La Perouse - Start of the SP mission...

[Bryce Neyland]

I'm trying to use this forum to catch fish, so will give mine back where I can. Not sure if it will help though.

On a mission to catch fish with these SP's. Never used them before and love the challenge. May take a week, month or year, but gunna get a fish on these little buggers.

PLACE: La Perouse

New to the whole Sydney area. I am land based, so have to stretch the legs to get to the country.

Note to Self: keep the hell away from Congwong Bay, lot of old blokes ignoring the no nudity signs. I'm not a judgemental guy but I prefer the grub on the hook, not on the beach.

Fishing needs to be real flash to weave in-between them.

Moved to Frenchmans Bay way wading in water throwing the plastic around.

METHOD:

As I said, throwing a couple of plastics around. I am trying a 'flick flick, wait till the SP on the bottom again, wind in slack, flick flick' method. Can anyone say if this has worked/improvements? Slow right?

I am thinking about chucking around a few metal lures, but I cannot cast too far out. Thought it may not work.

RESULT:

I had a little flatty chase the plastic right up to my feet, picking the whole way, but sorta spat it out and took off. CLOSE!! Other than that, I had something give it a long pull, little head shake, then nothing.

I'm not exactly sure how the hits are meant to feel. Do they smash the plastics, or knick at them/hook themselves or you hook em? I gave it a crack whenever I thought I got a hit, though similar to playing hit the pinyatta - no idea haha

Going to try the beach at Yarra Bay tomorrow morning.

After talking to a Raider, seriously considering getting a hobie kayak when my money tree comes back into flower. Hopefully then I will be able to get out in the mix, provided that jaws music doesn't start up in my head.

In the meantime, anyone with any advice on what I'm doing?

Beats the office regardless.

Thanks,

Honkatonk.

[brendong]

On a mission to catch fish with these SP's. Never used them before and love the challenge. May take a week, month or year, but gunna get a fish on these little buggers.

PLACE: La Perouse

Note to Self: keep the hell away from Congwong Bay, lot of old blokes ignoring the no nudity signs. I'm not a judgemental guy but I prefer the grub on the hook, not on the beach.

METHOD:

As I said, throwing a couple of plastics around. I am trying a 'flick flick, wait till the SP on the bottom again, wind in slack, flick flick' method. Can anyone say if this has worked/improvements? Slow right?

I am thinking about chucking around a few metal lures, but I cannot cast too far out. Thought it may not work.

RESULT:

I had a little flatty chase the plastic right up to my feet, picking the whole way, but sorta spat it out and took off. CLOSE!! Other than that, I had something give it a long pull, little head shake, then nothing.

I'm not exactly sure how the hits are meant to feel. Do they smash the plastics, or knick at them/hook themselves or you hook em? I gave it a crack whenever I thought I got a hit, though similar to playing hit the pinyatta - no idea haha

Going to try the beach at Yarra Bay tomorrow morning.

After talking to a Raider, seriously considering getting a hobie kayak when my money tree comes back into flower. Hopefully then I will be able to get out in the mix, provided that jaws music doesn't start up in my head.

In the meantime, anyone with any advice on what I'm doing?

Beats the office regardless.

Thanks,

Honkatonk.

Haha, I've renamed Congwong Bay to ShlongDong bay for obvious reasons... I gave some livies in that region but can't if i hve the skids on board... your method is fine...Twitch, twitch, retrieve and let it sink...now you just need to find the fish....best to just try and target flatties to begin with so swimming mullet, curl tail grubs, 4' minnows, 80 to 100mm wrigglers or fish (with s-factor) are the go....maybe go to Brighton on the Dolls Pt side and stalk the flats and drop offs there on a higher tide....you should be in with a show....cast as far as you can to work max area....flatties will often hit it on the drop after the twitches so sometimes you don't feel the 'tick' and when you next twitch you will have weight....if you do have weight, hit it again to set the hook as they often just mouth the plastic....its also worth watching your line, you will see the bite and can strike straight away (hard to see if really windy though).

i would only chuck metals if you see surface bust ups and just retrieve straigh back...I'm not sue how effective they'd be work as a plastic.

I'm not a yak man, but it would help you to explore a larger area....Towra, woolaware bay, kurnel etc

Good luck with it all...hang in there, once you get there with plastics you won't look back....i now loath collecting and buying bait and hate getting the boat dirty and stinky with the stuff, plus you are ready set go when ever the urge or chance to fish comes up...just think once you mastered sp's, you can begin your collection hard body's, poppers, blades, the list is endless and as will be you visits to the tackle shop....

[pkat87]

Hey there honk,

I'm no expert by any means but I too have been fascinated by catching fish with plastics.. A couple things you might need to clarify are:

1) what main line/leader are you using?

2) How heavy are you going with the jig head?

Sounds like your flicking around fairly shallow water, so you'd wana go pretty light with the jighead, i'd say around 1/12th-1/16th of an ounce, if your weight is too heavy the plastic will jus dart down to the bottom in an unnatural fashion,

you want it to kinda float down after you've flicked it up to mimic an injured baitfish/prawn.. And one thing I learnt is using different strength line definitely makes a difference, on some days I'll get zero hits on 8lb line and then switch to 4lb next time and get hits on almost every cast. If you're after flathead I've had good success with the Gulps in pumpkinseed, but I know squidgys are pretty popular as well..

And hobie's are great fun, I wish I could be out on mine everyday

Peter

[danlarter]

Hey honk,

I've also recently taken up the plastics fishing in port hacking and I'm having a fair bit of success with gulp shaky shads the small ones in disco prawn colour. I'm not catching much on anything else. I use the same technique as you do and most the time the flatties seem to grab the plastics in the pause between flicks. Keep trying mate it's only a matter of time!

Dan.

[helliconia]

If you think about the action you're giving to the plastic, the "hit on the drop" is not surprising with flathead.

The twitch bit lifts the plastic off the bottom and makes it dance around so the flathead notice it. The retrieve and pause as it sinks is when they rush over the grab it.

Occassionally you'll get lucky and twitch one right on his nose and he'll strike, but mostly it will be on the drop.

The trick is keep a little tension on the line as it drops soy ou're ready to strike when they snatch it.

It's also worth having a variety of colours and pattterns available. If one doesn't ge you results, switch and try something else. I have a preference for the green and red atomic wrigglers for flatties and I have to remind myself to try something else if I'm not having any success.

Keep at it, I find SP's can be really frustrating and at the same time really rewarding when you get a fish in the net

[fishythings]

Hi Honk,

Next time we can do lure fishing at Botany Bay, we can catch flatheads, breams, trevally and sometimes kingfish there.

Cheers,

Andy

[Bryce Neyland]

Thanks for all the comments gents.

Taken on board. I will let you know how they go.

Andy sounds great mate. I will let you know when I am back from Adelaide and we will hit it up.

[Ridesh]

the pedal kayak are quite expensive. you be looking around $2300 for a basic set up plus electronics and other equipments.

There is an off shore type as well called adventure island. It is awesome!