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Dollies still everywhere off Sydney!


Scent Blazer Lures

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Went for a troll on the 23rd January 2014, 5 of us on-board, we took my friend’s son and my son for their first game fishing trip. Unfortunately the conditions weren’t ideal for their first trip offshore, it was quite lumpy and swelly, so the boat was bobbing around a quite a lot, but the kids to their credit handled it really well.

We rounded Sydney Heads around midday and put the lures in straight away. We had 3 Scent Blazer lures chains out as well as an 8 and 12 inch lure for something bigger. We put pilchards inside the bait chambers. Water temp straight of Sydney wasn’t real hot, about 21 degrees.

About a mile out we came across dolphins feeding on slimey mackerel, we caught one trolling. Slimey mackerel that is, not a dolphin, LOL! Poor thing couldn’t pull the line out the clip and it was probably on there for a little while before we noticed it. It was dead and its neck was snapped by the time we got it in. Anyway, good fresh bait, so we cut it up and put it inside the bait chamber of some of mackerel coloured lures to match the hatch.

We trolled NE towards the Whale Fad, hooked up a on a few small dolphin fish on way. We kept and hooking up dollies around the Whale Fad and then we trolled NE towards Manly Hydraulics, hooking up on the way there as well. More dollies caught around MHFad then we decided to troll NE looking for something bigger and warmer water, warmest water we found was 21.8 and we just kept getting more dollies, they were probably following us.

Around 4.30 we started trolling back, on the way back we hooked up on what appeared to be a biggest fish of day. The outrigger clip cracked open and the rod bent over really hardwhile the line was peeling off on the tight drag, the line was singing in the wind under all the tension. Excited, we started clearing the gear. The kids were experts by this stage, helping us wind in all the rods and clearing the other lines out of the water. We left the rod in the holder and the kids had turns winding it in. I was thinking it was a really big dolliebecause it was not budging and kids were struggling to get a wind on it.As it got closer to the boat I saw from the fly bridge it was just a fouled hooked fish. It was hooked in the stomach. Still bloody exciting and a nice fish to end the day, it went around 70cm. We let the kids wind in all the fish on the day and we landed around 15 dollies in total and lost a few as well, most of them were just under size, 5 fish went over 60cm which we kept for dinner, nice little haul and good fun.

I am predicting that over the next few months if the dollies continue to hang around in close and the water temp rises in close that the marlin will be in amongst them. So you won’t have to go a long way out to hook a marlin.

P.S. we also got some troll cam footage, which I’ll post later. At times there were more than 50 dollies behind the spread.

If you want to try our SB lures, you can get a lure pack for $99 + delivery.

Happy Fishing

Peter



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Scent Blazer trolling lures we used.

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First fish of the day trolling, slimey mackerel.

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Nice little Dollie.

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Dollies kept coming in all day.

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Bit bigger Dolphin Fish. They will get bigger over the next few weeks, they grow really quickly.

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Game fishing school. Lesson 1: Don’t stop winding!

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Great colours when they get out of the water.

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Dolphin Fish Galore!

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Dolphin fish taking a Scent Blazer lure caught on troll pro.

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Lots of dollies behind the lure before striking the lure.

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Hi Peter, do you add weight to your scent blazer when chasing dollies or just pack it with bait. I bought the tuna pack from you last year so hanging for the bluefin to arrive.

By the way I was watching a fishing show on TV and they were using your lures for the first time and were impressed. They had quite a few hook ups.

Keep up the good work.

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Looks like you had a great day out! Great pics too!

How far out were the dollies? (Forgive me, I'm not sure where the Whale FAD is)>

I took my new boat out on Friday on here maiden voyage just to look around and spotted a lot of mutton birds working about a mile off Palm Beach. We trolled out there and there was a huge pod of dolphins smashing into baitfish, I assume slimies.

Baz

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Hi Peter, do you add weight to your scent blazer when chasing dollies or just pack it with bait. I bought the tuna pack from you last year so hanging for the bluefin to arrive.

By the way I was watching a fishing show on TV and they were using your lures for the first time and were impressed. They had quite a few hook ups.

Keep up the good work.

Good stuff, what fishing show did you see the lures on?

I normally put a few sinkers inside the lures, just to give them a bit of weight off Sydney because conditions off Sydney are generally a bit chopped up so a little bit of weight helps them bite into the water. But they will work well without the weights as well.

A couple of those long barrel skinny sinkers or small round sinkers will do the trick. If you need to any help on how to rig them let us know.

Peter

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Looks like you had a great day out! Great pics too!

How far out were the dollies? (Forgive me, I'm not sure where the Whale FAD is)>

I took my new boat out on Friday on here maiden voyage just to look around and spotted a lot of mutton birds working about a mile off Palm Beach. We trolled out there and there was a huge pod of dolphins smashing into baitfish, I assume slimies.

Baz

Hey Baz,

The fads coordinates can be found at this link

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/fisheries/recreational/saltwater/fads/map

its Sydney Harbour No. 17

its about 4-5 miles out from Sydney Heads, sometimes there are lots of boats on it, if that's the case you might want to take some soft plastic lures, pillies or live bait and cast around it because you wont be able to troll close to it when there are other boats sitting on it

we have been catching them on the way out from about a mile out

yeah the dolphins are feeding on the slimies, we have caught a couple slimies trolling through the dolphins, if you can down rig a small lure when see the dolphins feeding you can often get yellowfin tuna feeding under dolphins

take it easy

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Good stuff, what fishing show did you see the lures on?

I normally put a few sinkers inside the lures, just to give them a bit of weight off Sydney because conditions off Sydney are generally a bit chopped up so a little bit of weight helps them bite into the water. But they will work well without the weights as well.

A couple of those long barrel skinny sinkers or small round sinkers will do the trick. If you need to any help on how to rig them let us know.

Peter

Hey peter, the show was Jason Kennedy's Fishin' Trip.

Thanks for the tip on the lures.

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