Middle Harbour

[mrsquid]

Hi Raiders

Bit of a late report but better late than never, Sporting a lingering hangover from Friday night i Took off in my mitey tinny from Tunks park about 2am last Saturday night loaded up with some nice fresh squid caught that afternoon, Plan was to go straight to my know jew spot and catch the tail end of the low tide that had just passed then go look for some big Jews around middle harbour.

It was dark night with no moon just stars above me and god knows what below me, I pulled up at my first point to find dirty but warm 21d water, I put out 2 rods each loaded with full arrow squid on 4/0 circle hooks and backed up by 40pd braid and 60 fluro. With everything set above and below, I started burying heavy with lots of old fish carcases and pillies but to my disappointment the yakka’s were nowhere to be seen!

After an hour of waiting for something or nothing as the case was to happen, I decided to pull up anchor, thinking I could drift down my own burly trail and surely there’d be something around!

Now for the fun top begin, after drifting for half hour or so zzzzzzzzzzz screams my reel on the 15kg rod! I pick up the rod and strike! Straight away I know this is something bludey huge!!! With line tearing off my reel faster and faster, I was still giving myself half a chance of landing this beast which hopefully is mother of all jewfish! But this run is not stopping, I try put on the brakes a little more but still it goes, I think my tinny was making wake at the point as beast dragged me away from Bantry bay entrance towards the spit! By now im thinking this is a shark for sure because surely a lazy jewfish would have chucked in the towel by now, I remember what I had been told about fighting kings and sharks that the more u gave them the more they gave u so I let the fish run only taking line whenever it stopped or slowed. 30 min later i had half my spool back and all was looking good! The fish would stop give me ten meters or so then take off with as much power and force as the first 10sec of the game, but each stop was getting longer and runs shorter, soon it was doing circles around my tinnie but I still couldn’t see anything and straining from this epic battle! It must have swam 10 wide circles around before I saw a big tail splash the surface of the water then dive deep again taking another 5 meters of line but as it came up again, this time broad side to my tinny I got to see the full scale of this creature!! This bull shark was easy the length of my 3.4 savage maybe a little under but in the dark I was standing precariously in the middle and from nose to tail seemed to be the size if not bigger but this is all afterthought because at the time when I saw the size I wanted it as far from me as possible!! I’m not normally afraid of sharks but been in my tiny tinny in the middle of the night hooked on to this monster I was scared shitless but first thing I did was get that leader close and cut that monster away!

With adrenalin making me shake I was amazed at the catch and spewing my camera died in last week’s bad weather but I was also very happy it was over. I cruised back towards Roseville looking for holes or anything else holding fish but with a few fruitless stops along the way I arrived back to where I would anchored up and wait for the sunrise and high tide!

No longer after anchoring up I had a few runs that didn’t take then bang one rod bends over and I bring up a small jewfish at 50 cm happily release my catch and set up again to catch its mother! But as the sun rises so does the crowd and it’s not long after the first water skier gets going too so with a big smile of the night’s action I call it a day and head back home.

Short story today as ive been heaps busy and right now I,m gonna go get some squid! tight line all.

Fast facts:

Fish size: big scary shark and 50cm Jew

Water temp: 21c

Bait: fresh squid whole

Line/leader 40lb braid/60lb fluro on 10-15 kg rod

Rig: swivel and light sinker running to the hooks

Weather: clear rising pressure

Burly: pilchards and fish carcases

Tide: shark caught 2-3 hours after low and jew 1 hour before high

Moon:????

The jewfish was landed using whole squid on 2 4/0 circle hooks

[lostproperty]

Nuts !!

[Blood Knot]

Great report mrsqid

Cheers Blood Knot

[rjc123]

Nice work man!

The sharks are in hey?

Had a few run ins in the past with big guys much like yours. I fought a 8' model for an hour on 20lb (braid and leader) so i can certainly understand what the battle was like. Not at night though

Glad i bought a big yak as seeing a fish of that size next to me would scare me shitless. Might have a few landbased shark sessions over summer in MH. There's loads of them in there...

Nice work on the jew too!

A few nice holes around Bantry... Big Flatties up the back end as well.

Cheers, Tom

[Scratchie]

Awesome report!!! I would have cut it off too.

[Robinsoi]

Another top report Mr Squid

I'm glad you came out in one piece after that marathon battle!

Keep up the great work.

Ian

[dadwithnoidea]

great report!!

Makes me worry a little when i sit out all night in my little kayak.

I am in balgowlah too....maybe I need to stalk you out to there one night and have a fish with you. Any sharks are yours in the boat thought!!

Mat

[stickybeak]

Good report again Mr Squid and that was a short story jeez !!