Middle Harbour

[Paul]

G'day Raiders

The regular kayak crew (nbH00d, A.dawg, Thanh and myself) decided to hit Middle Harbour earlier this week for some surface action on lures after recent reports of the water boiling up. Our main target were bonito, salmon, tailor & although unlikely at this stage ... Kingies. Launched at 5:30 am and headed to Balmoral to look around for weed beds and half assedly attempted to get some squid while looking around for birds and boils. We ran into Spongy and another friendly kayak fisher who had the same goals in mind so we all hung around each other off and on.

Wasn't too long before the birds were spotted and we noticed the boils and headed towards them. The early casts produced some tailor & salmon for our crew while the other kayakers managed some bonito and salmon as well. Took a few more goes before I was able to land my first ever salmon coming in at 50cm. Fantastic fight on a 1-3kg rod, 4lb fireline & 6lb leader. Lure was a 15g gold Halco twisty lure, wasn't really rated for my rod but all I had on me that would do the job. Took a few runs and did 2 air jumps before I was able to land him. Hooked onto another but shook himself free on an air jump. At this point, my yak started to look like a bloodbath, so when the action died down, we decided to beach up and fire up the portable BBQ for some snags and I gave my yak a bit of a rinse. Turns out we were at a nude beach as some dude started to strip about 50 metres away so we quickly ate, packed up and got back on the water to meet up with the other kayak fishos and the action picked up again. Some more bonito (still none fore our crew) and salmon were landed and then the action really died down so the other fishos left and we decided to head to Clontarf for a dip and all take turns on nbH00d's Hobie Adventure Island which was incredible fun.

Afterwards, we had to get some ice from the marina so decided to have a few flicks around some of the boat moorings and pontoons near the Spit Bridge but the best we could manage were pinkies after pinkies so we anchored up and had a nap. nbH00d got bored so he went back out to look for some boils and it wasn't too long before he spotted some, caught himself a salmon and gave us the call to get back out there. He came back for us and towed us back out there to see that it had really heated up! Birds and boils galore and the salmon were clearly seen at the top of the crystal clear surface. Problem we had were boats were driving straight through the schools every time we got near so we set up a square formation about 15 metes from each other and a boat decided to go straight through that too . Didn't matter though as they salmon just kept coming back up to the top but we couldn't entice them with any of our lures and the boils were starting to appear too far away so we decided to head back. There was some more action when we got back though and the boys managed to get a few more salmon before finally calling it quits. Fun and exhausting day. Pics Below

A.Dawg and one of the 3 salmon he landed in rapid succession

Thanh leeching a ride

nbH00d's salmon while we were caught napping

nbh00d's salmon and Hobie Adventure Island

Me and my first ever salmon

Kayak Choo Choo Train

Some future shark bait and dinner

Hope you enjoy

Cheers

Paul

Edited January 22, 2013 by Paul

[zen801]

Mate that's funny about the nudie beach. Gotta be careful on that front especially at night. I will keep it PG rated and say only this "don't get off the boat at night" in some of the MH parks.

I was on the roof of a skyscraper today in north Sydney and watched a surface boil for about 15 minutes in a bay near the old submarine base. Not one boat went anywhere near it. Would have had it to yourself.

Mike

[nbh00d]

Nice report Paul. In regards to the nude beaches can anyone explain why they are also good squiddng spots??? (E.g. Lady jane beach, Obelik beach) I always laucn at Camp cove and spend a lot of time squidding at Lady jane. I think now I can easily ignore whatever happens there and concentrate on catching squids. But then looking at the reactions of A.dawg is priceless when he found out he landed at a nudist becah LOL.

Edited January 22, 2013 by nbh00d

[Day's Fishin]

There are so many idiots out there that wouldn't have a clue when it comes to fishing. They think that they can drive their boat right on top of a boil and the fish will just swarm all around them. The only good thing about these clowns is they don't catch anything except a mouthful. Good to hear you and the boys had a good time anyway.

Regards Jeff

[SargeRX8]

There are so many idiots out there that wouldn't have a clue when it comes to fishing. They think that they can drive their boat right on top of a boil and the fish will just swarm all around them. The only good thing about these clowns is they don't catch anything except a mouthful. Good to hear you and the boys had a good time anyway.

Regards Jeff

Hey you never know they might catch a fish with their propeller if they're fast enough!

[Paul]

Mate that's funny about the nudie beach. Gotta be careful on that front especially at night. I will keep it PG rated and say only this "don't get off the boat at night" in some of the MH parks. I was on the roof of a skyscraper today in north Sydney and watched a surface boil for about 15 minutes in a bay near the old submarine base. Not one boat went anywhere near it. Would have had it to yourself. Mike

What happens at Middle Harbour beaches, stays at Middle Harbour beaches

There are so many idiots out there that wouldn't have a clue when it comes to fishing. They think that they can drive their boat right on top of a boil and the fish will just swarm all around them. The only good thing about these clowns is they don't catch anything except a mouthful. Good to hear you and the boys had a good time anyway.

Regards Jeff

We couldn't really get mad at all the boats, maybe they were racing out to get Kingies at the Heads or offshore. The one boat that did p1ss us off was the one that went straight through us when he had pretty much all of the harbour to get to his destination. We're all pretty relaxed anyways so we got over it pretty quickly.

Nice report Paul. In regards to the nude beaches can anyone explain why they are also good squiddng spots??? (E.g. Lady jane beach, Obelik beach) I always laucn at Camp cove and spend a lot of time squidding at Lady jane. I think now I can easily ignore whatever happens there and concentrate on catching squids. But then looking at the reactions of A.dawg is priceless when he found out he landed at a nudist becah LOL.

I've never seen Alan not hungry for snags til then

[rjc123]

Nice one Paul!

Salmon and Tailor are always good on light gear.

You gotta be careful about going too light though... Kingies will destroy you on 6lb (usually). I made that mistake today. Fished for flatties of 4lb (leader) and ended up getting more than what i bargained for. Fought this fish for 15 minutes on a 1-2 kg rod and right at the yak it wore through my leader. This flathead was comfortably over a meter!! Very Very gutted Thats the good thing about holidays, the yak will be on the water for the next 3 days!

Anyway i'll stop ranting, onya boys great stuff!

Cheers, Tom

[humesy]

Nice report Paul. In regards to the nude beaches can anyone explain why they are also good squiddng spots??? (E.g. Lady jane beach, Obelik beach) I always laucn at Camp cove and spend a lot of time squidding at Lady jane. I think now I can easily ignore whatever happens there and concentrate on catching squids. But then looking at the reactions of A.dawg is priceless when he found out he landed at a nudist becah LOL.

So true. Have seen some well dodgy behaviour at some of my squid spots. And why is it that the people you generally spot at Sydney's nudist beaches are the types you'd least like to see naked.

Edited January 22, 2013 by humesy

[Paul]

Nice one Paul!

Salmon and Tailor are always good on light gear.

You gotta be careful about going too light though... Kingies will destroy you on 6lb (usually). I made that mistake today. Fished for flatties of 4lb (leader) and ended up getting more than what i bargained for. Fought this fish for 15 minutes on a 1-2 kg rod and right at the yak it wore through my leader. This flathead was comfortably over a meter!! Very Very gutted Thats the good thing about holidays, the yak will be on the water for the next 3 days!

Anyway i'll stop ranting, onya boys great stuff!

Cheers, Tom

I had a 6-8 kg ready to go in the horizontal rod holder just in case the kings were out but was really keen on landing a sambo and a bonito as I haven't caught any before. Really disappointed that I haven't had a bonito yet. That would have completed the trifecta for the summer. There's still time

Then I gotta do something about my Blackfish PB lol

Edited January 22, 2013 by Paul

[estuaryangler]

Hi all,

Very new to fishing (last 6 mths), but have slowly learned a thing or two. I have been out in MH over the last few days trying my luck at all those bustups. While it looks like 'shooting fish in a barrel' (pardon the pun) it has not been as easy as that in getting constant hook ups. The salmon are hit and miss, and I still haven't found the right metal or soft plastic that is reliable. However, I have been having great success with Bonito! I too have been using Halco Twisties (10g) but have found the trick is patience, let the lure sink as long as you can before reefing it in at 100 miles p/h.

If this has been shear luck, so be it, but seems to work for me and has been the key to targeting Bonito (if your keen on that trifecta).

Happy to hear any opinions on this one (first post). Cheers

[quintrex480]

well done guys! sounds like you had a blast! but man, from what you've described, sounds like a very tiring day as well!!

isn't Gavin usually in a PA? what's he doing in an adventure island?

[Paul]

Hi all,

Very new to fishing (last 6 mths), but have slowly learned a thing or two. I have been out in MH over the last few days trying my luck at all those bustups. While it looks like 'shooting fish in a barrel' (pardon the pun) it has not been as easy as that in getting constant hook ups. The salmon are hit and miss, and I still haven't found the right metal or soft plastic that is reliable. However, I have been having great success with Bonito! I too have been using Halco Twisties (10g) but have found the trick is patience, let the lure sink as long as you can before reefing it in at 100 miles p/h.

If this has been shear luck, so be it, but seems to work for me and has been the key to targeting Bonito (if your keen on that trifecta).

Happy to hear any opinions on this one (first post). Cheers

Yep, the salmon were very difficult to entice in the afternoon. So frustrating as they were right in front of our eyes and what worked in the morning failed in the afternoon! Cheers for the tips, will try that technique on the bonnies next time I'm out.

well done guys! sounds like you had a blast! but man, from what you've described, sounds like a very tiring day as well!!

isn't Gavin usually in a PA? what's he doing in an adventure island?

Gav is a pelagics man and doesn't like hanging out with us estuary folk too often ... Just kidding

After some soul searching, he realized Pelagics, sailing and offshore is where his heart truly lies so he sold his PA and upgraded to the Adventure Island.

Extremely tiring, as it felt like we were herding cattle or sheep.

Edited January 22, 2013 by Paul

[zen801]

So true. Have seen some well dodgy behaviour at some of my squid spots. And why is it that the people you generally spot at Sydney's nudist beaches are the types you'd least like to see naked.

Hey andrew,

Ain't that the truth.

Mike