Aardvarking

Beachworms work an absolute wonder for beach fishing. You can buy them from some bait stores, or catch them yourself if you're patient. I've also had success with pilchards.

You can't eat the fish from there, can you?

From my experience you catch more fish with bait, but with a lot more small fish. With lures you catch less fish, but the fish you catch are bigger. Lures are a bit more fun and exciting imo, and much more satisfying when you get a strike. I generally leave out bait lines and use a rod for lure fishing while I wait for those to get a bite. If I only have one line with me I usually start with bait, but if there are a bunch of little bait stealers around I switch to lures, so only the fish I actually want to catch will strike. That said, it's different for all types of fishing.

I don't really know, it's just something my dad told me when I was growing up, so I've been conditioned to believe it. I think it was something about how fish generally lay their eggs on full moons, so they are hungry the day before and after. It could be absolute baloney, but imo there's no harm in using that logic.

I always thought the fishing was good the day before and the day after a full moon? Wasn't Sunday the day after a full moon?

I wouldn't buy something that is called a "tacklebox". Companies do this all the time where they get something cheap and common and bang a hobby specific name on it to make it more niche and jack the price up. I have a toolbox I got from K-mart for 20$, it has served me well for many years and does the job perfectly. I looked on their website but I couldn't find my exact one, looks like they might have discontinued it. The point still stands you're better off just cutting out the middle man and buying a toolbox, instead of a rebranded toolbox being sold at a higher price because it says fishing on it.

Thanks for the tip. I have always gotten my bait from the fish markets or coles, but maybe I should start going to bait shops instead. I was burleying up with some bread crusts I soaked in Tuna oil the night before, because I had a bottle of it lying around and thought I would try it out. Does that make a good burley? I guess for me the frustrating thing is not being able to go out in the boat anymore. I always had so much success in the boat, and have never been able to replicate it with land based fishing. If I was starting from scratch I wouldn't mind having some off days, but to go from catching tons of fish in a boat to barely any just gets tiring. I'll definitely keep at it, but maybe I should wait until the water gets a bit warmer.

On Sunday I went out on a fishing trip with one of my friends to the spit west reserve. He has always been more of a deep sea fisher, and never believed me when I told him about the fish I would catch in very shallow water down the south coast in Erowal Bay. I thought it would be a good opportunity to show him how the water doesn't need to be more than 25m deep for good fishing (what he genuinely believed beforehand). Unfortunately the day turned out to be a total bust, and I have no idea why. We arrived at the crack of dawn at 6.30am, my favourite time to fish, and we set up a few weightless lines, some with prawns and some with pilchards. The bait was all fresh as possible, as I bought it from the fish markets the night before. While we waited for those lines to go off we went up and down the shore lines using some blade lures, which is what I've always had success with. The first cast I threw in with the blade was genuinely the most eventful thing that happened all day. Half way through reeling the lure in it suddenly felt a bit heavier. I had assumed I had just caught some seaweed, so I pulled it straight in to take it off. Turns out it was actually the worlds smallest leatherjacket, which for whatever reason decided to go for a lure the size of it's head. After that first "fish" we got absolutely nothing, except for one blackfish which snapped my line. I botched the uni-knot connecting the leader to my braid, because my hands were so freezing I could barely move my fingers. I managed to lose 3 lures due to snags, and just got more frustrated throughout the day. We were there from 6.30-11am and apart from those two fish, we didn't get a single bite. I really can't understand what went wrong. I was at a good spot, at the right time of day, with some nice fresh bait and with plenty of lines out. I know it can't always turn out perfectly, but I just had such a good feeling about that day beforehand. I think I have some weird curse on me. Every time I go out and properly plan a fishing trip I catch nothing, but whenever I turn up at a wharf somewhere I get tons. The last truly successful fishing trip I had was off a wharf I found accidentally when I made a wrong turn at an intersection, and my past 3 trips I have planned and gotten excited about out have been utter failures. Maybe I should start trying to be more impulsive...

While I was there there were a couple of people smoking cannabis on the bench near the wharf. Luckily I didn't run into any problems with them, but it put me on edge.

That sounds like a perfect spot for me, but at the moment is a bit too far away. I'm restricted to places I can easily access on public transport from Glebe, near the CBD. I'll definitely check that out when I get my Ps next year though, so thanks for the suggestion.

A place I like to go in Wollongong is off the rocks just north of the swimming pool. At high tide I've gotten some pretty big bream and cod there. It's a bit prone to snags, but is a really fun spot. Where are you catching your beach worms in Wollongong? I've never had much luck there.

Really, what would you do to get fish there? Apart from that one big boi I had no luck. I had my usual wharf setup which has always worked for me, can't understand why I got pretty much no bites.

That said, it's not worth taking the risk if you're not sure. I only brought it up because I've had experience with porcupine fish and knew what I was doing.

It's actually the puffer fish which are dangerous, different species. The puffer push have smaller spines, the porcupine fish have the bigger ones. Even the puffer fish rarely cause any harm with their spikes, only poisonous when you eat them. The porcupine fish are also dangerous to eat, the spines are just sharp.

At my school we have an exchange program where people from all over the world come to Sydney for 6 weeks to stay with another student. Although I did this program last year, a few of my friends did it this year and I decided to take their Italians fishing. I took them to Beulah Street wharf because of the Opera House view, and because it wouldn't be a difficult spot for them to learn. I stuck a bunch of lines out, with squid pilchards and yellowtail. In 3 hours we had caught absolutely nothing, only getting a few bites. I was about to call it a day without a single fish, when one of my prawn lines went off. For the first 15 seconds there was a huge fight, and then it just gave up and felt like a dead weight. I was really curious what it was going to be when I pulled out the biggest porcupine fish I have ever seen. It was at least 15 kilos, and salvaged what would have been a wasted trip. Unfortunately, it got caught in my net, as when it puffed up each of its spines went into a different whole in the net. It took me 10 minutes to get it out, and I had to keet putting it back in the water so it wouldn't suffocate. A warning for anyone who catches one of these, their spines are surprisingly sharp and by the end my hands were covered with blood. Turns out it pierced me in 7 different places, whoops. I was about to have to cut the net, when it finally unpuffed, squirting me with water and soaking my shorts entirely. I was soon able to release it back into the water, minus the skin it bit off one of my fingertips. Even though the trip wasn't all that fruitful, catching that porcupine fish was quite the experience.

Hello everyone, I'm a new member to the Fishraider forums! I am 16, from Sydney, and have been fishing my whole life, since I was very young. I used to go fishing all the time with my dad, and have had great success with the fish, with my greatest claim to fame being a photo of me being in the fishing monthly newspaper, and the 6th google result for the search "hairtail": Unfortunately since my father passed away 3 years ago, I haven't been doing much fishing. For the 2 years afterwards I was too sad to go fishing by myself without him, and abandoned it entirely. However in the past year I have decided to try to get back into it, but I have been having difficulties doing so. We used to fish of our boat for the most part, but being on my Ls I can't drive a boat around, meaning I am restricted to land based spots. I also don't know the spots where we used to fish, because he always made it a surprise where we were going. I have tried out some popular spots (Chiswick wharf, Beulah St wharf and Gladesville bridge) but not had much luck. I know people aren't too inclined to give away trade secrets, but I am just looking for a few spots to get me back on my feet. In the past I have done all sorts of fishing. I have tried out going for some bigger fish (tuna, wahoo, jew fish, king fish) but found it a bit boring, I'm more of a quantity over quality guy. I don't mind the size of the fish, because I throw nearly everything back, so for me it's about getting as many bites/fish as possible. I also didn't really enjoy beach fishing all that much, because most of the time I can't even feel the fish. What I really love is mangrove and estuary fishing, with my target fish being bream, flathead, trevally, whiting etc. I like go out with poppers and soft plastics and to be constantly moving, searching for the fish instead of the other way around. It is my absolute favourite to go out in a kayak, but without my full licence I am limited to public transport. My other favourite types of fishing are rock fishing and bass fishing. I don't mind fishing off wharves, but I prefer to be active and moving. Any help for spots that I can access is greatly appreciated. I would hate to give up on fishing, because it's something I really love to do, but it's just so difficult to get started without any knowhow of good spots, especially with my transport dilemma. Unfortunately my spots are also limited to somewhere I can access on a bus from inner city Sydney, as much as I hate taking my fishing gear on the bus.

My biggest ever fish was a hairtail, and it was the best fish I've ever tasted. Best thing about it is that with the anatomy of the fish it is already in perfect fillets, so you don't need to do much work too cook them.