You will already be spending the hours on the beach.

Easier to wind up, less strain on everything, less painful to drop on your foot. Smaller visual impact and probably noise if you think any of that stuff matters.

Personally i wouldn't target them but i understand why you want to. If you are intending on releasing them then you should use a single circle hook to make removal easier as the rays will suck the hooks down their throat like a vaccum cleaner. I would suggest you keep the ray in the water and use a dehooker like the shark guys use so you do not have the get too close to the ray and muck around with pliers. The dehookers are basically a stick with a strong metal "S" shaped (blunt) hook on the end. You pull the line taught with one hand and push slide the dehooker down the leader until it engages in the gape of the hook. Then give a short sharp push to try to dislodge the hook. If it is too difficult or he has swallowed the hook just cut it off as close to his mouth as is safe and possible. Be careful of his tail at all times. And obviously do not gaff them at all as you are releasing them. If you use a heavier leader it will be easier to handle the ray to get the hooks out. I would fish at least 20lb line but preferably more like 50 braid and alot of it (at least 300m). Off the beach you will easily get spooled on a big one. Keep in mind that these guys have soft flesh and when the line is under alot of tension it can cut them as it gets pulled across their face or wing or back, especially on the leader or when the line flips them over during the fight. We catch them quite alot fishing for jewies and you often get spooled. I like to use 50lb leader for jewies off breakwalls and beaches with rocks so i fish with 65lb braid so that when a ray or shark has my whole spool (300m) out on me and i grab the spool i have a much better chance of it snapping at the other end and not losing all of my braid (both annoying as you have to have a spare spool or reel with you and expensive to replace).

I think yakkas and slimies are probably more popular because they are readily accessible and handle heavy current and being slow trolled. It is also about maximising your chances on what you think the fish would prefer. Fish will eat fish but they often prefer certain types. I would pick a slimy, over a small yakka over a large yakka or sweep or mado out of habit. I would try whatever you can get and whatever is around. Kingies are often following schools of sweep and mados around the bait grounds, probably because they feed on them.

I wouldn't be buying any squid to use as bait that has come into contact with freshwater, including the ice slurry you are talking about as it is extremely unlikely the slurry is made from saltwater. I would suggest finding a good bait shop that sells frozen hawkesbury prawns by in the 1kg bags or bigger. Keep in mind alot of the "fresh" prawns and bait at the bait shop and fish shop is often "already thawed" bait and has been frozen. Drop the frozen 1kg bag on the bench or floor to loosen them up and take out what you want on the day and seal it back up. You may want to keep them in an airtight container as prawns often spike holes in their bag. You can do similar with IQF pilchards. Salted pilchards also keep happily in the fridge, but do smell if not packed carefully. So keep them in the vegetable crisper so as not to contaminate the real food in the fridge.

It is highly likely that your drag will have a clicker in it permanently unless it has broken. It will be click no matter how tight or loose the drag is. The clicker will most likely be a tiny metal flap on a spring on the underside of the spool, there is a spiky cog on the base of the spool shaft that the little metal flap will click over and make a "ting, ting, ting" noise. The volume will depend on the reel. I would strongly suggest that you are watching your rod to see if the tip bounces indicating bites. Unless you have something else you need to be doing you are better off holding the rod. If you are trying to fish the method of light drag for the fish to swallow the bait then the idea is minimal resistance on the bait. If you are leaving you rod unattended in the holder you should definitely have the drag backed down so you don't lose your rod (unless you have a serious rod holder). You should still watch your rod because if you get a bite and don't see it you might be waiting for nothing with no bait. Do not strike just because you have had or are getting a bite. Often with livies and big baits the fish grab the bait, swim a little bit and re-grip or turn it around to swallow it. So i would wait until the fish has steady momentum or is accelerating before attempting to set the hook. You can carefully pick the rod up and point the tip at the fish to minimise resistance. When you decide to set the hook i would not strike back aggressively, i would have the rod lowered and either quickly do the drag up the 2.5 turns or grab the spool. Either of these tricks will cause the rod to load up with pressure as the belly is pulled out of the line. As the rod loads up, smoothly raise the rod to increase the pressure on the fish and the hooks should find their way into something solid. If you are on the beach you can walk backwards instead of having to wind. Then you can adjust the drag quickly, remembering that if you let go of the spool it may start spinning quickly and release pressure (bad). One bonus of this method is you are less likely to rip the bait out of the fishes mouth and spook it or rip the bait off the hooks if you don't hook up. Fishing for jewies these days i use a skinny squid strip and two octopus circle hooks with plenty of hook point exposure. I have the drag set to fighting even if it is in the holder (on the beach this is a picket driven in with a mallet). Small livies same deal. Big livies i would hold the rod and have a baitrunner reel or would have the drag in fighting tension and the bail arm open and hold the line lightly with my finger, to let it go when he grabs it. Then flip the bail arm shut to strike. For kingies i would have one livebait hook through the nose of the livie and use the free spool method or a squid strip with the drag in fighting mode. Most importantly, be prepared for many many trips without a decent bite, let alone catching a fish. We don't get a decent bite or fish on a lot more trips than we do. I had about 20 trips to wanda beach before my first jewie down there and almost another 30 before the second fish. I probably had almost 150 hours fishing specifically for jewfish out of the boat before i caught my first one and that fish was because someone came out on my boat and taught me how to. Even fishing for bream and flathead most people do not catch keepers all the time.