The Rev

They are healthy looking tuna. Are they any good to eat sashimi? Great photos!

absolutely - it's amazing though how conditions change. Even today the surf here at Manly cleaned up overnight from the brown look of yesterday!

Hi there fellow Raiders, Last week before the heavens opened I had wanted to get offshore to the Wave Rider Buoy on the Wednesday (17 March) to see if I could get a few MahiMahi. Alas, too much work and couldn’t sneak out early. The weather was great and the water was warm. From looking at the charts it looked 24+ degrees out there. And then the rain came, and came as we all know. Fast forward a week and I was able to take Thursday (25 March) off to catch up on some time due to me - it has been a crazy time with COVID for us at the church I run in Manly. I checked the surface sea temp chart and saw the dreaded blue colour sitting off the coast of Sydney - cold water. In the previous 24 hours the water temp have plunged about 4-5 degrees! The difference a day makes. Not to be deterred and with a perfect weather day otherwise I headed out by myself yesterday. Brown water in the harbour greeted me as I launched at Little Manly. Brown water with a temp of 19.6 C at the ramp 😕. Not to be deterred Iheaded over to Fairlight and caught some live yakkas (10)in about 40 minutes. With the enough bait for myself I headed offshore hoping beyond logic that the brown cold water wouldn’t extend 10km out to sea. As the conditions were perfect it was a quick run out. Sadly the water at both the Dee Why FAD and the Wave rider was brown and cold! Flathead I thought can’t be too affected by this so I headed over to my sure bet flathead grounds. Zilch. Not even a tap after 15 minute, so on we went, next stop Long Reef. When I was catching the live bait one of the charter boats was there (Raptor) filling up on livies as well and we were chatting about our plans for the day and he said that Long Reef often fishes well after rain. When I got there I was positively surprised to see a few boats fishing - hopeful sign, and green water! I have never been so glad to see green water , so much better than brown! I had brought with me two packs of Lake Macquarie caught squid from my trip up there in February that I had vacuumed packed for king fishing. I went to my spot from my last successful trip there back in January, put the minn Kota on spot lock, put in a few baits and started to burley and waited. I didn’t;t have to wait long as about 10 minutes later my new Penn Slammer 4500 loaded with 30lb braid and 40lb leader started to move and then sprung to life as a serious fish took off. With drag pealing off I hardly had time to lift the rod before it reefed me on the Wall. 😫. I had probably 11kg of drag on the line when it hit and it hardly stopped it - big king I thought. 5 minutes later the Shimano 8500 Baitrunner goes off. It also had 30lb broad with 40 leader. As with the last fish it was headed straight for the Wall with the drag screaming. With a fair bit of line already gone and knowing I was about to be reefed again I locked down on the spool with my hand and the line just exploded. Big fish #2 gone 😡. I was fishing at this stage with squid heads and I reloaded both rods with fresh bait and set them out in the burley trail and sat back to wait. In about 5 minuets the Penn went off with the reel again screaming. Given that this was the first serious fish it had hooked and has 30lbs drag, i was impressed with how smooth it was. This time I managed to pick up the rod quicker and managed to turn the head before it hit the wall. I then slowly got some line back and was feeling hopeful until the fish decided enough was enough and promptly headed down this time and reefed me again. Big fish #3 GONE! While this was happening other boats had joined the fun with 3 charter boats slow trolling livies. All of them were hooking up so I thought why not join the fun as after the 3rd fish it went quiet for 30 minutes. Sadly I hadn’t;t brought by heaviest rod as I was thinking MahiMahi and the Talica 12 was home in the garage. But I still had the Saragossa 10,000 that was spooled with 65lb braid. I had a livie on it the whole time the rods were going off and nothing touched it 😞 . But now was its time to shine. With a poor mans down river set up deployed I followed the conga line of boats slow trolling livies up and down the Long Reef wall with a whole dead squid attached. I hadn’t;t even reached the end of the firwst run before the thump on the Gosa’ rod could be heard and we were on. King for sure I thought and after a good battle managed to net it by myself. 63cm. Blow. But i thought to myself- it’s start. So a fresh squid was baited up and off we went again. 1 minute later - bang - another king. This one went 66cm and was quickly bled to take home for dinner. Next squid on and another 1 minute troll and bang again. This one felt bigger. It wasn;t able to pull any of the line with the drag wound up but was a serious fish the way it pulled. It went 69cm. After that it went quiet and I thought the fish are here in this new spot so I spot locked and fished with the Penn with a squid head. Bang - on again and this time managed to land it. 63cm again so back in it went. By this time it was time to head in. Final days count was 7-7-4. & kingfish hooked and fought. 4 landed. Excited by the reality of how many kings there were there at Long Reef (everyone was hooking up in the time I was there), I snuck out again this morning. With high tide at 7:15am, I thought I can be there on the tide change and I had more fresh squid in the freezer so no need to catch livies. So today I headed out again, with one of my staff on board on our day off, full of excitement for what the day could hold. The drive over to Long Reef was amazing with the sun rising behind clouds and the sea having more swell. But when we got there, the water temp had plunged even further to 18.5 and the colour had gone “Hawksbury River Brown”! As soon as we got there I new it was going to be a struggle. I down rigged 2 fresh whole squid for 2 hours for not one touch from a king! The difference a day makes. With nothing happening and my staff member now sea sick we can in early, cleaned the boat and sashimi kingfish from yesterdays catch! for those heading out this weekend - the weather looks good in terms of wind and swell, but the water is flowing south and the brown water from the floods was well and truly affecting things today. But you never know if you never go - because that is the difference that a day can make. The Rev

Ps - the jigs were size 2

thanks - Will heading out this afternoon weather permitting and should get a feed. The squid were most active on a natural prawn colour followed by a blue. White was meant to be the colour for the lake from a few local sources I have, but it had the least amount of takes. Sadly my new white jig that I bought for the trip got inhaled by a small pinkie snapper and it got caught in its throat. Sadly neither the jig nor the pinkie survived the ordeal. The stainless barb tail of the job snapped off in the throat when i tried to retrieve it 😕

It always amazes me how weather can change in 24 hours. Yesterday a blowing southerly gale. Today so much better to fish with moderate easing SE winds. With the wife back in Sydney for the day for a course she is enrolled in - I had another day to myself to go for a fish on our Lake Macquarie holiday. Today I headed to the Belmont Barges. I sounded up lots of bait fish and proceeded to flick the Samaki Soft plastic vibes I have been trying. One hour of effort yielded just one 38cm flathead - what looked so promising ended up not delivering much at all. Then again - Better than no flathead I said to myself! Off to the drop off to try for some squid. After a few drifts I only got one and thought that I would fish the top of the tide in the shallows of the entrance channel flicking lures. That was also sadly disappointing. Not to be out done I thought I would head over to Murray’s beach to try for the squid again having been successful there the other evening. That was a good call. 2 hours of drifting yielded 15 squid! What was funny was a boat pulled up and started drifting at the same time I got there but gave up after 15 minutes. Patience does pay off some times. All squid have been vacuum packed and into the freezer for Kingie sessions when I get back to Manly. I’m going out again tomorrow for squid and will probably eat what we catch tomorrow night. Cheers The Rev

Squid are great to eat - but I think Kings are better! So hopefully the wait pays off.

Thanks Scratchie - sure hoping to! The good thing about the lake is that there are lots of places to hide out of the wind.

Hi Fellow Raiders, After a long summer with all the up downs of COVID-19 and being a part of the Northern Beaches lockdown over Christmas, I planned to take a week off in February at a mates house at Wangi Wangi for some RnR with the wife plus some fishing. Two days I checked the weather report and it didn’t look good 😟. That’s life though I thought and was determined to make the best of it. The first days fishing was Friday 12th February in the afternoon chasing some squid. Ended up with 9 arrow squid that were the perfect sized for baits - so I had to tell my wife, apologies but no salt and pepper squid as they were being vacuum packed and frozen for Kingie baits for when I got back. There were a lot of squid where I was fishing with the young guy and his girl friend bagging out with 40 squid in 2 hours! We had a good chat while drifting close together and he was a local and uses them for Jewfish baits. After taking Saturday as a day for surfing as the rest of week looked unsurfable with the forecast southlies - I went back out again today. Weather forecast was strong southerlies 16-23 knots. The good thing with Wangi Wangi is that there are 3 boat ramps on the south, east and northern sides of long spit that is the town - all within 1km of each other and 0.5km from where I am staying. I headed out late after breakfast and saw a boat trying to get in at the southern boat ramp with 3 guys fighting against the wind and the surge. Sadly the wind and waves were too strong and the boat ended up being dragged over the rocks and was left beached at the ramp. Why they had put the boat in there boggles belief given that the southern;y had blown for the past 20 hours and all the weather reports predicted that it would get stronger 🤔. Very sad top see it sitting there though. See below for the picture. For this trip I have wanted to concentrate on lure fishing and bought some Samaki vibalicious lures in the 70mm & 100mm sizes. I foisted the northern side of Wangi and landed one 36cm snapper and 3 flounder around 27-30cm. All flounder were released and the snapper kept for eating. Hoping to get out tomorrow if the wind drops down. Not complaining though, just good to be away and out in God’s good creation! theRev

Many thanks @Smobaby for the intel. In regard to the Belmont Bay wreck - what are they getting there? Also - where about is Swan Island? I couldn't find it on any of the maps. cheers The Rev

Thanks Rebel

Hi there fellow Fishraiders, I am heading up on holidays on Thursday to stay on Lake Macquarie and will be fishing predominantly inside the lake, but also outside if weather permits. Just wondering if there’s any Intel on what is biting at the moment? Many thanks, TheRev

Good on you Scratchie. Also - Out of interest and to learn what NOT to do... What caused their boat to sink? The Rev

Hi Stash - PM sent

The Dolly season is just starting so now is the time to get out there 🙂

Thanks Duncan

Thanks Zoran!

Hi Yowie - I realised later that night after I wrote the report what I think the marks were. My mate told me that when he caught his dolly 24hrs earlier, spearfisherman were spearing there and in hindsight the wounds look exactly what a spear wound would look like that either came out close the dorsal fin line which was one of the wounds... OR only partially penetrated the fish which is what the second wound felt like when I inspected it. Cheers, the rev

Thanks Big Neil - I believe my mates are heading out Saturday to see if they can catch something by themselves! Hopefully they do well.