GreasePit Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 (edited) Hi Raiders, Over the last year or so, i have been on a mission, solely hunting for the elusive silver ghost or jewfish as they are known. Recently the boat has been back in action and i've had a bit of spare time in between semesters.I've started to target them around a tide change in deep water a few days before and after the full and new moons. So far I've been largely unsuccessful at landing a decent one, but have nonetheless been enjoying the journey, learning as i go and only making the inevitable to be more rewarding. On my most recent outing, i pulled up to a deep section of water on the corner of a bend before a big bay, sent my bait jigs down for livies, to my surprise coming up with a few horse 40cm yakkas, fat as all hell, never really seen them in berowra before. Stripped one up, and sent one out as a big fat livey and on another rod sent out a strip of chicken breastAfter about an hour of squat, the rod baited with chicken goes for a small run and then stops, very suspicious of a flathead. Let it sit for a minute, picked the rod up, wound the slack up and bang on for a flathead. After an easy tussle, get it up and in the net, before i could even get it out i see the same happen to the rod with a strip of yakka, and come up for the same result. Both flathead going around 45cm and kept for the table. The flathead around winter seem to be very lethargic with little to no fight in them comparatively to the usual summer lizards. Some more time passes by, and i start to see the livey start to very slowly straighten up. Winding it in felt like a big dead weight, dead giveaway for a big dirty muddy. Got her up and suspicions confirmed, netted her and into the esky she went. All turned into a good feed of fish and chips with chilli mudcrab on the side.Later on in that same night, a short while after the tide change, i had sent out a line with a red glowie, striped chicken on ganged hooks and no weight in case any hairies were around. Got a solid run on the 2-4kg outfit, and after a little fight, up comes a wee slab of silver going 53cm, producing a big fat smile on my numb face. Few pics and back she went. My quest for jewies has led me to some strange discoveries in berowra which i had never seen before such as the big yakkas and some land based hairies whilst the boat was out of action. On another separate land based session, caught about 10 of these little guys. Wish i could have a massive aquarium, and study their growth and behaviour. My best size landbased jew coming from the same landbased spot went 65cm, she took a relatively small livey and i had to drag her over some rocky territory unfortunately, causing a few scales to come off, i did swim her and she kicked away slowly into the distance. At the same spot on a different occasion, i lost my no doubt biggest jew after a fairly long fight as my braid just nicked the same rocks, started using a 15m mono leader after that. Edited July 21, 2016 by Laborgatory Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
papafish Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 Great report mate! Where did you land that muddy lol? I caught blue swimmer on lives before... But muddy is a first Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreasePit Posted July 20, 2016 Author Share Posted July 20, 2016 The livey had dead for quite some time i believe, for whatever reason, everytime i send a livey down at that particular spot compared to others i fish, my livies die very very quickly, usually 10 minutes, the other spots having heavier currents, when i pin them through the nose they last at least an hour.Quite close to some mangroves and in a deeper section of water in berowra, that's actually the 2nd i've pulled out of there in the last week on rod and reel, the fam has been loving the chilli mudcrab Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyrone07 Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 Stick with it mate it's all persistence, once you start getting a few you will start workin out different patterns. Definately worth it when you start getting into a few though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kyngfish Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 That's a great report how long were the hairies that you caught landbased? Did you use the ganged pilly rig for those? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreasePit Posted July 21, 2016 Author Share Posted July 21, 2016 Stick with it mate it's all persistence, once you start getting a few you will start workin out different patterns. Definately worth it when you start getting into a few though Yeah i'm slowly getting the hang of it, hopefully my hookups become more frequent as i go. That's a great report how long were the hairies that you caught landbased? Did you use the ganged pilly rig for those? Didn't measure them, but i'll take a guess around 1.3-1.5m I actually caught them on a running live bait jewy rig. 1m trace, to a swivel, with another sinker running freely on the mainline with 5cm's of line to a star sinker. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sam bros Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 Nice work mate There are definitely monster jew in those areas so keep at it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scratchie Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 Nice effort on a few landbased fish! Good luck on your quest for that big elusive jew. They're out there! Cheers scratchie!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yowie Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 The big yakkas are probably Cowanyoung, a close relative. Have caught a few around the 40cm mark in Port Hacking over the years, and they do put up a fight at that size. The little jewies will take a large bait, about half their own length at times. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreasePit Posted July 21, 2016 Author Share Posted July 21, 2016 The big yakkas are probably Cowanyoung, a close relative. Have caught a few around the 40cm mark in Port Hacking over the years, and they do put up a fight at that size. The little jewies will take a large bait, about half their own length at times. Very interesting, had no idea there was another species which looked like the yakka, how do you differentiate the two species apart from the size? The size 8 fine worm hooks bend quite easily, had to take things very slowly to get them out of the depths. Yeah i'm happy to send anything up to 45cm's down for them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yowie Posted July 24, 2016 Share Posted July 24, 2016 (edited) Very interesting, had no idea there was another species which looked like the yakka, how do you differentiate the two species apart from the size? The size 8 fine worm hooks bend quite easily, had to take things very slowly to get them out of the depths. Yeah i'm happy to send anything up to 45cm's down for them From memory something to do with the number of fins and different lateral line. Also they grow larger (about 64cm) and have larger eyes (you would have larger eyes if you were a larger fish ) and prefer water below 17 degrees. For us great fishos, they look very similar and we would need to be scientists to tell the difference. Edited July 24, 2016 by yowie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
budzsta Posted July 24, 2016 Share Posted July 24, 2016 How do they taste? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stevefish Posted July 24, 2016 Share Posted July 24, 2016 (edited) How do they taste? Like yakkas! Edited July 24, 2016 by stevefish Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meg126 Posted July 26, 2016 Share Posted July 26, 2016 If you can get your hands on some fresh Hawkesbury squid - you'll increase your chances... They love it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
big Neil Posted July 26, 2016 Share Posted July 26, 2016 Loved reading your report mate. Good luck with your quest for a big Jewie, I'm sure you'll get there. Cheers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreasePit Posted July 31, 2016 Author Share Posted July 31, 2016 If you can get your hands on some fresh Hawkesbury squid - you'll increase your chances... They love it! Berowra is only 10 minutes away from where I live, like to keep things as local as I can, there aren't too many squid in Berowra itself, and the Hawkesbury is a bit too far to travel for me currently (uni student, petrol is a killer on the wallet in a 4wd) So I try and catch the bait that I find in the system, though if I make a trip, I'll try load up on some squid Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreasePit Posted July 31, 2016 Author Share Posted July 31, 2016 Loved reading your report mate. Good luck with your quest for a big Jewie, I'm sure you'll get there. Cheers. Cheers Neil, I'm sure with all the hours, it's only a matter of time Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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