Blackfish Bonanza

[AlbertW]

Hey Raiders,

This one’s a long one so feel free to scroll to the bottom and read the TL:DR

Headed down to Sydney Harbour and arrived at 9am today in search of bream. Arrived at the wharf and met a fellow fisho who had caught 4 jewies, a snapper and a flatty in a span of one hour! I started the day off pumped because of the good news but after a couple hours of nothing on my paddletail I started to loose hope. At 12 I then changed to a rocky area and started to use bread instead, after a bit of berleying a few small silver- dark fish started to show up and I let a ball of bread slowly sink unweighted on a long shank, after half an hour of they “bream” coming up and brushing against the bread and a few nibbles, finally a big dark shape came out of the deep and swallowed the bread whole. At first I thought it was a bream as it pulled so hard and it ran my line and tangled it onto a submerged shopping cart. I managed to tire it and pull it towards the shopping cart which untangled my line, after a risky move I pulled it up onto the wharf and revealed that it was a blackfish! This was my first time catching them and I only targeted blackfish once which was with Derek and big neil using weed and under a float which explained why the fish were circling my bait. After quickly dispatching the fish I had to change rods as the line was messed up and tangled due to the fight. Using the same rig I continued now full with confidence, a bit more time passed as a small crowd of non fishos gathered around me as I managed to hook onto another one and it was a chonker, nearly bloated in size. It was getting late now and after a final tiny 20cm blackfish I called it a day and got a hotdog for lunch *hint hint* and then headed home. My theory for why the blackfish were taking the bread so willingly was because the hot dog place threw what I presumed was expired bread and both the bream and blackfish were used to eating the bread. After taking the two fish home I cleaned them and found this white stuff in the fat one’s stomach does anyone know if it’s fish oil or is it just their organs or something?
Then I poorly filleted them, scaled them and covered them with spices and fried them for dinner.

TL:DR- Arrived at Sydney wharf, caught nothing for 3 hours, nearly gave up but gave a new spot a go, managed to catch 3 blackfish- two legal, went home and fried them up for dinner.

Fish Caught 

Blackfish x 3  2 legal and one undersized 

One 39cm and one 37cm

Tiny little snapper x 1

[Isaac Ct]

Great stuff Albert, nice looking meal as well. Great informative write up .

Well done.

[Little_Flatty]

Solid feed there Albert, well done!

Bread is a magic bait at times.

[masterfisho7]

Nice report Albert well done 

[Centrepin]

Albert,

Nice report, many thanks.

The white stuff could be milt from male fish. The roe is yellow orange colour 

This is still spawning time for another month so most likely milt 

 

Regards ,

 

Geoff

[AlbertW]

4 minutes ago, Centrepin said:

Albert,

Nice report, many thanks.

The white stuff could be milt from male fish. The roe is yellow orange colour 

This is still spawning time for another month so most likely milt 

 

Regards ,

 

Geoff

Ahh okay cheers

[Yowie]

Blackfish will eat bread at times, especially if the crusts are floating on the surface. I have caught them occasionally by floating a piece of crust on the surface, the hook hidden inside the crust and NO sinker.

The white stuff you say was found in the stomach. Was it actually inside the stomach, or was it in the belly cavity? It looks like fatty tissue from a well fed fish, OR, as Geoff stated, it could be a milt sac from a male fish.

Edited August 21, 2022 by Yowie

[AlbertW]

4 minutes ago, Yowie said:

Blackfish will eat bread at times, especially if the crusts are floating on the surface. I have caught them occasionally by floating a piece of crust on the surface, the hook hidden inside the crust and NO sinker.

The white stuff you say was found in the stomach. Was it actually inside the stomach, or was it in the belly cavity? It looks like fatty tissue from a well fed fish, OR, as Geoff stated, it could be a milt sac from a male fish.

Yeah it was found inside of the belly cavity, the fish was a chonky one though so both are possibilities.

Edited August 21, 2022 by AlbertW

[AlbertW]

6 hours ago, leonardgid said:

you got your self a couple of (Boys) Albert, thats why they had the white stuff in them,  did you see the 4 FOUR!! jewfish?   or was it something someone said? also the reason why blackfish eat bread there  is because they are fed a great deal of bread and other junk food ,  actually im very surprised that you did not catch any bream , do more catch and cook in the future and thanks for sharing  your catch with us 

I didn't see him catch the four but I believe him because he hooked up on a good one when I was there, apparently there were a few jewies swimming up along with the jewfish he hooked up but the 4 he caught were tiny, only 30-40 cms

[Rebel]

Top report.

Nice Blackfish.

Well done.

[big Neil]

Ok you young punk what does TL:DR mean? Some modern speak for you younger computer type people, I suppose?

Seriously Albert, you really are a very keen young angler. How do you rate the Blackfish on the plate?

BTW your post wasn't all that long, have you read Waza's?

Sarcastically, bn

[Little_Flatty]

3 minutes ago, big Neil said:

 

Ok you young punk what does TL:DR mean? Some modern speak for you younger computer type people, I suppose

 

TL;DR = Too long; didn’t read  

I suspect the term predates Albert (it goes back to 2002) and therefore should actually be called “old-timers computer speak” 🤣

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TL;DR

[big Neil]

1 hour ago, Little_Flatty said:

TL;DR = Too long; didn’t read  

I suspect the term predates Albert (it goes back to 2002) and therefore should actually be called “old-timers computer speak” 🤣

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TL;DR

Aha, many thanks for letting me know what it stands for... how rude though. If somebody takes the time to write something informative (or otherwise)...least we should do is read it. I just looked up your link and found out that we no longer rely on Webster or Collins dictionary...we now have to consult with "Wiktionary".

Probably the reason why I didn't know what it was, goes like this. Over 30 is an old timer these days. I am old enough to be their grandfather...so what does that classify me as? Probably something to do with Dinosaurs? Maybe best I don't know. lol.

bn

[Little_Flatty]

1 hour ago, big Neil said:

Aha, many thanks for letting me know what it stands for... how rude though. If somebody takes the time to write something informative (or otherwise)...least we should do is read it. I just looked up your link and found out that we no longer rely on Webster or Collins dictionary...we now have to consult with "Wiktionary".

Probably the reason why I didn't know what it was, goes like this. Over 30 is an old timer these days. I am old enough to be their grandfather...so what does that classify me as? Probably something to do with Dinosaurs? Maybe best I don't know. lol.

bn

I only bothered to look it up last year when someone started using it at work and I felt like I really should find out. It’s used a lot in the tech world and working in tech, I thought it was time to learn. In that context, someone was using it rather like Albert was using - to provide a short version of a longer composition.

When I get called ‘old’ these days (just a bit of context, I’m back at uni and some of my fellow students’ parents are not that much older than me!), I just take it to mean more knowledgeable and experienced 😎 If only that could translate to catching more fish!

[Pickles]

Great report Albert - great fun catching blackfish (however their hooked).

[AlbertW]

8 hours ago, big Neil said:

Ok you young punk what does TL:DR mean? Some modern speak for you younger computer type people, I suppose?

Seriously Albert, you really are a very keen young angler. How do you rate the Blackfish on the plate?

BTW your post wasn't all that long, have you read Waza's?

Sarcastically, bn

Looks like Lil' flatty go to you first haha, I don't use computers that much either so I only picked that up when I was reading articles and other websites. They were really good, their meat was soft and I didn't bother taking the skin of I just cooked the skin first and off it came.

[big Neil]

4 hours ago, AlbertW said:

Looks like Lil' flatty go to you first haha, I don't use computers that much either so I only picked that up when I was reading articles and other websites. They were really good, their meat was soft and I didn't bother taking the skin of I just cooked the skin first and off it came.

I enjoy eating them. There are a lot worse tasting fish. bn

[Yowie]

16 hours ago, big Neil said:

Probably the reason why I didn't know what it was, goes like this. Over 30 is an old timer these days. I am old enough to be their grandfather...so what does that classify me as? Probably something to do with Dinosaurs? Maybe best I don't know. lol.

bn

Tyrannosaurus Rex.