Mike Sydney
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Posts posted by Mike Sydney
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Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the shallows...fun bit of footage here. I guess this is a territorial display rather than them going for a feed?
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Incredible write up! Thanks so much for this.
Niall one thing you mentioned is often the bream will come up on the side and take the front trebles. I often get splashes next to the side but no actual bite.
What’s your theory on what is happening there? Are they just investigating or is that them missing? It often happens with a stationary lure.
I see the same with top water whiting but the whiting keep trying and will hookup whereas with bream I get a little splash with no follow ups (even with scent).
Is that them having a look and losing interest do you think?
thanks, Mike
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On 1/19/2021 at 9:23 AM, Rebel said:
Great story. Thanks for the info. Well done.
Anywhere there are submerged or slippery rocks I wear rock boots, much safer.
Cheers.
Great advice thank you Rebel. I just bought some Rock Hopper Mirages for $60 which should arrive tomorrow.
The belt with rodholder is a great recommendation too and I’ll certainly seek one out. I just blew out on a ton of new lures and the boots so perhaps next month
Cheers
**edit - the Rock hopper boots are incredible. What a game changer. I wish I’d got decent fishing boots months ago! Thanks Rebel!**
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On 2/3/2021 at 1:23 PM, motiondave said:
All good, also look at Saint Ignatius college wharf , Riverview (Lane Cove River)....Yes its on school grounds, but people are allowed to fish there.
Thanks for posting this. I’ve stared at that spot enviously on google earth a number of times but always presumed it was off limits due to the school.
I’m also guilty of using maps and google earth to find out where these youtubers are fishing haha. It’s led me to a few new spots I’d not otherwise have tried. In addition to shroom and Windsor bait tackle I’ll chuck in ‘flick with mick’ who is doing tons of land based all around Sydney. His latest video was at Lilyfield and I must admit a bit of a chuckle when he lost a crank bait in the exact same spot I left one a couple of days earlier!!
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Some beautiful fish there, well done!
That’s a great to get mullet on lures. Were the mullet taking the ribbedfish or the cicadas on the surface?
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Land Based Lure Fishing – Shallow Flats / Mangrove edges (Parramatta River)
First things first – I am a beginner fisherman. I began fishing only in May 2020 and spent many fishless months in the estuary systems before lure fishing finally ‘clicked’ late last year. In the past few months I’ve been fishing the Sydney estuary systems most days and I’ve learned enough to now be confident I can catch fish most days regardless of the tide.
I don’t profess to be an expert and have much to learn myself, but hopefully I can share some of the learnings I’ve had as a new land-based lure fisherman in Sydney to help other poor boat-less folks get on some fish.
For us land-based fishers, there’s far less content out there on the internet than for those with boats. Often when searching for tips on sand flats a promising looking video ends up with a boat hundreds of meters from shore, with guidance on drifting and engines and positioning yourself relative to the fish. We don’t have that luxury with the dry-boot brigade having to fish where we can.
So, this will be focused on land-based fishing, with the occasional wade into the water up to our knees only if we absolutely have to (like retrieving a favourite lure from a snag). All of the areas I am fishing are shallow, with the focus on around knee high water max.
In the current summer months the fish I am targeting in the estuary systems are Bream and Whiting. Flathead and Tailor will turn up frequently on the end of your line too but won’t be specifically targeted.
Be light and mobile
For gear I’m recommending a 2-4kg rod with 4lb braid and a 6lb-10lb flouro leader. 10lb leader is heavy, but around these systems are a lot of rock oysters, snaggy rocks and sharp-toothed tailor/large flathead itching to slice up your leader so I fish a little heavier to give me a bit more confidence – which is important when you’re throwing $20 lures out there.
The biggest recommendation I can give for any land based lure fisho is firstly, be mobile. Get your walk on and cover a large area rather than staying in a single spot. Besides just making it more interesting, you increase the chance you’ll find fish even if you aren’t paying attention to tides and wind (more on that later).
Leave the big tacklebox at home and take just your rod and a backpack. In the backpack we can keep all our essentials – a handful of lures/plastics/jigheads, our leader line, pliers, scissors. I also take sunscreen, insect repellent, water and band aids.
Just making that one change saw me catch exponentially more fish on lures than standing for hours on my old faithful bait-fishing platform. If you only do one thing differently, fish on the move instead of a single spot.
Scout the low tide
I used to think dead low tide was the absolute worst for land based fishing. Far too shallow to catch anything within casting distance and a special smell in the air made for some pretty rough sessions. While it’s definitely not the ideal time to be catching fish from shore, it’s the perfect time to be having a proper scout of the area you’re intending to fish.
The first thing to look for at low tide is where the food sources are that fish can’t yet reach. That could be rock oysters on rocks out of the water, or it could be crabs, insects, shellfish that live in the muddy mangroves. You can usually see the high tide mark by the line of debris it left behind hours ago, and so pay close attention to what is in between the low and high tide areas.
Let me get specific for a second. At an area I fish around Lilyfield, there’s some mangroves near the Bay Run which are dry at low tide, with the high pushing them half underwater. At dead low tide, I can see lots of tiny little holes in the sand there, lots of oysters and mussels. So, the food is here. But when will the fish be here?
Look for access areas. Where is the water coming in first? Is there a rock ledge or small dirt hump that the water will need to spill over before the fish can come in? In my area the water comes in via some small channels (as in a foot wide) and in between some rock ledges before spilling over the rocks and into the mangroves.
The water in this example begins filling up in the small channel from about +40cm of rising tide. It hits the rock edges about +70 with some of the bigger rocks not being covered until +90, and the mangroves get inundated after that through to high tide. I know these measurements now from experience but I could also have figured this out with a tape measure and a tide chart.
There are plenty of tide websites but I use www.tide-forecast.com which gives me a live tidal height to reference against what my eyes are seeing.
There’s tons of other things to look for at low tide too. Where could you walk/wade if you had to? Where is the sand hard vs soft and muddy? What snaggy areas do you want to avoid? What are good angles to cast at if you’re stuck on shore?
Find the fish
Using the same Lilyfield example, I can guess where the fish are at any time despite being stuck on land. By knowing where the food is, how the fish will arrive and how fast the water height changes you can have a pretty good point-in-time guess on where the fish will be.
If it’s dead low tide, I can go out and stand on my rock ledge and fish the rising tide near me.
Once the water gets close to +70cm, the fish are coming towards the shore and sitting underneath my rock ledge.
As the water spills over and we get to +90, I can find some fish near where I was just standing as the fish come across the rocks to the mangroves. For the rest of the rising tide I can fish around the mangroves.
When the tide starts to recede, the same happens backwards – and you can fish those same locations back to low tide again.
First come the small baitfish, then the bream and whiting. Flathead are always going to be found not far behind. If the baitfish have made it to the mangroves, then the flathead are back waiting near the rock ledge to ambush them on the way out. If the baitfish are near the rock ledge, the flathead are behind them ambushing latecomers.
It's important to also consider what the wind is doing. If you can, fish the side of the river or bay that the wind is blowing to. Plankton and small baitfish will get funnelled over that way and your target fish will be following them. It might mean you can’t always cast with the wind at your back but better to be casting where the fish are than long-bombing to no mans land.
Use the angles, and the right footwear
Wherever you can, try and fish parallel to the shore. If you have a rock ledge that’s running near shore you are better off casting right along the length of it than over it to ‘open water’. While I try and keep dry boots wherever possible, often it’s beneficial to get in the water and wade to somewhere you can cast from a better angle to keep your lure in the zone for more of the retrieve.
To this end, Kmart sell cheap wading shoes for $8 bucks. Thongs are hopeless, barefoot even worse. I have shredded my feet up so you don’t have to – buy the cheap wading shoes. Barefoot sounds nice and all but rock oysters are sharp as hell, and stingrays are also a thing. I’ve seen stings buried under the sand inches from shore. Don’t go barefoot. While you might not want to get in the water at all, if you’ve scouted it properly at low tide you should be comfortable enough with wading out to retrieve a snagged lure or to change angles. The right shoes make all the difference.
If you are getting wet boots for a better angle, consider how you’re going to land and unhook the fish. I see videos of veteran fisherman unhooking in the water while holding their rod but that is tricky for me or other beginners to do, so think about where you’re going to take the fish hook out if you are wading in the shallows or around the mangroves.
While talking about shoes, here’s a pro tip. I used to wear my regular sneakers and they would STINK something horrific after walking near the flats. They’d stink out the car, they’d stink out my room, and no amount of sprays or powders would remove the smell. Until I read about a trick to chuck them in the freezer overnight, killing the bacteria responsible for the smells. Crazy, but I can attest it works!
Lures and retrieves
Soft plastics are very effective in the right hands, which aren’t mine. I can catch fish with plastics but I can snag out a lot easier. Tired of losing so many lures to snags and wayward casts I began focusing on two types of lures which I have a much higher chance of going home with – surface lures and floating crankbaits.
Surface lures such as the Bassday Sugapen, MMD Splash Prawn, Skinny Pop Jr are verygood at catching whiting. A constant walk-the-dog retrieve works great for whiting, and if you throw in the occasional pause you can catch bream too – though I’ve found that only the larger bream will have a crack at surface lures. Smaller ones will follow it and then just stare at it. A bit of wind on the surface and overcast is perfect for topwater – the fish need to not be scared of birds or other predators to take a lure off the surface and a windy surface or overcast day will have them more confident. Too much wind can shut this down though as your lure can go unnoticed in the noise.
Shallow diving crankbaits work much better to extract bream. Drew M has a video on his Youtube covering many of these lures which I’d recommend. The Jackall Chubby 38F shallow is my crankbait of choice. This will dive down to a meter or so depth and then bang along the bottom until I stop retrieving – at which point it will float slowly back to the surface. This is good for snaggy areas because you can fish it slow and then at the first ‘bump’ on a nasty zone you can pause and get back to the surface. For the retrieve I tend to do a constant slow roll with occasional accelerations. I don’t pause for bream usually, with the change in speed being enough to get them on. The pauses make whiting lose interest, so by keeping a slow roll going we can ensure both bream and whiting are in the frame.
Blades can be fished the same way but with a much higher snag rate. You can mitigate this somewhat by keeping your rod tip high on the retrieve, but I tend to avoid blades in shallow water due to the snag fear. They cast so far that often they’ll snag where I don’t have an appetite to wade and retrieve. I love them and they’re super effective but I don’t like losing them. The Jackall Chubby has the same vibration as a blade but with the benefit of it having a slow float too.
I will link to videos on Youtube below covering a number of these lure types.
Hazards
Learning all this stuff has not been a painless process. I’ve slipped, scraped, scratched, ripped and scared myself plenty, so let’s highlight some watch-outs.
Firstly, slippery rocks. Rocks are slippery and complacency is your enemy. Watch every step and if you’re walking on rocks that are submerged or recently submerged, try to stand on bits that have ‘dimples’ to give you some natural grip. Footwear can make or break you here. Decent grip on your shoes and watch every step.
Sharp rocks. Rock oysters, specifically – these are sharp as hell and will cut you up. Interestingly, you might not even feel it when underwater but they will cut you and deeply. You do not want to slip on a slippery rock and grab onto these to steady yourself.
Stingrays. I didn’t know much about stingrays until I began fishing but I see them plenty in the shallows all up and down the Parramatta river and Sydney harbour. They will bury themselves in the sand and be almost invisible, and worse will do so very close to shore in as shallow as a couple of inches water. I’ve never stood on one thankfully but I read a tip on how to walk in the shallows to avoid treading on one. Shuffle your feet in outwards circles, kinda like you’re ice skating. If there are any rays buried you won’t stand on their back this way which is good for all concerned. If you do get stung it’s gonna be on the feet and the treatment is the hottest water you can stand without burning yourself.
Spiders. Only this morning I was rolling through the mangroves to get to the rock ledge and I forgot to wave my rod ahead to break the webs. I walked face first into an orb spider web. After a manly shriek and a few spins around I was able to carry on but they are everywhere in the groves stringing their webs at head height between trees and can sometimes be invisible.
Other Resources
There are a couple of Youtubers I highly recommend as they do a lot of land based fishing around the Parramatta. Shroom ( https://youtube.com/c/ShroomFishing ) and Aaron from Windsor Bait & Tackle ( https://youtube.com/c/WindsorBaitAndTackle ) Both of these guys put out a ton of content and beyond catching cracking fish they talk about their thought processes a lot. I’ve learned almost as much from their sessions as my own personal experience and have applied much of their ideas to my own fishing (as well as fish the spots they did!).
Google Earth is unbelievable when it comes to locating spots to fish (or trying to figure out where someone on a youtube video is fishing…!)
www.tide-forecast.com for live tides
www.willyweather.com.au for live wind and sunlight hours
This video on tides was very in-depth while still being concise and easy to follow: Aardvark McLeod Fly Fishing (how to understand tides for flats):
Drew M – crankbait lure selection
Drew M – topwater lure selection https://youtu.be/iUx4x-SQXNk
Niall – Topwater bream article:
Other fishos – talk to everybody you see fishing! There are so many different perspectives and insights to be gained from locals and I’ve found without fail other fishermen are only too keen give some advice or tips on the local area and what works and doesn’t. Some of the best advice I received for fishing the Cooks River came from another fisherman walking the bank who turned out to be an absolute ace, helping me with rigging and locations and reading the river. Talk to others wherever you get the chance!
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Live prawns at the live bait store in Beverley Hills, 326 King George’s RD Beverley Hills.
Was in there earlier today, live prawns $10 for 25 prawns. They also had yabbies and worms.
A good place for those fishing after dark as this shop is open until like 11pm I think and opens crack of dawn as well.
its near the corner of Moorefields Road by Roselands mall.
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Not an expert but I’ve been doing a lot of topwater last few months for bream and whiting with some success.
overcast, windy, rising tide and not too deep has been getting best results for me. Bit of rain seems to be Ok too.
generally speaking the fish need to feel brave enough to take a surface lure. Wind/rain/cloud gives them cover from predators like birds and they seem to be a bit more likely to hit in these conditions.
great Topwater article in the library from Niall which I’d recommend reading. A recent doc lures podcast on st George basin bream was largely focused on topwater too and worth a listen.
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5 hours ago, XD351 said:
You could also have a listen to some of the podcasts by Australian Lure fishing , on this podcast the host interviews some of the best lure fishos in Australia and the host is also a marine biologist / scientist so he understands how fish work plus he also designs and makes lures .
Unfortunately most but not all fishing shows on tv or YouTube are big on product advertisements and pretty light on real information .
As a fellow beginner, let me echo the shout out for the podcast here. Three nights a week, I don’t know how he manages it.
fantastic listening even for a beginner - the ALF podcast has been sent from the heavens. Australian content about Australian fish and absolutely loads of practical and specific information.Many episodes on flathead and a couple on fishing the Hawkesbury for jewfish and perch.
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Hi Kent!
I don’t want to share the exact location I was but this was sand flats in the harbour.
i also got one yesterday at George’s River (picnic point) so it seems anywhere with a sandy bottom and shallows.
These were all in super close to shore and a lot shallower than I’d have thought. As in, only ankle or shin deep.I’d have a crack at Rose Bay sand flats. While it wasn’t where I caught this lot I do plan on having a crack at Rose with this lure over next couple weeks.
Double Bay also has a similar sandy setup and I reckon there’s whiting to be had chucking out from the ferry wharf.-
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That’s sick mate well done. A real beauty!
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5 hours ago, 61 crusher said:
Good read & photos there Mike
sounds like Derek’s a great teacher as his students take it all on & keep passing with flying colours 😎👍
Patient as a saint!
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Yes I’ve seen a few videos mentioning that. Some suggesting getting rid of the front ones too and having only the assists. I can definitely see the reasoning as the whiting always attacked from behind and frequently missed their first strikes at the lure.
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After posting of my first fish on a lure a few weeks ago, I’d been in contact with @DerekD who had given me some helpful advice on how to fish lures more effectively. Ahead of a weekend’s fishing I’d been assigned some homework – grab a 70mm Sugapen and prepare to catch some topwater whiting.
I was very excited, having never caught a whiting or a fish on a topwater lure before. I bought two of them at my local tackle shop and headed out at lunchtime to a nearby bay to sneak in some practice.
It didn’t take long and I soon landed my first whiting with a ‘walk the dog’ retrieve across the top. Not a huge whiting, but a whiting nonetheless and in quick time. And on a lure again, hot dog!
I came back that evening and was just getting ready to cast when I heard a splash a few meters to my left. I cast blindly towards it without thinking and knew immediately I had made a mistake -the Sugapen was halfway up a tree hanging over the water’s edge, perhaps 10 foot off the ground.
I spent the last of the dying sunlight to try and get it back, figuring I’d at least figured out which branch it was on. The first 30 minutes of darkness I spent up the tree, below the tree, in the tree, shaking the tree, breaking the tree. At one point I’d taken my belt off to drag the branch down a few foot. I must’ve looked like a right moron – or high - to the dozen or so spectators but I didn’t care, I was getting my lure back.
Except of course I didn’t. I’ve been back a few times during the day and still can’t find it. I asked the council guys if they could cut some branches for me, but they just looked at me strangely and said they only do the bins.
I’ve stared up into that foliage for so long I’m seeing it in my dreams. I almost reckon I should stop fishing that bay before I go even crazier.But anyway, later that weekend I spent a day with Derek who promptly dumped all over my technique and gear and then began ‘showing me the way’ – walking through casting, casting, and how to cast, and then moving on to rods, reels, leaders, lures. How to find fish, how to land fish. Different retrieves. It was an absolute *game changer* – my casting distance improved out of sight and i began realising how things had gone so wrong for me fishing lures all winter without success.
I learned how to keep the slack out of my line, which I hadn’t been. how to actually let the lure hit the bottom, which i definitely hadn’t been, and that a retrieve isn’t simply pulling back in a straight line. I’m sure a lot of it was basic stuff, but for a beginner like me it was pure gold and not something that I really found out there on the net.
Energised, I went back to Sugapen Tree and landed seven whiting on the other suga in an hour session. My previous best entire day had been three, so this was really something. One of them thrashed a bit as I was taking the lure out and I got a bloodied finger from a treble - ouchie, but didn’t take the gloss off the catch.
As a bonus to top off the week I landed two small flathead - another first - and a nice bream on a vibe too.There was time for one final lesson. As we’d been fishing a bank, Derek had warned me about making sure the rock I was standing on was properly stable. I brushed off the advice at the time – I mean I appreciate the fishing advice mate but I think I know how to stand up - but this morning the rock was not stable, and nor were my thongs. Down I went into the mud and oyster rocks, cutting my hand, ripping a hole in my jeans but somehow not hooking myself with a treble again or banging my head on a rock. It was a nasty fall and I should’ve copped it worse. Lesson learned and a bit of humility – footwear and footing are important after all, even if I’m not out on the rocks proper.
Anyways it was a fantastically productive week with ten more fish on lures and a couple more species. Thanks @DerekDand the FR community for all the guidance and I’ll see you out there.
Cheers, Mike
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Congrats champ! Plenty more coming for you I am sure.
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Hi Raiders,
After some six months of trying, I finally broke the lure drought and caught my first fish on a lure! Followed quickly by my second and third on the same day.
Over the months of fruitless casting in the winter I kept having people tell me – just wait until the water warms up and they’ll be hooking up. This proved very true!
I arrived at the usual spot in Neutral Bay about 8am after dropping the kids off at school and within about 5 minutes I had my first fish on a lure – a baby snapper. Mixed feelings as while I was delighted that I’d finally caught something on a lure it was hardly a trophy.
These were basically all I caught as I learned to fish over the winter months on bait, but it was still marvellous to have something on the hook from a lure.
Threw him back in and five minutes later I have my second, another baby snapper on a tiger/gold Savage blade.
Things quietened down after that and we fished until lunchtime before heading off to the pub.
Seeing the storm approaching I snuck out for one last flick at the same spot around 8pm that evening, and was rewarded handsomely almost immediately with a beautiful tailor on another blade, black this time as I’d heard the silhouette was important at night.
I couldn’t believe just how ‘night and day’ it was from my usual fruitless luring. This time, a school of tailor literally fought each other over the lure, with my hooked tailor being chased by his mates as they tried to pull the lure out of his mouth. I reckon I was even in with a chance of getting two on a single lure if I’d stuck it out!
As I pulled him up the other tailor leapt out of the water. It was a wild sight seeing a frenzy like that for the first time and a great reward for months of perseverance with lures when the ‘easy option’ of bait had been delivering for me all winter.
Almost immediately I was summoned home to deal with a sick kid so sadly had to put family ahead of the rest of the tailor....
So, from no fish on lures in five months of trying to 3 in a day. I try to think about what I did differently, but nothing really springs to mind – could it really have just been so dang hard to lure in the winter?
Hopefully I’ve turned the corner and am in for a productive summer!
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Excellent thanks for the replies both!
on a side note , if I catch a fish like this one which is not on the DPI bag limit sheet I got with my license can I assume it’s good to use as live bait or keep?
Keen to be a responsible fisho, what’s the rule of thumb for fish not on the size or bag limit lists - are we free to do as we please or is it the opposite?
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Hiya raiders!
First time poster but have been reading this site for a few months - you all have been a wealth of knowledge as i started my fishing journey back in May.This poor chap pictured was hooked in the eye at Rose Bay today as he came in for a bite of chicken breast.
Length was perhaps 12cm, very small indeed.what am I looking at here? Is this a juvenile Yellow Perch, a striped snapper, some sort of baitfish, one of those hallucinogenic Salema things ?
I couldn’t make a positive ID from googling so figure why not come to the experts.
some quick thanks - Waza for the write up on Bradley’s Head / White Rock which was amazing. Whoever posted that recent squidding guide too, incredible detail.
I started fishing as a way to get out of the house back in Sydney’s Covid lockdown and as I’m sure with most of you I now can’t stop. Only a dozen or so fish caught and released so far - bream, tailor, fan bellied leathers and a bunch of baby snapper. This was the first catch in what has been a slow few weeks.
any clues or definitive identification would be welcome. Heck it could be a super common baitfish but I am very new to this whole thing!!
cheers, Mike
Epic School Holidays Fishing Madness. All of on soft plastics... Some flukes and some bait!
in Fishing Reports
Posted
Beautiful report mate and some cracking fish there. Congrats on a great run!