Jervis Bay

[benfot]

Headed out with my dad from Murray's at about 6am on Wed. The perpetual nor easter had finally stopped (light southerly was blowing) so was nice fishing conditions for the day...

Caught a squid off the boat ramp (to add to the frozen one we'd caught the night before) as well as plenty of yellowtail. So with plenty of fresh bait headed over to the bombie off long nose point to have a crack.

Passed loads of dolphins and penguins on the way across the bay and caught a small legal snapper pretty quickly. Was a bit slow til around 10am but after a brief chat to the guy in the marine parks boat managed to suss out where all kings were hanging around... And the fun began!

Landed a decent king on a whole dead yakka fished near the bottom first. Could see them in and around the big schools of baitfish and all around the boat.

Ended up landing about five I think, on dead yakkas and squid as well as on 5-inch clear/sparkly stick baits. Seemed to be taking juts about anything we put in front of them. Saw one decent king cruising past the boat and dropped a whole squid head near it... turned around straight away and smashed the bait about 2 metres from the boat! Sadly busted us off pretty quickly though.

Most of the fish were caught in about 5 - 12 metres of water. All landed were rats but got busted off by one or two reasonable fish - pretty much inevitable in such shallow water with a reefy bottom on lightish gear I guess.

Anyway, was a top day out. Plenty of great fish but no kingies for dinner unfortunately!

Cheers

Ben

Almost there at about 63cm... Certainly was a healthy fish. Caught off the bottom on a whole dead yakka.

Caught off the bottom on a whole dead yakka.

Caught on a squid strip.

Caught with a stick bait... Wasn't busting up on the surface, but there were loads of them just cruising around the baitfish so thought we'd try our luck!

Edited February 8, 2009 by Balmain Boy

[Richard]

Sounds like a great day guys, it's great when kings don't play hard to get.

you guys took boat down from sydney to Jervis? I am planning to do that one day.

Cheers

Richard

[bruce welsh]

great day on the kings ,cant think of anything better

[greenfish]

Nice catch of kingies, well done.

[benfot]

Sounds like a great day guys, it's great when kings don't play hard to get.

you guys took boat down from sydney to Jervis? I am planning to do that one day.

Cheers

Richard

Yeh mate, we were staying down there for a couple of weeks.

Guess you could drive down for the day but usually takes at least 2 1/2 hrs so bit of a mission. But obviously there's far less boat traffic than in the harbour (and a fair few of the boats head out anyway) so much less need to get out early. Fishing seems to be better from bout 9am onwards anyway, except maybe for squid.

Can't think of many nicer places to fish. And there's so many fish would almost certainly be worth the effort!

Edited February 9, 2009 by Balmain Boy