klainz

Hi guys, anyone have any advice about a good travel rod that could flick smaller lures/plastics (down to 3/8 ounce jig heads to 30-40g poppers for GTs). I'm heading over to christmas island for some bonefishing but want to bring a spin stick to have a go at some reef species and medium size GTs that cruise the flats that would probably decimate my 8 weight. Yeah, not realistic trying to get one rod to fit all but I'm thinking if I go lighter then it will expand my options but still give me half a chance at a GT. Any thoughts?

Fished the harbour land based at one of my regular spots east of the bridge. Not a ferry or plank of wood or jetty rat in sight too! (Its nice to find little spots that you're not always wondering if there's gonna be someone else fishing it already). A good high tide at dusk and had 2 week old vac frozen squid for bait. Interesting mixed bag and first flounder on squid. The whiting fought very well and measured 42cm. Both the whiting and flounder were caught on squid baited for jews (snelled rigs - size 5 octopus hooks). I was packing up and had a squid strip out under a float - hoping for a king. Instead of a king a 43cm bream smashed it. Didn't even realised I had hooked up until I went to reel in the float but then couldn't see it. A great mix of fish and all on squid. My recent jewies seem to be around the 55-65cm size. Do guys reckon some spots only hold this size? It has produced a couple around 70-80cm but these are rare. This one area I've fished only seem to have this size. Any thoughts guys? Do other spots consistently produce bigger jews? Still aiming for the single session of a land based jew and legal king quinella!

Went for a session on some harbour flats working the drop off with a wriggler on 5lb braid and 8lb leader. Turned around and saw this cruising in knee deep water a few meters behind me. Sight cast to it and I was on. Great fight in shallow water. The first run reminded me of the the first run of a bonefish (did some recent flyfishing for bonefish in belize - bonefish everywhere there! And they eagerly take pretty much any sort of fly you throw at them, you just gotta get it in front of their faces - I even got one on a squimp pattern I tied myself - and my fly tying is crap at best). I'm pretty sure it's a frigate but can someone confirm? Whenever I catch one of these I always 2nd guess myself and think I've caught some sort of tuna. Definitely my biggest frigate to date at 45cm. I sometimes use a spin/fly rod on the flats (you can get hybrid spin/fly rods from USA which can convert between spinning and fly - they don't use the best quality blanks but they sort of do the job and it means you carry a single rod for both techniques). I saw some bust ups off the drop off, converted to fly and tried to get a small clouser to them but no luck. Would have been great to get one on fly.

Hey Caddis, Great catch! I think this has already been mentioned before but what general type flies are you using? Do you fish a dry as an indicator? Do you prospect likely looking water or are you sight casting to fish? Also, what sort of distances do you need to cast? Thanks for any info, Klainz.

Great report Denis, I've been wondering what the trout waters would be like on the opener. Good to hear there are a few fish around. Might just have to hit it myself soon. Also, solid looking haul from the salt water too! Any reason why you cut the bonnie's head off?

G'day, are they still keeping the entry gate locked until 0500 or so? Or can you access it it all hours again? Hit that spot a couple of years ago and the gate was locked - ranger opened it around 0530. I've caught kings on live yakkas under floats there and spun up the usual pelagics with metals or whole pillies under floats in the past - but be very careful, a very dangerous spot - I believe it is in the top 5 in terms of fatalities in NSW. Cheers, Klainz.

G'day Jewgaffer, I hope this doesn't come across as nitpicking or inappropriate (and I know this isn't a medical site!!!) but I thought I should give a little feedback to your post as I disagree/would like to correct some aspects of it: The crystals you talk about are in the inner ear which is the part of the ear which feeds back to the brain about balance/position etc. The middle ear is where people get 'middle ear infections' or otitis media - anyone who has kids knows what this is all about. The middle ear is where there are the little bones that transmit sound from the ear drum. It connects to the back of the throat by the eustacian tube and is the part of the ear which you 'pop' when you're equalizing air pressure between the mouth (atmosphere) and the middle ear. You refer to a vertigo associated with tinnitus - there are two well known causes of vertigo related to the INNER EAR: Benign positional vertigo which is not usually assoc. with tinnitus and Meniere's disease which is usually associated with tinnitus. They are different diseases and have a different approach to management. Without alarming anybody, vertigo can also be a symptom of stroke or other serious brain related diseases - if you do have these symptoms for the first time or to any serious degree - go to your local doctor or the emergency department depending on severity. Vertigo can represent serious illness. The occiput is the base of the skull and not part of the cervical (neck) vertebrae. The base of the skull articulates with C1 vertebra (which is also referred to as the atlas). Jewgaffer, I'm not sure how much of your post about the vertebra being out of alignment is real or in jest - but I disagree whole heartedly with the advice you are giving about this: a blow or fall to the back of the head is a potentially very serious problem. As a result of this blow or fall, you refer to the 'occiput' being out of alignment causing tinnitus and later mention (I think you mean) subluxation. If you have a traumatic injury serious enough to cause subluxation of the cervical vertebra then you are at grave risk of a spinal cord injury!! Subluxation refers to loosening of one vertebra over another (which are normally held together by strong ligaments and joints) and if it is as a result of an acute injury (which means significant forces were involved) - it is potentially very serious and sometimes assoc. with a fracture too! It means the mal-aligned vertebra can actually press on the spinal cord and damage it. Even a chiropractor will say acute traumatic neck injuries causing subluxation are out of their area of expertise (I would hope!). Tinnitus associated with a head injury is also potentially serious. It can be from several causes which include: base of skull fracture; mal-alignment of the crystals in the inner ear 2nd to the impact. Saying it is from some disruption to the upper cervical vertebrae (where no anatomically related structures to the ear exist) would seem a stretch. Jewgaffer, i know these are your personal opinions about these things but I felt the need to 'correct' and 'advise differently' for the purpose of guys reading your post - given it is a public forum. I have absolutely nothing against chiropractors but some things should probably not be initially managed by them (namely, acute traumatic neck/head injuries leading to subluxed vertebrae!). Cheers.

G'day raiders, Anyone have any opinions re: which is a better squid bait - arrow or southern? As a general purpose bait and also for jewies? I think southerns taste better than arrows but will eat arrows over southerns if guys reckon southerns are better for bait! Also, anyone ever tried using garden variety earth worms as a saltwater bait??? I'm wondering if the salinity would just destroy them soon after being submerged. They would probably die quickly and shrivel up! But, I guess they are easily found and 'free' so could be an economical choice. Guys do talk about bream foraging edges/grassy areas of riverbanks that have flooded in upper reaches of estuaries.

Just did a quick search on royal red prawns. this FR thread is actually the 7th listing on google. Royal reds are almost like bycatch for trawlers and are found at serious depths like 350m+! Trawlers from port stephens to ulladula catch them commercially. I wouldn't have thought there were pigs out on the continental shelf. Maybe they are! I guess you can presume they are not a natural pig food. Sydney fish markets considers them a 'low price' prawn with flesh that 'spoils very quickly'. I wonder if their 'low price' has something to do with the fact that they are touted as a quality pig bait? Cheaper bait means more guys will be using it therefore more pigs caught etc. leading to idea that they are a top pig bait. I read a article in Fishing world about how guys along the coast buy them bulk off the trawlers for cheap and freeze them for later use. Also read another article from a central coast fisho who uses already COOKED imported prawns from any supermarket (NB. COOKED not the raw variety - using imported raw ones risks introducing diseases so NEVER use them as bait!). He baits one and whilst waiting, eats another! Maybe the royal red flesh is more robust than the humble servo prawn. The little pigs I have caught have been on these servo prawns. Can anyone shed any light?

G'day raiders, can anyone tell me where I can buy some royal red prawns? Fresh or frozen? Still after my first legal pig. cheers, klainz.

StarCitySlic, Extraneous? Do you mean: extraneous [iks-train-ee-uss] Adjective not relevant to the situation or subject being considered [Latin extraneus external] Hmmm. Each to their own ways, I guess. Apologies for the written diarrhoea, starcityslic. Dens, don't think that was me at kirribilli. Maybe a guy that catches but never tells.

G'day Esky, that's the best shot of a yowie I've seen in years! Beats the 1967 Patterson-Gimlin 16mm footage hands down! (by the way, that footage has never been formerly debunked...) You should send it in to channel 9! klainz.

Date: 6/6/09. Time: 0300-0800. Location: landbased. Sydney harbour. Somewhere between bridge and the heads but not from a wharf. High Tide 0713 at 1.29m. 2 day before full moon. Moon setting around 0530. Conditions: minimal cloud in sky. Light westerly winds ~5kt. Water calm. Raining most days the last 2 weeks but 2nd week much smaller amount and last couple of days small amounts. Barometer: 1011 with slight rise to 1013 by ~0500 to 0900 then a steady drop to 1009 from 0900 to 1600. Water temp: unknown. Reasonably clarity. Comment: Nil activity from 0300-0600. Rebaiting every 30-45 minutes or so to keep the bait fresh. Hooked a good jew at around 0600 (barometer had been steady at 1013) using a skinned wing from a large southern calamari caught 1.5weeks prior (the uncleaned, unskinned wings and head being vac-sealed and frozen day of capture). Bait had been in water about 15 minutes then massive hit and run (drag set at less than 1 kg), picked up the rod, tightened drag and struck to set hook. Great runs when more pressure put on the fish. It went 70cm and weighed 3kg. It's stomach contents interestingly contained: cubed pillies - a head and mid body segment - still easily recognizable - ie. hadn't been broken down yet, so presumed eaten recently (which does suggest you could catch jewies with a bag of pillies from the servo... as long as you hit the right spots, I guess everyone has heard of amazing jewie bycatches when going for bream or any species that will take a pillie) - stomach also contained a fish frame of some sort about 15cm long, no head on it. Anyone have any theories about the jewie run? Why do they smash and run - given the bait is dead? I'm presuming they inhale the bait (versus nipping or chewing at it) then feel the hook points then get spooked and start swimming off at speed. Or is their competition for the bait and thus they have to smash and run off with it. Tried to catch some yakkas for live bait but ended up catching a PB mullet (32cm) from a peeled prawn. Apologies about the crap photo! Haven't caught a mullet since I was a kid fishing lane cove river weir - and these were all 15cm or less in size. Not really targetted them since then. It was quite a good fight. Going to fillet and skin it and try to convert it into some bream off the rocks...

G'day Gerg, great catch! Any idea what the conditions were for your big haul? Things like the barometer, tide, etc. In fact weatherunderground website has a great archive option where you can check out graphs of air temperature, wind and barometric changes etc for the day including the time you fished. You might gain some useful info. Always interested in what conditions were like when guys get big hauls fish (any species) - I reckon it means there is some common thing experienced by all the fish in the area that triggered them to feed intensely or become more aggressive in that period of time (assuming no burley was used - even burley sometimes doesn't work). We've all had sessions that appear to be freak occurrences. Maybe there's something to it. When you watch those bream comp shows and sometimes they note on their pre-fish day they get a solid catch then the very next day they struggle even though they hit the same/similar spots and use similar techniques. I've got no idea when it comes to bream comps in general but you just get the feeling that the bream were 'exposed' to a common factor that switched them off. Just in general, if guys do get a large haul of fish (particularly in a shortish period of time) it would be great to get info on the conditions to see if there are any correlations. Apologises in advance to the guys who find this sort of pseudoscientific cow dung the equivalent of digging the ground at the end of a rainbow and becoming rich!

Great report wttmrwolf, and really appreciate the extra details! Can never learn enough and sharing info on conditions especially when there is a good catch can only help us all! Never really had a proper go for jew with yakka fillets but knew they were a great bait to try, will definitely give them a go now and the fact you fished in a well fished spot is interesting too. Catching it mid run out tide is also interesting. I get a little fixated with fishing the run in to the high and an hour or two either side but will try fishing other conditions with more hope. The rising barometer is noted too. Agree, intuition also can help! Bring on the optional template of overall conditions for future report postings... Cheers.

Thanks for your consideration, mrsswordfisherman! Look forward to seeing what you guys might come up with. As fishos we're ever looking for any edge possible and we can never get enough info. Hope making things possibly more 'scientific'on a grand scale could be useful! Not a new concept but the possibility of the numbers of results could unlock 'new' info for our local conditions. Cheers.

Thanks for your reply Jewgaffer, a template for reports could be a great option! In a way it could almost become like a communal diary (I presume most of us keep diaries of our own sessions - I do anyway!) We can all look at the conditions reported and correlate it to whether the day produced results or not on the subsequent report! Could be slots for: barometrics rising or falling or stable, weather fronts, wind conditions, rain, moon cycle and rise or fall. Actually, might lead to braining the fish once and for all! Could be an ultimate way in sharing information on catching different species... If someone was superkeen we could actually gain a lot of possibly useful info by pooling then analyzing everyones results over a period of time and correlating it to species targetted or general location fished...successful patterns could possibly emerge. Probably wouldn't be fair on the fish in the end...then again! I guess it would be a great way to collect and use info from a vast number of fishos - yet doesn't necessarily give away secret favorite locales or even techniques etc. Any thoughts from the moderators... Thanks for the links Joel.

G'day raiders, anyone know of a website that gives up to date info. re: water temps inside parts of the harbour/hacking/other major harbours along NSW and immediately offshore? Probably does not exist (for in shore anyway) - what would be it's use - apart from possibly helping fishos?! Any info would be appreciated. Also, if anyone has been around middle harbour/harbour proper in their boats - any updates re: water temps in last 24-48hrs? Website idea??? Could it be a possible option on the fishraider website for guys to post. 'up to date' ('personal and unofficial') water temps/conditions in different waterways who have been out on the water or landbased?? that day. Obviously a disclaimer that people do not use it as their weather source - seabreeze, BOM, weather undergound being more official sites...could help as 'local report' of the conditions. Example: Boat fished lower reaches around middle harbour at 0655 29 April 09: water temp 24.0 (I wish!); slightly muddy; minimal chop. Or: Landbased lilli pilli wharf. Strong westerlies making casting difficult; much weed, leaves, mud in water post heavy rainfall etc.... Probably not a great idea, but thought I'd throw it out there. Cheers.

Doesn't look like a pike eel to me either. Here's a headshot of a pike eel from the net. Anyone know if the species from the original post are good eating (not the pike eel in my post)? I've caught them going for jewies. I know some cultures that dig a bit of eel. Seem to have a firm flesh to them and a decent amount of meat too.

Went for a strictly 'catch a feed' land based session in MH yesterday. Noticed some tiny bait fish jumping and finally saw what was attacking them. Sight cast a lightly weighted prawn cube and got an instant hook up. A few aerials and a couple of high pitched screams from my 1500 reel and this was landed. Measured around 55cm. Had seen these attack my plastics when hitting the flats for flatties in the past; glad to have finally landed one. Believe it is a long tom. Are they good eating? It reminded me of a pike but it didn't have that pike smell so I bagged it! A quick search on the net says they're actually related to garfish (never caught a garfish before) and despite lots of bones, good eating. Ended up with it and a keeper bream and 3 large fantail leatherjackets. Not bad for a 3 hour session. At least there's some meat in the fridge now! There's alot to be said about bagging a feed (and possibly equally satisfying) compared with going for the glamour species like jewies and kings. On the note of kings - anyone have any opinions on how much longer they'll be around the upper reaches of MH?

That fish could be a rat greenich cobia...the prominent dorsal spike implies it is a sub-species of it's more northern and larger growing cousin.

G'day Jewgaffer, is there a scientific explanation behind the connection between barometric changes and fish feeding? Or is it more an association? I'm keen to find out if you base your info on speaking to lots of other fishos and your own experiences or is it from other sources scientific or other in nature? I've heard the swim bladder theory, where the higher the barometric pressure = external pressure on the fish's bladder (presuming that the barometric pressure has enough of an effect to transfer into the water and to thus to the fish) and thus more room for the stomach to expand in the abdominal cavity triggering a feeding response by telling the fish it needs to be filled! I'd be keen to find out if there are actual explanations for these associations that people talk about with barometrics or are they gained from the combined experiences of thousands of fishos over many hundreds of years! Cheers.

When you go down to malabar (ie. long bay) and check it out on a sunny day with clear water, your mouth will water and casting arm start twitching at all the dark patches admist sand bottom within casting distance from the shore.

Had been constantly toying with the idea of hitting the spot where I had caught my first ever jewie a couple of months ago but because of the hard yards involved, kept putting it off. Takes me alot of 'mental angst' heading into a serious jew attempt (so many fishless trips!) - real hope for a miracle but also fully acknowledge you most likely will not convert. Also, on this occasion, had extra odds stacked against me: converting again at the same location on only the second time hitting it - I was surely going to be in for the usual long fishless session. Yet the moonerage, tides and even the wind seemed to imply there might be a 'textbook' chance. (anyone want to put forward their thoughts about barometrics and jew??) The session started at 2am catching a few yakkas at an ever reliable bait ground which on this occasion held a few squid also. Great start. Caught 2 arrows and 2 southern calamari all perfect whole squid size baits but threw the 4th back as it was probably too small and I could see bigger ones in the water. Interestingly, as soon as I threw the little guy back in - the others all disappeared! Got to the spot at 0315 carrying that bucket of live bait pain through bush and spider webs galore. Started poorly with both fresh whole squid taken sequentially by eels in the first 3 hours. Had already cut up the 3rd fresh squid (before losing the first 2) into tiny strips going for a consolation dawn keeper bream or two (which never happened). Thus, had to pull out a 2 week old (but frozen the day of capture) Malabar caught squid and put on half a skinned hood. The sun was well and truly out and I already had dreaded thoughts of the walk back to the car. Then, at almost exactly the same time as when I caught my first jewie a couple of months back - the awesome sound of my new eclipze90's (been doing a bit of gear upgrading recently) drag began. It ended up being smaller than my first jew at 74cm but it fought twice as hard. Early in the fight, I sincerely thought I was not going to be able to land it! (knife is 30cm long) Next cast out, using a wing this time, a few solid taps then that sweet sound. It felt like a smaller fish and it was. Went 60cm. Absolutely no joke, during the night I had seen 2 shooting stars! Autopsy of the bigger model revealed this: Anyone know what it is?? It's got some lobster like tail on it. Instead of taking a monster bag of laundry or stuff needing storage to my folks' place I was able to give them a few of these. I'm never going to hit that spot again, surely! PS. Is it just me or does there seem to be more jewie reports than ever before? More guys fishing for them or signs of a healthy system? It's great stuff. PPS. If anyone is wondering, I actually livebait the yakkas under a float - I've heard that you can apparently get kings at this spot too - yeah, gotta be a load of BS (then again, the Spit apparently offers both) Don't think I'll bother with the yakkas anymore. The arms certainly won't mind.

Nicely scaled flatties. Took me a second to work it out!