Bate Bay - jackets are back

[Yowie]

Headed to Bate Bay for a flattie drift, but only one legal there. Plenty of little spiky flatties and a few undersize tigers.

Drifted out a bit further (about south of the lighthouse) and the jackets turned up. At least they are big enough to eat, except they take bigger bites out of the baits and chew off the hooks without too much effort. Switched over to wire traces, but lost a couple of them when the jackets attacked the line above the trace. A couple of times the school swam up under the boat, but swam off quickly again.

Edited September 9, 2013 by yowie

[Linc]

Those are some decent sized jackets - at least a tasty consolation prize, though probably cost you more in gear than they're worth!

[leonardgid]

To all raiders that usually remove the whole head with the guts off , if you do catch the large ones try cooking them with the heads on(skinned& gutted) , the reason being there are a couple of large cheeks on the head that pros used to keep for them selfs , im sure that those of you that have never been near a fish head before will find it worth your trouble.

[Linc]

To all raiders that usually remove the whole head with the guts off , if you do catch the large ones try cooking them with the heads on(skinned& gutted) , the reason being there are a couple of large cheeks on the head that pros used to keep for them selfs , im sure that those of you that have never been near a fish head before will find it worth your trouble.

How do you skin it without removing the head? Just make incisions that just go through the skin and then peel back like without the head or is there a secret? I do appreciate a good fish cheek after living in China for for 11 years!

[leonardgid]

How do you skin it without removing the head? Just make incisions that just go through the skin and then peel back like without the head or is there a secret? I do appreciate a good fish cheek after living in China for for 11 years!

there is no secret it is time consuming , people that are used to cleaning them the usual way will find it takes three times as long but once you cook one up head and all , as you know your self there is some real choice meat around the head and wings of any fish ,

[Geoff]

Switched over to wire traces, but lost a couple of them when the jackets attacked the line above the trace.

Yowie. I've found, using black traces with black swivels tends to be a lot less attractive or perhaps noticable than silver or brass. Since changing my losses have decreased considerably.

Having the sinker some distance down the trace , away from where the line joins the trace , also draws their attention away from the join.

Should they attack the join , I have found braid line appears to be far more durable than nylon type line.

Geoff

Edited September 10, 2013 by Geoff

[Yowie]

Yowie. I've found, using black traces with black swivels tends to be a lot less attractive or perhaps noticable than silver or brass. Since changing my losses have decreased considerably.

Having the sinker some distance down the trace , away from where the line joins the trace , also draws their attention away from the join.

Should they attack the join , I have found braid line appears to be far more durable than nylon type line.

Geoff

Geoff,

Had the black traces, but they were aggressive jackets due to their size. Even with a 4 ounce snapper lead, the jackets stopped the baits before they sank too far. Not the day to fall overboard into a jacket school.

Had a couple of them chase the bait up as I was retrieving the line and get hooked, and a large one chased a small tiger flattie to the surface and chewed out it's throat and gills.

I use nylon, never used braid, as I also use handlines up river at times so I've stuck with mono.

Dave.

[Linc]

Had a couple of them chase the bait up as I was retrieving the line and get hooked, and a large one chased a small tiger flattie to the surface and chewed out it's throat and gills.

Christ, they sound more like Pirahnas! Although they sound like a pain, I am really looking forward to my first encounter with these crazy NSW jackets. I'm sure one encounter i'll be wishing I never found them though!

[Krispy !]

Nice feed there yowie

[Paikea]

Many years ago fishing in Bate Bay during another Jacket plague we had a crab trap with us planning to see if we could score some crabs at the Ballast Heap later in the afternoon/evening. (Before crab traps were banned in Port Hacking)

As we could not get a bait past the Jackets we baited the crab trap and hung it over the side thinking that it would attract the Jackets, then concentrate them around the trap so that fishing on the other side of the boat we could avoid at least the whole swarm attacking our baits.

It sure did the job, in no time flat we had Jackets swarming all over the trap. Then to our surprise they entered the trap and literally filled it. Could not believe the numbers that squeezed into the trap. Of course as trapping is illegal we had to let them go.

But the next time out we took a 4 litre paint tin with holes punched all around it, filled it with fish frames and a squirt of tuna oil and lowered it about 4 feet over the side. Drove the Jackets nuts as they tried to get into the tin. It did allow us to get some baits past them. Maybe worth a try again?

Cheers

Paikea

[Yowie]

Many years ago fishing in Bate Bay during another Jacket plague we had a crab trap with us planning to see if we could score some crabs at the Ballast Heap later in the afternoon/evening. (Before crab traps were banned in Port Hacking)

As we could not get a bait past the Jackets we baited the crab trap and hung it over the side thinking that it would attract the Jackets, then concentrate them around the trap so that fishing on the other side of the boat we could avoid at least the whole swarm attacking our baits.

It sure did the job, in no time flat we had Jackets swarming all over the trap. Then to our surprise they entered the trap and literally filled it. Could not believe the numbers that squeezed into the trap. Of course as trapping is illegal we had to let them go.

But the next time out we took a 4 litre paint tin with holes punched all around it, filled it with fish frames and a squirt of tuna oil and lowered it about 4 feet over the side. Drove the Jackets nuts as they tried to get into the tin. It did allow us to get some baits past them. Maybe worth a try again?

Cheers

Paikea

Fishos that catch fan tail or yellow finned jackets up river are used to a gentle nibble on the bait from those types of jackets.

The yellow or chinamen jackets caught outside are a different proposition. They are extremely aggressive at times, attacking larger fish in big numbers and killing and eating them in no time at all, similar to piranha.

As I reported on previous times, my grandfather caught them in big numbers after World War 1, and he dropped a net overboard with a fish head in it, and had trouble lifting the net full of jackets into the boat. He actually grabbed them from the water by hand and tossed them into the boat.

Groper posted a report of Russians fishing with a hand grenade a couple of months ago, except the dopes blew a hole in the side of their boat !!! About the only way to get rid of them.

[Justin80]

Yeah, they're in serious plague proportions off Sydney at the moment, and have been for a few weeks. I work on various fishing charter boats and the amount of tackle we've lost is unbelievable. Last weekend I must've spent 3 hours straight just making up leaders. We had 40 wire paternosters on-board and they were all gone within an hour or so. The jackets were just biting through braid above the swivel. We would've caught over 100 in maybe an hour-and-a-half. They're a real pest at the best of times but when you're a decky on a fishing charter boat with 16 people on-board, they're an absolute nightmare. I almost asked my skipper for a raise! Never worked so hard on a boat before. At one stage I could've just scooped them up with a net.

They are good on the chew though, I must admit.