livo Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 (edited) What a day? This is a short version before dinner and I'll be back with details and pics later tonight. 10 Morwong (not huge but keepers), 6 big blertas (trevors to you Sydney siders), 7 flatties to 54 cm, 1 pink Pigfish, only 1 Leatherjacket (not much lost gear,......to them anyway) and my dinner tonight a beautiful Pearl Perch. Plus the usual parade of undersize pinkies, although only about 6 all day. 1 Sargent Baker was the only rubbish today. Then came the bit about being totally outdone by fish. There were some really big fish out there after about 3.00 pm and we got smoked and done over well 5 times in about an hour. We had no chance of stopping whatever these things were. We finally gave up and as we returned to The Haven we came across a school of huge pelagics of some type boiling up and jumping. We tried to chase but at 40km/hr we couldn't catch up to them. Fully leaving the water these things were 3 - 4 feet long. I've never seen anything like it. Pretty close to shore too. Post picks later plus details of bust-ups. Edited December 28, 2007 by livo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livo Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 more pics another pic. Pearly. Shared this fish with and yum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davemmm Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Nice haul Livo well done. Question though - given you were rigged for flatties etc what would you have done had you caught the 40km/hr, four foot pelagics dave Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livo Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 As we were about to up anchor and go home in 50m, a couple of k's in front of The Entrance Bridge the FIL brings in a large slimey. A quick re rig and a 7/0 livebait hook in his back, out he goes. Very spooked for a couple of minutes and then reel goes for a cracker run. I wind my bottom rig half way up and decide the livey eater is going too far too fast so I swap rods only to have the bottom rigged rod start screaming line off from mid water. Both lines are cleanly bitten through as soon as there is any pressure. Nowhere near breaking strain or drag setting so whatever they were they had teeth. Dropped another livey at the boat so out go some floater pillies and Californian frozen calimari squid (yes, and great squid too) only to have three more identical bust offs. Whole rigs bitten through after a screaming fast run. While all this is going on another boat drops anchor fairly close and floats a couple of balloons out only to be smoked up as well. He actually had a fish up close to the boat and his decky had the gaff all ready but something went wrong. The guys who hang around at the ramp said there had been a few big Sampsons caught. The current was screaming in from sea to land all day except for an hour or so around full tide which is when we got the flatties. Very Tired. Going to bed. Nice haul Livo well done. Question though - given you were rigged for flatties etc what would you have done had you caught the 40km/hr, four foot pelagics dave Thanks Dave. We weren't trying to catch them. We were trying to catch up to them to see what they were. As we'd already been completely smoked at our anchored spot we would have had no hope with the gear we were fishing. They were really big fish and hooting up the coast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seagoon Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Geeze. Talk about on the boil!!! Awesome. Imagine how much by-catch a pro would kill to get that lot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scon Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 a nice catch there how did the Pearl Perch go down? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Poacher Posted December 28, 2007 Share Posted December 28, 2007 Nice work Livo, I see a lot of boats come in a terrigal and not many do as well as you have. Maybe they were sharks biting you off. Poacher Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livo Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 a nice catch there how did the Pearl Perch go down? Thanks. We were happy with the day. The Pearly was beautiful. Lightly seasoned flour and shallow fried in oil, a drizzle of LJ and a nice salad. They are a top table fish and always welcome onboard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livo Posted December 28, 2007 Author Share Posted December 28, 2007 Nice work Livo, I see a lot of boats come in a terrigal and not many do as well as you have. Maybe they were sharks biting you off. Poacher We don't always do that well Poacher. It was just one of those days. Often we only average a fish an hour on the water and have to move around a lot to find that. This catch was taken from only 2 spots. The mowies, pigfish, jacket and Pearly were from THE DRUM mark in 76m of water and the flatties and Trevally and the bustups were closer in, out in front of THE ENTRANCE in 48m. My first thought was sharks but we didn't see any on the surface at all. I can't think of anything else that would've cut our lines so easily though, or not that you'd expect to find where we were fishing anyway. I don't know whether large Sampsons have teeth to do that or not. We got dusted five times in quick time from a live slimey on the surface to slightly weighted floaters of whole pillies and squid, a rig at half water (25m) and one from the bottom. Each time the reels let line at blistering pace and parted without reaching drag weight. The sounder was on with fish alert and not a pip, even from the one that took the rig at half depth straight under the boat. The guys in the boat near us lost there first livey under a balloon pretty quick but hookud up on number 2. After a few minutes they had all the other lines in and the fish took them all round the boat. They had the gaff ready but seemed to spend a lot of time at the back of the boat and we didn't see anything come over the side so it's possible it was a shark and they released it. Whatever they were they gave us a big thrill for a while. I'll pack some wire and some heavier gear on board from now on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abiasin Posted December 29, 2007 Share Posted December 29, 2007 mate that sounds like the ultimate day on the water out there chasing some great fish, well done mate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kiwi Dan Posted December 29, 2007 Share Posted December 29, 2007 solid days fishing there mate well done. Would have been the perfect way to finish the day by catching whatever it was smashing your gear. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
livo Posted December 29, 2007 Author Share Posted December 29, 2007 solid days fishing there mate well done. Would have been the perfect way to finish the day by catching whatever it was smashing your gear. I wanted one but we were totally outdone. But that's good in a way. Anyhow, Ive just spent 3 hours filleting, boning and skinning what we caught and it produced plenty of all edible fish. Lucky I've got the sisters coming over for a late Xmas tomorrow. Taking any more home would be foolish and wasteful. I only wish I was going out to set some lobster or crab traps to get rid of the frames. I've bagged it up and frozen it for future use as bait or burley. I hate waste. Oh, and obviously it was fish for dinner. Thanks for your thoughts Dan. Livo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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