Nelson Bay

[scotty1983]

G'day raiders,

Just back from a few days up at Nelson Bay, could've picked a better few days to be honest. Weather was a bit ordinary Sunday, Monday and only came good yesterday afternoon. Managed to sneak away yesterday afternoon to Shoal Bay for a quick flick but I think there must've been some little Tailor around; every plastic eventually came back without a tail! Never hooked a thing.

Got up this morning and headed down to the break wall for a few hours and managed a solid 30cm Bream on first cast then the wolds smallest Leatherjacket on the second cast then nothing for about an hour............then I really got a workout.

I was fishing 2 rods; one with a squid & prawn paternoster and one with unweighted prawn. All of a sudden the one with the paternoster rod doubled over. After I struck into it it felt like a dead weight and I thought it was a big sting ray then it woke up and took off, pealing 8kg line like crazy. Whatever it was went about 100m into the Marina then turned and headed about 100m in the other direction out into open water. It surfaced once and thrashed violently on the surface before heading round the break wall . As I stumbled to get off the rocks and onto the footpath to chase it I must've got snagged and the line snapped. I'm guessing it was a decent Kingy, when it broke the surface it looked to be at least 60cm and it gave me the runaround for a good 15mins.

After that...nothing, so I packed up headed back to accommodation.

If it was indeed a Kingy it was my first and I've now got the bug. I can't believe the awesome power and speed this thing had, it definitely caught me rather than me it.

Cheers,

Scotty.

[helliconia]

Scotty, thanks for the interesting report.

On your lost mystery fish, I've done a fair bit of scuba diving around there and I've seen schools of smallish tuna running the edges of the channel up there around this time of year. Could be stripies or maybe largish bonito, its a bit hard to identify them in the murk when they move so fast.

[rjc123]

Mystery fish has got me a little. While Empty Hooks is right, there are a few tuna and big bonnies around there this time of year, they wouldn't really feel like dead wait at any point. They go hard and fast from start to finish. Could've been a king i suppose. I would normally say jew, considering the dead weight followed by powerful runs and place it was hooked. Although jews don't normally thrash about on the surface in the way you described. Going to throw a cat amongst the pigeons here. It may have been a Cobia. I caught a 60cm model there a few years ago and the way you described the fight matches it fairly well. While not a common catch for the area, they do get them there on a irregular basis.

I guess you'll never know for sure though.

Cheers, Tom

Edited November 21, 2012 by mulloway man

[Scratchie]

Hey Scott,

You right about the weather, it has been really ordinary up here and the winds very unpredictable. I got out on the bay yesterday (wednesday) with completely calm conditions from 5am-11am. On the top of the tide, I started collecting bait and managed 2 squid and a few whiting. Headed to my Jew spot on the run out. It was so calm that I didn't really need to drop anchor cos I wasn't moving, but I did anyway. Started to burly and sent out 1 livie, 1 live squid and 1 rod with fresh prawns. The squid got hammered and so did the prawn but no hook up???

As I was winding in the prawn less rod I caught a chomper tailor chasing my silver hook. Ah ha, that's what had been destroying my bait. So I collected a few, butterflied 1 and sent one out live. Was there till 1hr after run out with nothing decent. There must have been a million tailor in the bay. All baits were destroyed. So I moved to another spot and same thing. Probably the worst day I've had in the bay with those conditions. Oh well, this means I will have to got out again on the weekend for this weeks fish for dinner!

Cheers scratchie

[hookmeup]

G'day raiders,

Just back from a few days up at Nelson Bay, could've picked a better few days to be honest. Weather was a bit ordinary Sunday, Monday and only came good yesterday afternoon. Managed to sneak away yesterday afternoon to Shoal Bay for a quick flick but I think there must've been some little Tailor around; every plastic eventually came back without a tail! Never hooked a thing.

Got up this morning and headed down to the break wall for a few hours and managed a solid 30cm Bream on first cast then the wolds smallest Leatherjacket on the second cast then nothing for about an hour............then I really got a workout.

I was fishing 2 rods; one with a squid & prawn paternoster and one with unweighted prawn. All of a sudden the one with the paternoster rod doubled over. After I struck into it it felt like a dead weight and I thought it was a big sting ray then it woke up and took off, pealing 8kg line like crazy. Whatever it was went about 100m into the Marina then turned and headed about 100m in the other direction out into open water. It surfaced once and thrashed violently on the surface before heading round the break wall . As I stumbled to get off the rocks and onto the footpath to chase it I must've got snagged and the line snapped. I'm guessing it was a decent Kingy, when it broke the surface it looked to be at least 60cm and it gave me the runaround for a good 15mins.

After that...nothing, so I packed up headed back to accommodation.

If it was indeed a Kingy it was my first and I've now got the bug. I can't believe the awesome power and speed this thing had, it definitely caught me rather than me it.

Cheers,

Scotty.

My moneys on Kingy, I have stood on that marina looking at balls of baitfish madly balling up & thought whats going on here only to see a couple of quick flashes as decent size kingys went ploughing into the ball, stayed there watching for about 1/2 hour & whilst they kept moving around they always kept coming back & I mean right to the edge of the marina.Bummer you lost it.