Bait seasonality

[DavidMoxhe]

Hi,

i hope you are all well

i see in a lot of video fisherman explaining that to choose your bait or lure you need to match what the fish that you’re targeting is hunting for, at that particular time of the year, in that particular area. That makes much sense but how do you know what’s in the water at that time? 
you try to catch some? 
 

thanks a lot

 

david

[little fisho]

use the fishraider search tool, im almost certain i remember seeing a post about seasons and when fish are active, but general rule of thumb is that pelagics such as kings bonito salmon etc are active in warmer months and species such as bream and blackfish are active in the cooler months. basically all fish can be caught all year round tho with a bit of luck and finesse

[XD351]

I’m a great believer that fish are in a certain area for four main reasons :

Cover , protection or comfort ( like water temp ).

Food,

Spawning,

Staging or moving through an area to get to an area for reasons outlined above .

I generally pick a species i want to catch and do some research on it paying particular attention to Food and Spawning periods as these are the two main reasons fish will aggregate in one area in larger numbers.

The fish are also in tune to with the  spawning habits of their prey and you will find that the two spawning time are closely related . 
 

Take for instance Dusky Flathead in the Hawkesbury river ,

Spawning is just kicking in now and will go for a couple of months and this coincides with the prawn season so i would be using live or at least fresh Hawkesbury prawns and start searching from milson island downstream and out into broken bay looking for contours or channels that funnel the water flow into them as that is where the Flathead will be waiting. Winter time is the opposite - the metabolism slows down and they head for the warmer shallow water where they are more likely to be feeding on baitfish or the  occasional prawn .

Summertime i use medium to large soft plastics (75mm and over )that i can weigh down enough to get to the bottom in 10 -15m of  water and drift jig them , Wintertime it is small to medium (under 75 mm)and it is up over the sand flats paying particular attention to weed beds and drop offs .

Mulloway , Kingfish and Squid are another combination that always seem to appear together but that is another story altogether that you can spend a good part of a day reading fisheries data ( boffin fodder) looking for clues ! but in essence pick a species and region , look for the spawn season ,what the species predominantly eats then break the bait down into  categories like baitfish , crustaceans ,molluscs etc and do a bit of study on these looking for any coincidences in regards to spawning times and peak seasons  that are close to the fish you want to catch , look for areas where this bait will be more prevalent - ie: you’re not going to find pink nippers in a gravel bed and once you have a few pieces of the puzzle you will find everything will start to fall into place .

Matching the hatch can help but sometimes you just have to keep experimenting until you break the code , lures for example have many varying attributes that can make one lure that appears to be very similar or even exactly the same to another lure next to it but one will have a different acoustic signature or action or maybe a different sink rate or have slightly different buoyancy and one lure will get smashed but the other won’t get a touch .

 

 

 

 

[DavidMoxhe]

Thanks a lot! 
what you just explain about the flathead in the Hawkesbury is exactly what I try to do. 
As quite a beginner everything seems very foggy, and if everything you’re telling me makes lots of sense I’m struggling to be able to build the process myself for another species and/or place. 
i will keep on reading and I’m doing a log of all my fishing trips

 

thanks again for your time

 

 

[XD351]

A fishing log is always a good idea but they become more effective if you fish an area at different times , tides , moon phase ,weather and time of year.

For example :
If you only fish an area on the first half of run in tide , in the morning , on a full moon and on sunny days your data will only indicate what you caught with these conditions and you may never crack the code for that area but if you mix it up and try different tides , time of day or night , moon phase , weather and time of year  you can really tune into what is happening in that area.

If you can get your hands on the book pictured below i can highly recommend it - it is in my opinion one of the best fishing books ever written and even though it was published many years ago everything in it except the depth sounder information is still relevant -depth sounder technology has come a long way since then !

 

 

You could also have a listen to some of the podcasts by Australian Lure fishing , on this podcast the host interviews some of the best lure fishos in Australia and the host is also a marine biologist / scientist so he understands how fish work plus he also designs and makes lures .

Unfortunately most but not all fishing shows on tv or YouTube are big on product advertisements and pretty light on real information .

[Mike Sydney]

5 hours ago, XD351 said:

You could also have a listen to some of the podcasts by Australian Lure fishing , on this podcast the host interviews some of the best lure fishos in Australia and the host is also a marine biologist / scientist so he understands how fish work plus he also designs and makes lures .

Unfortunately most but not all fishing shows on tv or YouTube are big on product advertisements and pretty light on real information .

As a fellow beginner, let me echo the shout out for the podcast here. Three nights a week, I don’t know how he manages it. 
fantastic listening even for a beginner - the ALF podcast has been sent from the heavens. Australian content about Australian fish and absolutely loads of practical and specific information.

Many episodes on flathead and a couple on fishing the Hawkesbury for jewfish and perch.

Edited December 16, 2020 by Mike Sydney

[XD351]

Yep and this is the only fishing show / podcast or anything of the like that i have found that always produces the goods in regards to information that is solely aimed at making its listeners better anglers and  even though the show does allow a small amount of PB boasting this is soley in the context of allowing the listener to get to know the guest , after that it is all about pumping as much quality information out of the guest as possible while keeping it entertaining .
When you have guests that are in the top 10% of lure fishos in Australia you can’t go wrong !

Sometimes the host Greg “DOC” Lures Vinall will do solo show and give a glimpse into his amazing fishing mind - these are pure gold as far as I’m concerned !

And just when you were going to ask -  yes much if not all of this info can be used for bait fishing ! Instead of casting a lure across a sand flat you could always drift a live poddy mullet under a small bobby float across the same sand flat, my mates used to do this 40 yrs ago using cordial bottles and swim them out to the drop off - catching the damned thing when a big Flathead or Tailor took the bait was another thing altogether though!

With lures you are trying to entice a fish into eating something that is not real , if you apply some of the tactics from this style of fishing to bait fishing you can improve your catch ratio considerably .

[DavidMoxhe]

Thanks a lot for the podcast and the book. I will get into it. 
 

much appreciated