Watts Reef Jewfish Session Thursday 7/1/2010 & Sunday 10/1/2010

[jewgaffer]

Hi Raiders, just a quick report on some Botany Bay jewfish that were caught recently by Cungee George and Occy1 in the daytime..

George and Larry anchored over a broken section of Watts Reef again today and caught six jewfish all up with half of their jewfish and a good size flathead caught right on on the bottom of the tide and the other three jewfish were caught about an hour or so into the run out tide..

All fish today were caught on yellowtail fillets left over from our Hawkesbury session on Friday... On the previous Thursday George and Larry caught five jewfish and a 10kilo cuttlefish in the same location and caught quite a few undersize kingfish and they were also anchored over a broken part of Watts Reef.

Here are the photos

Today's catch included 6 jewfish, 2 flathead and a large Gummy shark

Last Thursday's catch 5 jewfish, 2 flathead, 3 bream and a 9kilo Cuttlefish

Cheers

jewgaffer

Edited January 10, 2010 by jewgaffer

[zephi]

wow that's an amazing haul of fish there. That huge cuttlefish was a huge surprise....

Any good to eat lol, cuz it looks really gross.

[marcel haber]

Not a bad days effort that any angler would be proud of.

That cuttle would produce some good cut baits.

Twin 1

[Basil D]

nice haul guys, cuttle fish are awsome to eat, they are soft and melt in your mouth even at that size, and with plenty of left overs for bait,

[Keflapod]

Yiasoo George,

You know I had no idea that Watts reef produces jew.

My wife told me last Friday that she's bored of eating bream and whiting. This made me realise that I had become so good at bream/whiting but that I had lost touch with other species. I tried for a jew at capt cooks bridge sunday moring from 4:30 to 7:00am - no luck, then I went for crabs - got 3 and didn't know what else to do except bream/whiting. I did that for a short while - got some fish and then copped the 20 knot SE at 9:15am which sent me home.

I don't suppose we could get together with Byron in my boat and have a shot at this spot ?

I've hassled Byron some months ago to go for a jew trip in the George's river but neither one of us followed through.

Gotto catch some jew, even if they are soapies - gotto save my marriage

If you want to have a look at my boat and meet up before you decide, then please PM me for details.

I understand that Byron's back requires certain comforts to be present - this way you can check it out..

Tony

[jenno64]

Cracking bag there!!!

[bluebottle18]

I think the jew are the result of the release of a few hundred fingerlings four to five

year ago by Fisheries with our licence money.

Its great to see this area beginning to fire again. A great night spot back in the early 80`s

especially in winter.

Good catch.

[helliconia]

Nice bag Jewgaffer!

I've seen hordes of cuttlefish that size under the ledges along the easterly reef off Shelly Beach near Cronulla while scuba diving. Never seen one out of the water though! Nice work!

[jewgaffer]

I think the jew are the result of the release of a few hundred fingerlings four to five

year ago by Fisheries with our licence money.

Its great to see this area beginning to fire again. A great night spot back in the early 80`s

especially in winter.

Good catch.

That's very true about Watts Reef Bluebottle, .. Watts Reef was a good night spot and a very popular one too. It used to be like a carpark in the summer months and it was generally always mentioned in the Botany Bay reports in the newspapers and was referred to as being the key to fishing in Botany Bay.

On week nights around autumn and winter, there was generally always at least a couple of jew boats settling in over the reef in the late afternoons... They used to catch jewfish that came in and schooled up around the reef I believe and these seemed to be around the seven to eight kilo mark but by the same they wouldn't catch too many all that often... Like the Hawkesbury the Botany Bay would occasionally produce a jewfish big enough to see a photo of in one of the many local tackle shops that used to be in the area.

Fishermen from La Perouse often used to fish two boats over the reef at night, one each side of an opening ...If you didn't do any good on the jewfish, you could always get a few fish to take home over a night session and especially pan size snapper in the winter months, rock cod and also quite a few bream.. Handline fishermen used to say there were all sorts of unstoppables there and if they went to sleep at night their handlines would be either broken off or missing, probably taken by sharks or kingfish I suppose..

I'm not so sure the jew around that size are the result of the fingerling problem... Sometimes you wonder how many of the fingerlings would have survived the flathead compared to the number that were released..

The fact that George and Larry fished the run thru the reef and hooked up the jewfish in daytime hours during their two sessions was perhaps the result of the tides at the time more than anything else..

Cheers

jewgaffer

[johnny doi]

well done george & occy.great effort,especially for daytime. i also didnt know watts reef produced jew.

4 or 5 years ago when i got back into fishing,i used to fish watts 2-3nights a week with a local vietnamese tackle shop owner.back then i wasnt very knowledgable about fishing & thought the reef was a bait ground as the man i fish with loved to eat yakkas,slimies & tailor,which made up the majority of our bags along with trevally.he would only use pillies for bait but i also took squid as bait & would hook & loose the occassional king or salmon i think.

we would only fish watts at night in summer & autum & in winter we would fish the beaches including congwong beach for bags of trevs during the night.

we'd also get plagued with port jacksons when they moved into the bay to spawn when we put a bait right on the bottom,1 of which took me over 30mins to get up & well over 1.5mtrs.

if only i knew back then that yakkas & slimies were gun baits i wouldv definately used them for bait.the old man would occassionally put a small live yakka out & did get 1 small jew but mostly pt jacksons & shovel noses.

the slimies we did catch were horse slimmies up to & over 30cms.cos the slimies were so big,the way the old man showed me to target them was with whole ganged pilles for the slimies,tailor & odd salmon.at first we fished with floats with a glow stick on the float,but then after a season or 2 we fished the pillies unweighted & got great catches or good sized tailor.i would also fish a paternoster rig with pillie on 1 hook & squid on the other & catch all the mention species mentioned,except for the trevs which were usually rite on the bottom.

its been a long time since i fished with the old man & in the bay by boat.in fact i havnt been on a boat for over a year now.cant wait till i get the chance to soon.

thats a awsome result george & occy you got there,& during the day.top bag of fish boys.

cant wait to meet you george & have a fish with you & byron in the near future.you & byron are definately my jewfish fisherman idols.my 6yr old son jai thinks jewgaffer is an absolute legend jewfisherman.everytime im on fishraider & he see's your name,he tells me to read what you'v wrote.

good onya gentleman once again & il speak to you soon byron.

cheers johnny.