Lilyfield

[Chhayzor]

Good evening Raiders,

 

Just wanted to share a session @Obsessed Fisherman and myself had at Lilyfield last night. I've never had any luck night time lure fishing but Phil assured me success was possible, so I thought 'why not?'

We met at the first spot at 10PM and were entertained by nothing but conversation and Mullet showing off their aerial abilities. Once the rain settled in, we decided to move around the corner and try our luck there.

Second spot was quiet to begin with and again we were met with the acrobatic showings of Mullet all over. Phil thought they might have been another species, so while I was trying to catch my first night fish on a lure, Phil was desperately trying to catch whatever it was that was jumping.

Having tried vibes, cranks, top water and grubs, I eventually settled on a 3inch paddle tail plastic and thought the tail's vibration would attract a bite. Aaaaaand it did 😁

Within the space of half an hour, I managed to land 3 Bream, ranging from low 20s to an impressive 35. Also losing one, setting the hook too a little too emphatically 🤦

Phil, in the meantime, never gave up on those jumping fish 😂. Unfortunately, no success there.

All in all, a wet but fun night session. Thanks to Phil for getting me out past my bedtime 🤙 hopefully the first of many sessions together.

Thanks for reading. Hope everybody manages to get out over the weekend 🎣

 

 

Edited March 5, 2022 by Chhayzor

[Yowie]

There you go, your efforts paid off. It shows that fish like bream will be eating most of their time.

[masterfisho7]

Well done they are some nice bream

[XD351]

Great to see the fish down there are doing ok ! Fantastic to see you got some great fish !

[Little_Flatty]

Good job @Obsessed Fisherman and @Chhayzor!

I have seen schools of salmon and kings up that way, and have actually caught the odd salmon there. I think I have an example in one of my very old reports, when I was fishing that area a lot.

If the fish were genuinely busting up, my bet would have been smallish chopper tailor. They have been the bane of my existence of late, in all the spots I fish (including Iron Cove).

[Rebel]

Great report.

Top photos.

Well done.

[Chhayzor]

9 hours ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

It was a pleasure to witness @Chhayzorpopping his virgin cherry!

I went back there to try to prove I can catch something there today, and I ended up with 3 flatties all above 35cm. Now, back to trying to catch those fish that were busting - I am still adamant they were not mullets.

Hahah. Great fun, Phil. 

I've got something lined up for our next session, too 😁

2 hours ago, Little_Flatty said:

Good job @Obsessed Fisherman and @Chhayzor!

I have seen schools of salmon and kings up that way, and have actually caught the odd salmon there. I think I have an example in one of my very old reports, when I was fishing that area a lot.

If the fish were genuinely busting up, my bet would have been smallish chopper tailor. They have been the bane of my existence of late, in all the spots I fish (including Iron Cove).

So they were Salmon! 

Will have a trawl through your posts. 

Any tips on targeting them? Particularly at night? We threw everything we had at them but no interest. 

8 hours ago, XD351 said:

Great to see the fish down there are doing ok ! Fantastic to see you got some great fish !

Thanks 😊.  

We were sceptical with all the rain dirtying up the water.

8 minutes ago, Rebel said:

Great report.

Top photos.

Well done.

Thanks! 

 

[Little_Flatty]

15 minutes ago, Chhayzor said:

So they were Salmon! 

Will have a trawl through your posts. 

Any tips on targeting them? Particularly at night? We threw everything we had at them but no interest. 

Maybe salmon. Probably not, to be honest. Most likely tailor. Were you getting little rat-ta-tat-tat bites as the lure sank? That would give them away.

I get them on my usual bream gear when they are around. So long as your lure is sized for what they are eating, they will likely eat it if it is presented close enough to the bust up.

This was the post (I was sooooo young back then!):

 

Edited March 5, 2022 by Little_Flatty

[Mike Sydney]

Hey well done guys, good effort! It’s a great spot, I was there an hour or so before you arrived but there was a lot of lightning in the distance approaching Sydney and I spooked off home. Did it not arrive there? 

That entire stretch fishes great on a rising tide and particularly the creek entrance at the bridge as the tide comes over a large stretch of intertidal mudflat where the the bream will come in for crabs. Plenty of prawns about also right now. 

The jumping fish were almost certainly mullet, the area is packed with them and I witnessed a big mullet spawn event there in mid January. I have though a school of salmon come in during the day and they also ignored all the lures I threw too, but that bay has tons of mullet throughout. 

Well done on getting out in the brief weather break and congrats on the bream.

[Chhayzor]

2 hours ago, Little_Flatty said:

Maybe salmon. Probably not, to be honest. Most likely tailor. Were you getting little rat-ta-tat-tat bites as the lure sank? That would give them away.

I get them on my usual bream gear when they are around. So long as your lure is sized for what they are eating, they will likely eat it if it is presented close enough to the bust up.

This was the post (I was sooooo young back then!):

 

I was thinking Mullet or Tailor, but I've fished there before in daylight and never seen Tailor around. 

Sambos.. so much fun on light gear. Love the photo.

1 hour ago, Mike Sydney said:

Hey well done guys, good effort! It’s a great spot, I was there an hour or so before you arrived but there was a lot of lightning in the distance approaching Sydney and I spooked off home. Did it not arrive there? 

That entire stretch fishes great on a rising tide and particularly the creek entrance at the bridge as the tide comes over a large stretch of intertidal mudflat where the the bream will come in for crabs. Plenty of prawns about also right now. 

The jumping fish were almost certainly mullet, the area is packed with them and I witnessed a big mullet spawn event there in mid January. I have though a school of salmon come in during the day and they also ignored all the lures I threw too, but that bay has tons of mullet throughout. 

Well done on getting out in the brief weather break and congrats on the bream.

Shame we missed you, Mike. We were around the corner towards the Vic Rd bridge while you were there.

No, thankfully the lightning didn't make it's way there. Oddly enough, when we got there the rain completely subsided.

I've seen Kings cruising through during the day. Plenty of Bream up close too, but uninterested in any lures. Frustrating.

[Little_Flatty]

7 minutes ago, Chhayzor said:

I was thinking Mullet or Tailor, but I've fished there before in daylight and never seen Tailor around. 

Sambos.. so much fun on light gear. Love the photo.

Shame we missed you, Mike. We were around the corner towards the Vic Rd bridge while you were there.

No, thankfully the lightning didn't make it's way there. Oddly enough, when we got there the rain completely subsided.

I've seen Kings cruising through during the day. Plenty of Bream up close too, but uninterested in any lures. Frustrating.

Mullet will generally be jumping clear of the water or swirling gently on the surface.

Tailor, Kings or any other pelagics on the surface will be 'swooshing' on the surface as they chase bait. Often this will be associated with the presence of birds.

I have a theory that when you can see bream, they can see you too and are unlikely to take a bait or lure presented to them. However it's a different story a bit further out, when you are out of sight.

[Chhayzor]

10 minutes ago, Little_Flatty said:

Mullet will generally be jumping clear of the water or swirling gently on the surface.

Tailor, Kings or any other pelagics on the surface will be 'swooshing' on the surface as they chase bait. Often this will be associated with the presence of birds.

I have a theory that when you can see bream, they can see you too and are unlikely to take a bait or lure presented to them. However it's a different story a bit further out, when you are out of sight.

Thanks for the insight on the Mullet/pelagics.

Yeah, I figured the Bream were sitting there watching me and thinking 'come on mate, try a bit harder 🙄. We're not that silly' 

[Isaac Ct]

Good stuff boys, nice bream there mate. 

[Little_Flatty]

9 minutes ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

My educated guess by the way they were busting it was aussie salmon. We did see some tailor clear water, but the ones that were splashing at the surface before diving seemed larger than tailor. Oh well, I tried my best with my entire set of lures.

Going to have to get some stick baits and bigger poppers to see if they were salmon.
 

PS: Chhayzor's bream was a fatty! FAT FAT FAT - wish we could keep it.

You don’t always  need bigger lures for pelagics, quite often it’s the complete opposite.

The salmon I caught was on a Berkeley 3inch power minnow.

I’ve hooked up (note: not landed 🤣) on kings that were ignoring 5-7inch plastics but then took a 2inch flick bait rigged on a 1/32oz jighead. A tiny metal might have done the trick too. Moral of the story is to try to work out what they are feeding on, then approximate that.

[Little_Flatty]

1 minute ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

I should have mentioned, I tried on a small metal lure. I basically tried everything that I had in the small to medium size range - the only thing missing were larger poppers and stick baits. I lost my only stick bait the night before and didn't have time to replenish it.

Fair enough. I’m guessing being dark you couldn’t get a visual on the bait? If you could see them, then you could select something similar.

Sometimes you can’t go small enough, and you can only get them with fly gear, if at all.

But yes, if they are feeding on pilchards or similar then the stick bait might do nicely.

[Chhayzor]

17 minutes ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

We saw a lot of baby pillies or mullets near the shore (at least I think they were) but not sure about what they were feeding on since the bust ups were between 5m to 10m away.

Will add to that, I did see small Gars in numbers along the shoreline too.

[Little_Flatty]

20 minutes ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

We saw a lot of baby pillies or mullets near the shore (at least I think they were) but not sure about what they were feeding on since the bust ups were between 5m to 10m away.

2 minutes ago, Chhayzor said:

Will add to that, I did see small Gars in numbers along the shoreline too.

All likely culprits, if you imitate any of those then you’re in with a chance. If they don’t work, then it’s likely tiny stuff.

[Chhayzor]

25 minutes ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

I think @Little_Flatty should be joining us on our next trip, eh @Chhayzor?

The more, the merrier!

Not sure how my ego would fair, though 😂

[Little_Flatty]

59 minutes ago, Chhayzor said:

The more, the merrier!

Not sure how my ego would fair, though 😂

Haha @Chhayzor I’m not that great 🤣 Plenty of people on here who can out fish me hands down!

Would love a fish with you two sometime when we can tee it up.

[Little_Flatty]

1 hour ago, Obsessed Fisherman said:

Hmmm, I tried blowing bubbles like a fish, and wiggled my body from side to side. In fact, I did such a good job of imitating a fish that @Chhayzor started casting his lures at me. I still didn't get any bites though.

Sometimes they just don’t want to play. We might well live out the rest of our lives trying to work out why. That’s what makes fishing fun