Fishing at Mosman beach

[pugzthugz]

Hey everyone, just recently me and a mate went fishing at a beach in Mosman, whilst we didn't catch many fish it was a great day. So we aren't very experienced at fishing from a beach of any manner, we have tried surf beaches before with no success, so you can see why the day before when we were planning this trip we were doubtful about how this expedition was going to unfold.

We decided that if we were going to catch fish we must wake up early so as planned, the next day our alarm went off at 5 am. We tiredly gathered our stuff and made our way to the relatively calm beach. It was a horrible journey with 4 rod-holders and rods, backpacks, bait, footys, etc, however, when we eventually got there we were greeted by a nice fresh day and a sunrise that was - whilst slightly obscured by clouds - quite a spectacle. We quickly and eagerly unloaded, rigged, baited and our rods. We had one legitimate beach rod which we loaded up with a paternoster rig and 3 small 2-4kg estuary rods which we loaded with size 4/0 Mustad circle hooks and running sinkers. We were using servo pilchards which I whole-heartedly mistrust.

The first half hour was very slow fishing full of what were either very small nibbles or the swell. Another fisherman set up a little way down the beach, he said that he'd caught a few shovel-nose sharks around about where we were. Just five minutes after talking with him my mate was onto a fish, not surprisingly it was a shovelnose, it had swallowed the hook so we cut the line before letting it go. Not long after - when the tide was approaching high - I saw my rod get pulled out of the rod holder and into the wash zone. I sprinted over and picked the rod up, full of adrenaline I rushed the fight causing the hook to pull. I was very disappointed. While I was rebaiting I looked around and saw my mate's rod being pulled down the beach. He ran over to it and similarly to me rushed the fight and dropped the fish. Before he could have time to rant about dropping the fish I saw my rod being pulled in. This time I took my time fighting the fish and safely landed it. It was a 39cm silver trevally, we had forgotten our phones so we couldn't get a photo. We let this fish go. Just after my mate missed a fish I saw my big rod being pulled into the water with amazing pace, I ran and picked it up. Whatever was on the end was fighting very hard. The drag was screaming. It ran straight for the rocks and after a stressful minute, I heard the dreaded twang of it busting me off on the rocks. We both missed another fish before the bite slowed down. We packed up and headed home feeling both content at our progress into the art of beach fishing and annoyed at passing up so many opportunities of fish.

Any advice is much appreciated, we are learning. What fish do you reckon I had? I think it was a kingfish (they are common around this area). Is the bait ok? What is more important tide or time? What tide is best? 

Cheers - Pugz

[anthman]

Get some PVC tubes to stand up your rods in the sand! It was painful to imagine the reels scraping through the sand and into saltwater!

With that out of the way, some extra info will be helpful to see what the situation was:

* what drag did you have on?

* Braid or mono? What LB test line are they?

Could've been kingfish, could've been salmon as well. 

My advice would be to change the drag accordingly throughout the fight - you have circle hooks on so you probably won't have them slipping off the hook (But as you said, can be pulled off the hook with too much pressure).

Loose to medium drag when *sitting in the rod holders* - circle hooks will need to gradually load up to allow time for the hook to find the corner of the mouth. If the fish is not heading to rough terrain, I would just take my time - enough drag that the fish, if sizable, can go for a run or two and it should be able to pull some drag. Careful on the waves. 

If the fish is heading to rough terrain, up the drag and fight a bit more aggressively - not full blast, but if it's getting close you either hope for the best and play it out or risk pulling a hook and skulldrag it out with max drag that your line and rod can handle. If you start feeling grinding against the rocks on your line, then dont max drag, you'll have to play it out carefully - maybe open the bail if it feels like the fish has wrapped something in the hope that if clears the structure.

 

Good luck!

 

[pugzthugz]

4 minutes ago, anthman said:

Get some PVC tubes to stand up your rods in the sand! It was painful to imagine the reels scraping through the sand and into saltwater!

With that out of the way, some extra info will be helpful to see what the situation was:

* what drag did you have on?

* Braid or mono? What LB test line are they?

Could've been kingfish, could've been salmon as well. 

My advice would be to change the drag accordingly throughout the fight - you have circle hooks on so you probably won't have them slipping off the hook (But as you said, can be pulled off the hook with too much pressure).

Loose to medium drag when *sitting in the rod holders* - circle hooks will need to gradually load up to allow time for the hook to find the corner of the mouth. If the fish is not heading to rough terrain, I would just take my time - enough drag that the fish, if sizable, can go for a run or two and it should be able to pull some drag. Careful on the waves. 

If the fish is heading to rough terrain, up the drag and fight a bit more aggressively - not full blast, but if it's getting close you either hope for the best and play it out or risk pulling a hook and skulldrag it out with max drag that your line and rod can handle. If you start feeling grinding against the rocks on your line, then dont max drag, you'll have to play it out carefully - maybe open the bail if it feels like the fish has wrapped something in the hope that if clears the structure.

 

Good luck!

 

Thanks for the advice.

We did have PVC rod holders, however, I don't think we put them in far enough. Do you normally dig a hole and pack them in?

I had low drag on, however, when I saw how much line the fish was taking I put it up because I thought the fish was going to spool me. Looking back on it I probably had 90 percent of my line so there was no point.

And again, thanks for the advice

[Rebel]

Hi,

When you put the PVC tubes in the sand, take a small hand spade with you it makes life easier.

Western Australian pilchards are the best.You can buy them in NSW. Some tackle shops have them.

When I am beach fishing I use fresh squid, you can buy it at Woolworths or Coles Also fresh mullet is great..

Cheers.

[Ledge]

Use long pvc pipes. 1m is good. Get a rubber mallet from Bunnings and hit them in deep. Your rod will snap before the pipe pulls out of the sand.

[anthman]

On 12/23/2018 at 7:35 AM, pugzthugz said:

Thanks for the advice.

We did have PVC rod holders, however, I don't think we put them in far enough. Do you normally dig a hole and pack them in?

I had low drag on, however, when I saw how much line the fish was taking I put it up because I thought the fish was going to spool me. Looking back on it I probably had 90 percent of my line so there was no point.

And again, thanks for the advice

We have pvc tubes about 1m in length and cut the end diagonally so it has a pointy end - almost looks like a giant syringe point! 

Then when at the beach, I usually pick wettish compact sand - I find i can twist the tube back and forth whilst pushing down over the flat top with my palm - all one handed. This combined with the pointy end into the sand makes it pretty easy.

Edited December 23, 2018 by anthman

[JimT]

I use a PVC pipe end cap a couple of sizes bigger than the pipe used for sand spike to push the spike into sand...much easier on the hands

Jim

[blaxland]

Last couple of weeks rat kings have been aggressive Mosman to north harbour eating anything this will not always be the case also bonito and salmon have been around and tailor.  Just keep trying but also try for bait squid, yellow tail and slimy mackerel while your bait soaks or even throw a few plastics or other lures. But the most important thing is having a go cant catch fish from your lounge room. Tight lines 

[Volitan]

On your question of what is more important, time or tide? The best answer is ‘it depends where you are fishing’, but if you must reduce it to one rule then around here time is much more important then tide.

Best time is just on daybreak and just before sunset.

Remember that fish don’t like to expose themselves in the shallows in strong light, and it’s more important in places like Sydney where there is a lot of other fishing pressure, boat traffic etc.

Tide is important too - again it depends on the location but in the absence of any other information I usually go with the knowledge that in most places shore fishing will be best on the high tide, or more likely the end of the incoming just before high tide. Reasons are probably that fish will be venturing across areas made newly accessible to them by the rising tide, and there is more depth of water to provide them security. 

I usually like to think that if I can go out when both time and tide are at their best then fishing should be at its peak. I wouldn’t say I’ve proven that to my satisfaction, the truth is I seem to always do well in that last hour of daylight regardless.

 

In terms of loosing good fish solidly hooked. I always think the best strategy for beginners is to set the drag to its maximum for the line strength (use a spring balance to measure) and keep it there at all times. If you get a good fish on do not touch the drag, under any circumstances! What happens, and the way countless fish are lost, is that the angler sets the drag to the approximate maximum and starts fishing. After a long boring spell a good fish climbs on board and the line is pouring out of the reel. The angler is unused to seeing a good fish run and instinctively tightens the drag, assuming it must be too loose. It wasn’t, but now it’s too tight and the line parts. All this happens in a couple of seconds.

[Volitan]

And on the question of what fish you lost - I’d go with salmon. There are a lot around and they love servo pillies. Kingfish is possible but catching them off the beach on a servo pillie is pretty rare. Not impossible, just way less likely.

And another thing. Don’t focus on being spooled. Most fish you are likely to catch around Mosman don’t run far in a straight line. Behaviourally, they just don’t have it in them. They may swim in one direction for a while, but then stop, change direction, even swim back towards you - just the way they are programmed. You will notice for, example, salmon caught from the beach will almost always do a couple of good diagonal runs, then switch to swimming along the beach - line of least resistance. Kingfish seldom swim far (typical reef dwellers). Most of my kingfish have been caught from a boat and even the big ones have not swum more then 50 metres - preferring to doggedly swim downwards in zig zags. Myth vs reality.

[PaddyT]

Around there-ray or shovelnose

[pugzthugz]

On 12/26/2018 at 10:42 AM, PaddyT said:

Around there-ray or shovelnose

Maybe but we'd caught a couple of those and this fought way harder than the ones we'd got