Catching bait

[JonD]

Normally I catch bait as I fish, I see it as part of the challenge, however I’ve decided to try things differently in order to concentrate more on larger target species.


So headed to the beach with my son in the hope of finding tailor. You don’t simply rock up to a beach and hope for the best, it’s more a case of stopping on headlands, then scanning the beaches for worthy looking deep gutters with channels to deep water.


Found what looked promising and my sons first cast proved we were on target. Another 20-30mins and we had enough bait for tomorrow evening where we will have the usual crew of kids along for some after school after dark hopeful rod bending.


I’ve knocked the fillets off and the head gut sections will be used by anyone keen on targeting sharks. There have been some very gummies big to 25kg recently and one of the young lads has his hopes on a large one of those.


Bait is vac packed in the fridge.
 

 

 

 

Edited May 30, 2023 by JonD

[Rebel]

Top haul & great photos.

Happy fishing.

Well done

[Marky mark]

Nice one, do you salt the fillets to make for a tougher bait? I've always found tailor strips to be a bit soft.

[bessell1955]

Those Tailor look good enough to eat.  Great haul.

[Yowie]

Nice bag of bait.

If it was me, I would have thrown a fillet or 2 onto the BBQ, with a good squeeze of lime juice. 

[JonD]

3 hours ago, Marky mark said:

Nice one, do you salt the fillets to make for a tougher bait? I've always found tailor strips to be a bit soft.

No, I like to keep them natural and by vac packing them within an hour of capture they stay pretty firm. 

Just about to head out and use them after checking a few beaches for good gutters earlier.

[Isaac Ct]

Great stuff mate, hopefully some big fish to come.

Well done.

[JonD]

Tiring night with barely seconds between baits hitting the water and fish on. Unfortunately it was mostly salmon and tailor with the odd grey nurse shark among them. It doesn't seem to matter where I go, I can't get away from nurse sharks, even the commercial abbb boat Ive been working on we are finding them just about every dive. 

[JustJames]

9 hours ago, JonD said:

Tiring night with barely seconds between baits hitting the water and fish on. Unfortunately it was mostly salmon and tailor with the odd grey nurse shark among them. It doesn't seem to matter where I go, I can't get away from nurse sharks, even the commercial abbb boat Ive been working on we are finding them just about every dive. 

 

What were you targetting?

[JonD]

1 hour ago, JustJames said:

 

What were you targetting?

Target was jewfish and gummy sharks, which unfortunately didn't turn up, or perhaps didn't get a chance from all the other fish.

It was a case of fish hitting baits after the cast before the rods could be put in the rod holders. With six people fishing I was fully under the pump from replacing hooks and leaders. 

We ended adding around 20 more fish to the bait collection. Using just mono for traces to avoid some of the sharks did'nt stop us having to release numerous grey nurse sharks again. It seems there's no getting away from them, every beach I head to with good gutters holding salmon and tailor also have GN sharks. This is something we are seeing on the commercial abb boat right down the coast to the Vic border also. Every time the divers come back to the boat they comment on seeing GN sharks, something they rarely saw this time last year. There are even resident GN sharks at Eden boat ramp feeding among the the stingrays in front of the fish cleaning tables.

Im always surprised by the bream we hook on 9/0 and 10/0 hooks with such big baits, these are not even big bream but normally an indicator someone wasn't casting out far enough as the bream tend to hold in close picking at the fish frames we use as burley.

I was worn out when we got home last night.

[Pickles]

Great work on the Tailor Jon, a pity the Jewies didn’t turn up and I’ve got to  agree with you about the Grey Nurse sharks. As a SCUBA diver I see heaps one day recently I counted 18 in 2 dives.

[Larkin]

Plenty of tailor around at the moment!

It’s a good day - fish or no fish, when you get to spend it fishing with your son! 👍

[JonD]

On 6/1/2023 at 9:36 PM, Pickles said:

Great work on the Tailor Jon, a pity the Jewies didn’t turn up and I’ve got to  agree with you about the Grey Nurse sharks. As a SCUBA diver I see heaps one day recently I counted 18 in 2 dives.

The experts claim they head north for warmer water during winter but they are common around the Vic border in water of 13'c which the abb divers keep encountering. 

[jenno64]

Great post and sounds like a flat out session!

Shame the target species weren’t cooperating 😫