hookerbruce

Hi rosco The ramp is concrete with a beach alongside it. I've worked out I can launch about 3 hours before high tide and take it out up to 2hrs after high tide without to much trouble. I have a 5.6m half cab. But I also launch at Como ramp which a lot of people don't do. Bruce

Hi LH The mono will give you a softer fight due to line stretch and less pulled hooks. Why not go to 15kg mono in a fine diamerer line this will give you heaps of line capacity and marlin are landed on 15kg mono all the time. I only use the braid for offshore bottom bouncing or in snaggy estuaries where I need to try and stop fish straight away. Hookerbruce

Hi Brian Nice fish from another of my favorite locations. That bar crossing can be scarey at times. But you do have the option of chasing fish in the esiuary and the bass upstream. If in doubt I don't cross the bar now I wait for another day. When the cobia are in on that jail ground I can't think of a more productive bit of water for them. The spotted mackerael up off grassy are another of my favorites up there. looks like it was a good 3 days. Bruce

Congratulations, They are so much more exciting in real life than on the tv shows. I have a pair of gloves that live in the boat just for that, they are brand new. Bruce

Hi Nice catch. Whiting taste very nice ....Bonless filets, milk & flour,salt, pepper, cooked in butter in cast iron frypan. A dozen whiting off the beach just using prawns sounds pretty good. Were you fishing the boat harbour end or green hills. Bruce

Nice catch there Benny I might have to leave Port Hacking alone for a while and hit the bay. Bruce

Hi Dave Yes when we get down the coast we normally only see a few prawn trawlers or mackerael boats, and some of the charter trips towards the middle of the day. In the mornings afternoons and night we have the place almost to ourselves. This is all changing in the near future as they are going to expand the bauxite mines down here and build a wharf and ship loader in the area. Very lttle phone reception,(stand on one leg with left arm raised touching the alum canopy at 8:36 facing north) Text messages get thru ok. The scenery down the coast is great, I only take a cheapie camera so my images are only about phone quality. Spend the evenings fishing off the back of the boat or hand feeding the groper and tawny nurse sharks. As the night goes by and a few drinks the fish piece get smaller but no one has lost a finger yet. Bruce

Nice catch of reds I'll have to memorise the boat, look for it to say hello. (won't hit the mark button while we're talking. Yes Peters I know what you mean by "itchy fishing fingers" when I finally got to go fishing yesterday I was really hanging out. Hadn't been since sunday. Bruce

Hi Grandad I had some chores to do around the house and didn't get to grays point ramp till 9.30 hence decided to fish the river I found it very quiet (1 salmon 1 bream). Very few surface fish, and the whiting & bream swimming past the live nippers. At least you caught more fish. Next fri I'll head down garie way (or the peak if I have a crew) Bruce

This trip was so long ago I thought I should put it in chat instead of reports. So much happens on a trip away this is very brief and rambling. Each year 6 of us go to weipa stay in the campground a couple of days then head out on a houseboat for a week. Last year it was the end of sept ended up costing us $1300 plus airfares each. WE got on the boat and travelled about 25klm down the coast to Redcliffs beach for first night. Next day we landed 15 barra off the beach and kept 4 to 70cm to eat. Couple of real big fish were lost when they jumped one throwing the lure the other breaking the sp jig hook. Then travelled down the coast to Boyds Bay for the next 4 nights.Fished offshore and along the beaches and rocky outcrops. Between us managed 53 species, my tally 28. Caught all the usual fish spanaids, long tails, cobia, queenies etc plus a multitude of fish from the beaches. Best/most useful lure was the berkley 3" dropshot, it exactly matched the small baitfish and good for barra, salmon, trevally, bream, flathead 40gm metal slugs caught longtails, spanaids, cobia and lots of things 100mm shallow divers seemed to work best in the rivers, creeks etc. Qld fieheries checked us twice, second time to remind us the barra season was closing. We had a great time, good fishing and gret scenery. I'm busy now organising next trip 22nd april easter. and chasing up people, booking cars and accom etc. Just eight weeks today. My best spanaid from 8, a cobia at the side of the boat. veiw from the mooring down the coast. a couple of barra from the beach If you want any details send me a message. Bruce

Hi I would think maybe a thresher by the length of the tail. Havn't looked in the book yet We caught a big one of Kurnel 3 times in half an hour once. Bruce

Hi All Went down and fished Nowra ANSA comp with my family. Only fished the river. Fri arvo produced a few eating size flaties and bream. Sat we could see surface action as we came down the hill to the ramp. An hours chasing the schools in the river produced 8 bonies on light 1 kg outfits. Left the bonnies and went chasing bream who didn't want to play. When the tide dropped caught nippers and poddies and chased flatties with success. Results for us in the comp both daughter in laws caught same size bonnie on 1kg for a first place tie in the ladies section. I was leading the estuary until a 4kg tailor knocked me off. I ended 2nd with a flattie 2.2kg on 1, and won longest flathead. Son got 3,4 & 5th place in estury. I also won in the raffle which was a first for me. Had a good weekend away and scored a nice feed of fish for 3 families.

Hi Bill It's good getting down to the lighter gear and given the right location you can land some big fish on cotton. Also makes small fish a challenge sometimes. For a real challenge try some 1 Kg mono pre test it has a breaking strain of 2 lb. You'll find that 4lb braid will hve a breaking strain approaching 10 lbs. If you try the 1 kg try it on the sand flats first. Bruce

Good fish Got to be happy. I think it's the one I wanted to catch on fri Bruce

Hi We were another of the boats at the peak on fri,( did a report in fishing reports) That accounts for 3 of the 4 boats drifting there at 1230 as the wind started to blow. Beige aluminium half cabin with outrigers. My son was jigging I dropped whole dead squid down. Trolling was very disappointing. Bruce

Hi Brendon Congratulations on first. Any jewie is a good one. I'm yet to get one one lure, have quite a few on bait It took me months to work out how to get the pictures into the report. I can do it now but don't know how. I use PICASO 3 to resize them. Bruce

Hi Finished work at 5am, straight home and a bit of sleep out of bed and packing the boat at 8am. Left home , fueled up and left Grays Point ramp at 930 latest start for ages. Ignored the surface action in the Port and headed for the wild blue yonder. Headed east from port Hacking till we saw something of interest. Happened to be a few mutton birds wandering around. We were in 90m of water so set out a spread of lures and a teaser. After about 10 min saw what was probably a free jumping beakie so worked the area for 15min without result, then continued trolling towards the east. Got to 120 m and found a small current edge and turned left to troll along it. After about 10min there was a big splash and something missed one of the short lures,...30secs later another miss on the next lure out, then another... getting frustrating. Then a solid hookup the line snapped from the outrigger the rod buckled over and line started to peel of the reel against a heavy drag, then nothing...no lure ...no trace ..no double, just what appeared to be a clean cut or break, no fraying no curly not ends. Even though there were several explosions on the lures we did not even get a climpse of what the fish was. Reset the lures and worked the area for a while then moved on dreaming of what might have been. We then continued to the north in approx 100 - 120m checking out fish trap bouys,even found a log covered in barnacles and other old gps marks till we got to the peak just after 12 without another strike. Jigged the peak for a few rat kings and bonito. One boat fishing with live bait appeared to be getting a few reasonable to good kings. Packed up and headed back to port hacking, Back at the ramp we had been motoring/trolling for 5hrs and used over 40litres of fuel without a fish. And we'll go again soon. But going to fish the banks in two weeks time for the ANSA comp first. Got out a T-Bone and a bottle of red for tea and just about to get in the spa before I fall asleep. Bruce

Hi Decided on fri to have a fish sat morn so hooked up the tinny. The wind kept blowing and at midnight was howling. That was good and bad. Good because not as many boats would be out, bad it could be too windy. I decided to stay in the river. Sat morning the wind had gone but it was heavy overcast and light rain. Discourage a few more boats maybe. Hit the ramp just after six and went straight to Mainbar to pump nippers. The rain got heavier so on with the wet weather gear, pumped about 30 then back in the boat to fish the flats where I was until the rain eased. Dropped a large whiting next to the boat when the hook pulled, not happy. Then had a steady stream of bream,flounder, mullet and small whiting most around legal but not worth keeping. Did manage 1 keeper whiting. Pumped some more nippers and moved up to Lilli Pilli, anchored on a favorite whiting spot, threw out an unweighted nipper and was on before I could bait the second line. A bream just over legal, hooked cleanly back he went. For the next hour & half it was fish after fish, nearly all bream, plus a couple of long toms and smaller whiting. Kept some of the bream that were hooked badly and bleeding released heaps. Did keep a blue swimmer, a nice whiting and a couple of the larger bream. Finally gave into the temptation of surface fish and went and cast lures on the 2kg outfit I'd been using for bream. Could see tailor and bonnies chasing the bait fish and after 5 mins finally had a hook up on a small metal. Not what I was expecting this thing took of big time, took heaps of line and just didn't know when to give in. Ended up fighting it between the channel marker and the baths not a very wide channel. Had to keep manouvring the boat so boats could get past, as on my own. Finally got to see it A King. Took 10-12 mins to land on 2kg mono and not quite legal went 63cm probably could have bent the tail back a bit but was still healthy so back it went. Went on to catch a few tailor and a couple of good bonnies, then back at the ramp by 12. Best two bream kept went 37 and 39 cm. I had a great day.

Hi Cam Another place to consider is Lord Howe. Has very good landbased fishing jetty, beach & rocks for kings, silver drummer, bluefish, trevally etc. Also has various charters and trips available. The only place ever that I've been pulling in a shark and had it taken by a kingfish. Bruce

Hi Stan What did you find at Hamilton Island. Have a trip there next week Hookerbruce

Hi All Hooked up the tinny on thurs afternoon to head offshore and chase some of those kings everyones getting. Then the southerly hit and kept blowing, changed the game plan and decided to fish the river for whatever was around. Fri morning was overcast and very cool which meant the boatramp had parking and little traffic on the water. First stop was Mainbar to pump nippers then up to the sandflats to chase whiting. Heaps of whiting but they appeared to be in a spawning aggregation just chasing each other round and not interested in bait or lures. Heads and fins were a very dark colour and bodies very light. Perserved casting small unweighted nippers on 2 kg mono catching a few under size fish then a small take came up solid lots of weight but still coming towards me. I got to see one of the largest flathead I've seen in Port Hacking on the end of my line. Then remembered 2kg line, 30cm long 6lb fluro trace and a no. 4 long shank whiting hook. Didn't fancy my chances, anyway sent my son back to the boat for the large landing net while the fish powered out into the channel taking 40m of line in no time. A see sawing battle lasted about 10 mins when my son saw the fish he thought he should have grabbed the gaff instead. Another stressful 5 mins to get the last 5 m of line and the fish was in the net. Back to the boat for a measure and a photo and fish was successfully revided and released to fight another day. Luckily the hook was in the corner of the mouth and the Platypus pre test line was new. We then went and chase tailor and bonito at Lilli Pilli keeping a few of each with a whiting and a bream and back at the ramp by 10 am as the weather was clearing and the boats coming out on the river.

Hi Slink When they are really fussy small saltwater flies trolled unweighted long way back from the boat will work. Bruce

Hi Sounds like you're getting on the tillitoo on the 27th sept I'll be on the other boat till the 1st oct. will see you up there if you do board on the 27th bruce

Hi Yes you had more wind than normal, usually in sept it averages about 20km per hour, this year looking at the BOM site it's 30+ klm/hr. Hopefully it backs off a bit in the next couple of weeks. We hire boats so can please ourselves if we want to go offshore or stay in the rivers. We have noticed the guides are very hesitant to go out of the rivers with just a moderate wind that in Sydney wouldn't worry you. But then they get paid the same money to fish the rivers in comfort and with less fuel costs. Once you get down the coast a bit the wind is all offshore so the inshore areas along the beaches and cliffs are all protected once you get down there. We usually spend a couple of days in the river either at the beginning of our trip or at the end depending on reports and the weather. April and May seem to be the best months for a mixture of river and offshore fishing. June july and aug the water temp is down and the fish don't seem as active. It also gets cold enough for a jumper somedays. Better go and pack my bag. Bruce