Longreef 6/01/05

[REKLESS]

Gidday all,First fish for the year and it was a beauty,put in at longreef with my Brother Dan at 430 and screamed out on to the mill pond offshore.Feeling pretty confident that there would be no breaking waves on the Bombie off white rock we set the anchor in the shallow stuff and cast out with floater pillies and immediately were set up on by the black scourge. .Now I advocate against certain things but a man reaches a point where enough is enough.All of this talk about the "Death star" sized trawler that will wipe out the baitfish population has got me thinking about one that will SELECTIVELY pick out the football oval sized shoal of these pesky varmints. .

We had the current going past at about 2knots but decided to try out a spot "out where the water is much deeper.......".Dropped the pick at a small pinnacle after picking up lots of bait on the sounder,next thing you know the cousins and brothers of the sweep at white rock came galloping through the water like 2kg dolphin fish after a hookless popper. .We persisted there but after pulling one lonely 35cm king out ,we went off for greener pastures .

I knew that the kingfish where there somewhere and we trolled around the bombies off the front until Dan spyed the white bait in close getting hammered by "things",the area was alive with white bait so he tied on his "100% guaranteed white bait imitator".First cast was a follow ,next cast he said you could feel the nudges as the "fish" hit the lure then the "fish" hit the surface. BLOODY FAIRY PENGUINS.

Not wanting to get picked up by the fairy police we trolled out again heading north along the front then north west along the leading edge of white rock,they were swimming around the Rapalas to hit the christmas trees .After hooking up we got stuck in to them,they were all under sized with the average being 50 cm,they were taking pencil poppers,but the absouleute favourite is a P-50 rebel blooper.Everytime this thing went out it was either just missed or "slurped" off the surface.Dan had the best "take" of the day when he was getting wound up to cast again when a pesky king smacked the popper with 12" of line hanging off the tip .The school wizened up after 30 minutes of madness and departed .Still nothing on board so we headed out to the shipwrecks off narrabean looking for something edible and finding divers on most wrecks decided to drift with the southerley wind

.Started picking up good flathead to 2.5kg around the wrecks with the drift taking us in a NE direction with a southerley set on the current,after picking up 12 flathead I was winding in one fish and could just make out the brown colour and then saw the midnight colour of a little mako shark "visit" the flathead ........bump bump and then wound in the blunt end of a good flathead that would have made 68cm and was now around 25cm.

I was frothing at the mouth with having about 6ft of mako cruising around the boat and getting the apropriate gear out we were hand feeding the little guy with pillies and by the time I had got the gear in the water he had taken off for "Bluer " water.Dan made the observation that it may well have been fortuitous that the fish had pissed off as he was relating the storys of makos jumping into boats .seeing as the boat was only 7ft bigger then the fish he is probably right.Still one of the more memorable incidents we have had,we picked up another four good flathead and then trolled back in looking for the kings again.

We found them again,using the christmas trees to locate the school,there was so much bait out there that although we would have spotted them on the sounder it is a bitch to isolate them.The spot is to the North NorthWest of white rock and seems to be "the spot" for them all to congregate,here be some gold for you all

33" 43.962 S 151" 19.661 E.

its Just a general reef area that is up current of white rock.We hooked up one king on heavy gear and after making sure he was comfortable just left him swiming under a tether "calling"and threw the pick out.We then had another session on the rats again,this time it was poppers,bloopers,and then on to soft plastics,they like the sluggos!!.The fish were twitchy and we observed that you will pick up a few on one lure,then you have to switch to something else to regain there interest.Just like dolphin fish.

We headed back to the ramp and after cleaning the fish went in for a dip in with all the fish heads looking for all the local doormats,did not see one sting ray!!.

The water was looking really good,it peaked at 21.8c about 3 miles out,it had the purple colour but there was no plankton visible(the purple sparklers).There is a crap load of bait out there and we did manage to pick up one slimey from a school down at 160ft ,I suspect that if you were to get there at the tide change and swim one around I think there would be a good chance for a bill fish. I am going out there again next tuesday with that in mind.

simon

[Guest bluecod]

A good read there Rekless - sounds like one of those fun days where you get a bit of everything. Shouldn't be too much longer before the beakies put in a solid appearance, that is if they show in numbers at all.

[Martin]

Hey Rekless you may have just lived up to your name had you connected with that Mako. At 6 feet it would be around 100 to 120kg. That is not the sort of fish you would want to tackle from a 13 or 14-foot boat, unless you tag it from the rod tip with a long tag pole.

Bring it on board and the safest place for you and the crew would be in the water.

Nice bag of flathead and an interesting report. Good luck with the kingfish

[Byron]

Great report Simon!!

High quality info and details, and like your generous sharing of the White rock "spot" waypoint.

Hope to see you out there one day mate

[Narralakes]

Top report Reckless, flattys are a good feed too.