mike2153 Posted January 28, 2015 Share Posted January 28, 2015 Hi guys. Just after a bit of info, I saw a thread on here a while ago about how to catch gars. Now my question is, I've got my breadcrumb burley, my tiny tiny hooks and light line with a float and a tiny piece of prawn bait, but where are some popular far spots in sydney/middle harbour? How common are they? Are they hard to catch? What time of day is best to catch them? Are there enough around to be a reliable source of bait? Cheers guys Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jimbu Posted January 28, 2015 Share Posted January 28, 2015 I only have a little info - I caught them at the taplin park boat ramp in drumoyne a few months ago from the Jetty. I don't usually fish that area but had a couple of hours spare after an appointment out that way. It was mid afternoon, there were heaps of them, they were boiling up. I was using stale bread so kept losing my bait but I managed to catch a couple. Can't remmever any more details Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adamski Posted January 28, 2015 Share Posted January 28, 2015 I had a good day on gars at the sea wall at Double Bay before Christmas, you sometimes see schools there. Here's the post. They can be a bit tricky to catch as you need really small pieces of prawn on the hook. Take polaroids and if you see one under the float, let it munch away on the prawn for a bit unless you can see it obviously pulling on the line- sometimes they sit there after they've finished chewing. If one's been there for a while, give your rod a little lift and it should set the hook. Best time I've found is sunny, flat afternoons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gregh1 Posted January 28, 2015 Share Posted January 28, 2015 I used to go fishing for garfish with an ex girlfriends dad some 35 years ago. He was an old chinese australian guy who had fished for them for years. We would smoke them and eat them bone in and they were very nice. We just used to use handlines with light mono line, no sinker and very small hooks with a small bit of prawn on. Always had a burley trail going and I can remember catching heaps of them. From memory they put up a fight and jump all over the place. We usually anchored up close to a weed bed and fished just off the weed. The spot we used to go to has now changed. The weed has gone and it is just sand now. The spot was on the sandbank just up from Wagstaff wharf. Thats about all I can remember! It was a long time ago!!. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dynabolt Posted January 28, 2015 Share Posted January 28, 2015 I have used bread successfully. Trick was to not compact the bread too much.... so that when it hits the water, crumbs break off it and it is able to expand and appear like all of the bread burley. Obviously, if not compacted enough the bread will come off on the cast... so needs to be in between. I found that when the bread was too compacted it sank like a brick and the gar knew to avoid those bits. Have used sabiki jigs successfully - although removed the swivel from the bottom so the line essentially floated and drifted. As I am usually landbased, I only fish for gar when I can see them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fragmeister Posted January 28, 2015 Share Posted January 28, 2015 I have caught them in most of the quieter bays in the harbour. Clifton Gardens at night seems to work well and during the day at the little calm beaches in Taylors Bay. Cheers Jim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mike2153 Posted January 29, 2015 Author Share Posted January 29, 2015 Awsome thanks guys, fragmeister can you get them reliably from those spots or is it a bit hit and miss? Do you just anchor up somewhere near the shore and burley up and they come? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sydneyfisher12 Posted January 29, 2015 Share Posted January 29, 2015 Plenty around iron cove the best way is to burly up with surface bread see if they come up and use a float with the bait about 20cm under if they don't hit it move it slowly and pause and they love that and will usually hit it Also tiny bits of pillie fillet are my favourite bait for them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fragmeister Posted January 29, 2015 Share Posted January 29, 2015 Awsome thanks guys, fragmeister can you get them reliably from those spots or is it a bit hit and miss? Do you just anchor up somewhere near the shore and burley up and they come? Every time ( in recent memory) that I have collected yakkas for bait before sunrise at Clifton Gardens gars appear in the bread burley. But of course with that recommendation its bound to fail if I actively targeted them!... but thats fishing. Cheers Jim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mike2153 Posted January 29, 2015 Author Share Posted January 29, 2015 Lol, where abouts do you did the yakkas at Clifton gardens without annoying the guys on the wharf? Do you find there average sized yakkas? I normally go to balmoral but there are to many boats there now and the yakkas become oicky Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mike2153 Posted January 29, 2015 Author Share Posted January 29, 2015 Cheers sydneyfisher might have to give it a go Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fragmeister Posted January 29, 2015 Share Posted January 29, 2015 (edited) Lol, where abouts do you did the yakkas at Clifton gardens without annoying the guys on the wharf? Do you find there average sized yakkas? I normally go to balmoral but there are to many boats there now and the yakkas become oicky Generally I go early enough so that its not a problem. Pre dawn there are sometimes a few guys there but they are usually at the end of the wharf. I just motor in about half way down between the end and the back of the swimming enclosure. I strike up a conversation with them and let them know I will be out of their way in a half an hour or so. We exchange a few stories about the action of late... pretty much always they are friendly chatty blokes. A bit of burley and generally the yakkas will move away from the structure perhaps 10 meters or so where I sit with the spot lock on the MinnKota. I find Clifton Gardens yakkas are probably average sized at around 200 mm. Rose bay wharf ones seem closer to 150mm and Sow and pigs tends to have real horses of 250mm plus. I prefer the smaller ones at Rose Bay for live baits inside the harbour but to tell you the truth I haven't paid enough attention to the success rate for the various sizes as live baits so there is no real logic to my preference. I find yakkas are finiky biters at times and need plenty of burley to bring them on. They will sort of mouth the bait and not really commit. After half an hour they generally come good on a mix of bread and mashed up pilly when I use small chucks of pilly for bait. Typically I catch one every 5 minutes for the first 20 minutes and then I catch 10 in as many minutes. Always makes me nervous. I think I am not going to get enough and then all of sudden the same pattern emerges... Oh yes I say to myself...this is always the way it happens. LOL! You would think I would learn wouldn't you. Cheers Jim Edited January 29, 2015 by fragmeister Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mike2153 Posted January 29, 2015 Author Share Posted January 29, 2015 Lol same thing happens to me, the reason I ask about the size is that all I use then for is the dollies, the centurion ones are huge!! To big for the dollies to eat that's the problem, they haven't got a huge mouth like the kings. Yea I have been having a bit of trouble getting them lately and have been experimenting with different baits etc but I think the most effective is to cut the feathers thins off a sabiki use a 3 hook sabiki and bait eat hook with salted pillies, I just hate trying to bait them but lol. It's frustrating when there thousands of the bastards at your feet and won't take anything Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevefish Posted January 29, 2015 Share Posted January 29, 2015 (edited) For yakkas, Try a 3 loop paternoster. 3 chemically sharpened hooks to start replace the last hook with lead if you really need to. They are sharper and weightless has lifted my yakka success significantly. I use cut peeled prawn as bait. Edited January 29, 2015 by stevefish Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldsalty Posted January 30, 2015 Share Posted January 30, 2015 Gars can be fiddly to hook, if their not in a feeding frenzy they sometimes swim around with the bait in their mouth before letting it go. the top of the mouth is small and kinda of a hard little plate that can be tricky to penetrate, the bottom and side of their mouth has much more surface area to plant a hook (unless they completely swallow it) so when I see the bait disappear in their mouth a little flick or pull of the rod to the side or down as opposed to the standard upwards strike gets more hookups. Garfishing is all about watching, u can see everything going on so it's abit different to other forms of fishing, reasonably shallow weedy areas is where to look but they turn up anywhere at the least likely places sometimes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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