svsolaris Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Decided to head out on Sunday night despite the risk of getting drenched and was rewarded with a blustery Middle Harbour. Magnificent. i wandered near The Spit in the tender targeting bream to try out something I thought might work: Throwing a prawn-baited hook with the tiniest sinker within inches of pylons and other structures, taking risks exactly as you would with soft plastics. It worked! Kept these 25cm and 34cm beauties and released a few more undersized models in a couple of hours. Letting the bait drift away naturally from the targeted structures extra longer also got tailor interested. I am really pleased with my progress. It took me a year to catch a decent fish there but it starts to feel like I am more in control, with 5 successful sessions out of 5. There's basic technique, but I think taking time to decipher fish behaviours and habitats is extremely rewarding. And learning not to panic and get busted On a different note, I was curious about the reactions to my last report so also went out one night last week looking for horse mackerel. I know many people don't consider it good eating here but I really wanted to try a recipe as it's pretty standard fare in many places e.g. for tapas in Spain. I ended up with 4 totalling 1.2kg, gave 2 to some Japanese friends (they call it saba and love it) and oven cooked the rest sealed in foil with sake for sweet, lemon slice stuffing for sour, and a big dollop of butter for good health! Eat with salt flakes and a cold beer. It was yummy as! A bit like sardines or unsalted anchovies. The kids had seconds. Give it a go if you catch them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fisholb Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Well done mate...I think your horse mackerel is called yelowtail or yakkas...most fishos uses them for bait but some fishos love eating them too... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
svsolaris Posted November 4, 2013 Author Share Posted November 4, 2013 Thanks fisholb - yes according to fishbase apparently yakka, cowanyoung and yellowtail horse mackerel is all different names for it (and surprisingly the species only exists in Oz and NZ!). I only discovered recently that MH has 20cm+ models! http://www.fishbase.org/Summary/speciesSummary.php?ID=1979&AT=yakka Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sam bros Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Well done mate Persistence pays off Yep yellowtail good bait and good eating but I find they have too many small bones that become annoying Congratulations Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hookmeup Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Second one looks more like a tarwhine possibly, well done either way mate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Day's Fishin Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Small fish lots of bones! Yakka's (Bung) Yellow tail best live bait you can catch in the harbour, why put up with picking through the bones when you could turn them into big kings or flathead? Jeff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
svsolaris Posted November 4, 2013 Author Share Posted November 4, 2013 Totally agree Day's, what you see here is just me making the best of my noobie skills... Bigger stuff will come :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scratchie Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Each to there own! Well done on this fish though mate. Trying new techniques and catching something is what it's all about. I only eat certain fish I catch and I'm not one for picking out bones! As Days said, those yakkas make for great king candy or for Jews as well. Next time you catch them, try finding a nice hole and sending them down as live bait. You might just come home with some big slabs of meat! Cheers scratchie!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paulk001 Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Personally I find yakkas too fiddly too eat but I have friends who just love eating them deep fried or even sashimi'd. Keep an eye out for the doctors they sometimes carry in their mouths. Sent from my HTC Desire HD A9191 using Tapatalk 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aboz Posted November 4, 2013 Share Posted November 4, 2013 Nice work there SV!! You got out and nabbed yourself a feed and managed to target a species in hope to feed some mates with all round success. Congrats! Spotie.. Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
svsolaris Posted November 5, 2013 Author Share Posted November 5, 2013 Thanks guys. I want to focus on bream as my next code breaking for now, but flatties and kingies will definitely be on after that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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