Colmenar

Hi Raiders and happy new year to you all I haven't posted a report for a long while but I thought I would share the best week and a half of fishing I've had to date. Started my holidays on the 19th Dec and arranged a day out on the harbour with a work mate a few days later. Plan was to chase and boat our first kings. Started out at 6am and looked for some live squid and yakkas. The squid took a while but we managed two and then worked hard for 6 yakkas, enough to have a crack. Tried the spit for no result, so we moved in to MH and anchored next to one of the wave indicators. Put out a couple of livies and floated some squid strips down. Within a minute or two the rod with the livie gets hit hard and my 30lb leader is shredded in seconds. Re-rig and throw out another livie. Not long after, my mate gets a solid hook up and tussles with what looks like a nice king for a good 5 mins or so. We finally see some colour and it looks like a keeper (est 75cm). A couple of failed attempts at netting it and it takes another solid run and finds it's freedom. Mate's not happy. Anyway back to me. My livie is doing nothing but I finally get a hook up on my squid strip and the fight begins to keep this king away from the chains holding down the WI. A good fight and I finally boat my first ever king. Went 60cm only but I was soooo happy to finally experience the power of a king. I was getting a bit sick of the swell in MH so we decided to move to the calmer waters of Fairlight/Balgowlah??Anchored up and floated out some squid strips and within 10mins or so, the rod tip starts to flicker gently. I take the rod in my hands and strike to find a solid hook up. A short fight later I boat my first ever Jew (74cm - 3.2kg). All in all a great day fishing. I've heard said that once you catch your first king, the rest come easier. A few days later and I hit the bay on my own. Fished the oil wharf for 6 good trevs and another king that I caught on my bream gear. 6lb fireline and 10lb leader. Great fun on light gear and I managed to boat it aswell. Once again, not a keeper but a healthy 61cm. Back it went after a quick pic. Hot on the heels of my recent success, I invite my Brother-in-law out for a fish in the bay. We decide to take our daughters aswell and get them on to a few fish. We arrive at the oil wharf at about midday, not normally a great time to fish, and start a good burley trail. My daughter Madison is first to have her line rigged and baited and in the water. Before I could move on to rigging the other rods, she calls out "daddy I'm on", great words to hear from a kid. She boats a good trev 40cm, and then proceeds to bring in the next 4 before anyone else can get a line in. By now she's starting to give us the big 5-0 score card. Finally, things slow down for minute or two and I get a chance to sort out the other rods for my bro-in-law and niece. Now, my bro-in-law is an avid Alvey fan and is not used to the light bream gear that I use most of the time. He was giving me heaps about how good his Alvey is and how many big fish he's reeled in with it. Then he gets a solid hook up on my 2-4kg bream rod and it takes some great runs under the boat and around the boat and then around the anchor rope. After some quick tips on manouvering the fish back to safety and doing the limbo under the anchor rope, he lands his first king 60cm. The fight lasted about 10 mins. Deep down in places he doesn't talk about, I know he enjoyed it. Things slow down and we decide to move to the end of mol point. The wind was up by then and it was tough going but I finally got a chance to get in to some nice fish and landed 5 trevs and two flatties. One of the trevs went 51cm and 1.1kg. My pb for a trev. My bro-in-law deployed the Alvey again and managed to hook up to 4 fish that didn't even register on the too small to keep scale. He maintains he caught the prettiest fish of the day, some lion fish or something. It looked like a colourful flathead to me. Anyway, final tally for the day was 15 keepers. The girls had a great day and I was pretty happy with my efforts as a guide for the day. Got a few more outings planned before I go back to work on the 19th. How good is it to have such good fishing on our door step in Sydney.

Hi Dicko Seems like you have more offers than you can handle. Anyway, here's another one. I've never fished the harbour. I do all my fishing in the bay and the Hacking for pretty good results. I'd love to have someone show me around the harbour and put me on to some harbour kings. No need to share costs, infact I'll shout you lunch if you're willing to share some of your knowledge and experience with me. I've got a near new Stacer Nomad Elite 469 / side console + Yamaha 4 stoke 60hp with live tank onbaord. I'll PM my contact details. Carlos

Hi all This is my first ever report on Fishraider, just became a member. Hope to post a lot more over summer. Anyway, left work a little early on Friday and headed for Botany bay. Conditions looked good, light ENE and very little swell. I was feeling pretty confident of catching a feed. I was heading out to the oil wharf, run out tide, maybe some decent bream were on the cards. As I was going past the 3rd runway, I noticed a flock of gulls working the water in the middle of the bay. I rigged up a metal slice on my 2-4 kg spin rod with 6lb line thinking there might be a school of tailor on the chew. As I got closer, I saw the school bubbling on the surface, some big water slaps by what looked like some decent sambos. I started the cast and fast retrieve and I was on in seconds, a 60cm sambo gave me a bit of hell on the light gear but I landed him. Got straight back in to the water and I was on again, by this stage I was surrounded by them, this one was even bigger and pulled like a train, got him to the boat just to loose him as I tried to net him. Never mind, try again and hooked up immediately on a nice sambo that went 65cm.In again and hooked up on what was probably th e biggest of the session but lost him and the metal lure at the boat. Rig up another lure and on again, this time another nice sambo. In the final washup of what was a great 30 mins, was 3 x 60cm+ sambos and 3 x 30cm+ tailor. Not bad for an after work session. I want to catch my first Kingy this summer. Any tips on rig and locations?

Hi all This is my first ever report on Fishraider, just became a member. Hope to post a lot more over summer. Anyway, left work a little early on Friday and headed for Botany bay. Conditions looked good, light ENE and very little swell. I was feeling pretty confident of catching a feed. I was heading out to the oil wharf, run out tide, maybe some decent bream were on the cards. As I was going past the 3rd runway, I noticed a flock of gulls working the water in the middle of the bay. I rigged up a metal slice on my 2-4 kg spin rod with 6lb line thinking there might be a school of tailor on the chew. As I got closer, I saw the school bubbling on the surface, some big water slaps by what looked like some decent sambos. I started the cast and fast retrieve and I was on in seconds, a 60cm sambo gave me a bit of hell on the light gear but I landed him. Got straight back in to the water and I was on again, by this stage I was surrounded by them, this one was even bigger and pulled like a train, got him to the boat just to loose him as I tried to net him. Never mind, try again and hooked up immediately on a nice sambo that went 65cm.In again and hooked up on what was probably th e biggest of the session but lost him and the metal lure at the boat. Rig up another lure and on again, this time another nice sambo. In the final washup of what was a great 30 mins, was 3 x 60cm+ sambos and 3 x 30cm+ tailor. Not bad for an after work session. I want to catch my first Kingy this summer. Any tips on rig and locations?