Observing Big Bream Behavior with Cheese

[linewetter]

Had the day off again today and found myself with a few hours free this afternoon so headed out with some leftover cheese cubes and lures for some fishing.  I started with some plastics, tying on The Rapala Creeper plastics again today.  Not too much luck with it so swapped to my confidence lure, the Zman Slim Swimz paddletails of course.  This also did not result in much interest for a bit unfortunately.  I walked around and flicked to some dropoffs and finally found my first fish of the day after what felt like a small eternity:

 

 

Love catching flatties, this one was quite docile once on land.  It went back in swimming off strong.  

After dozens of more casts, I decided to swap to pulling out my cheese cubes.  Never tried cheese for bait before on its own but have heard good things about it.  Now that I've used it, I find that I like bread better - cheese doesn't seem to stay on the hook too well and falls apart to any pickers quickly.  I will say, it did attract more immediate attention than bread for me this time around.  First fish on the cheese was a pinkie:

 

In real life, this fish was a lot more red and pink than the camera shows.  I'm not sure if it's the change of season or what but I find that all the ones I've caught so far were a much lighter pink and not as vibrant as this one.  I've also seen a pic from another Raider's post recently and it too was noticeably more red than I'm used to, which is what made me think maybe it's due to the seasons changing.  If anyone has any insights, would love to hear it!

 

After this fish went back in, I walked around casting more cheese cubes.  Lost a lot because the cheese would fall off if a fish even glanced at it, but managed to hook an okay bream.  At first I only saw the seaweed and was trying to figure out what the heck I had hooked because I could feel it was a fish but never saw one like that before, then I realized the fish hadn't actually surfaced yet and it was just debris 🤣

 

After getting tired of losing so much cheese, I walked over to some nearby pylons and structure that I hadn't had much luck fishing before.  I knew it held fish because it had cover, shade, and lots of pylons.  I baited my hook with a cheese cube and stood a little further away from the water and started lobbing tiny cheese pieces.  I know bream are smart, and if they see me or worse, a fishing rod, they'd probably scram.  As the tiny cheese pieces went in, the bream emerged from under the cover and shade and out into the open by the dozens.  Small bream, big bream, all the bream.  They were all there, just sitting under the cover waiting for a meal.  I started lobbing more in.  The small and medium sized ones all watched the cheese at first then started eating once they saw the toadies eat it.  The big bream would circle around but only watched.  I tried lobbing in lots of cheese so that the small and medium sized ones that were fast would be busy eating and the big bream could have a chance at eating.  I wanted to see the big bream eat one so that they'd see the cheese was harmless and take my baited hook.  No luck though...I chucked a cheese in and one of the big bream swam up fast to it but only stopped and watched.  Eventually another fish came by and ate it. 

Even though all of the fish were feeding on cheese, the big breams all avoided eating and would only watch or swim up and stare the cheese.  After some time of throwing cheese in and watching them, I decided to throw my baited hook in before they got too full.  The smaller bream took my baited hook immediately.  I decided to try something I saw on Youtube too - left the bail arm open and let the bream run with it before flipping it down and setting the hook.  Worked pretty well!  I caught this decent bream and a couple smaller ones as well:

 

Each time after I pulled up a fish, I would toss in more cheese until I could see them feeding again to make them feel like the cheese was safe again then throw in my baited hook.  It worked about 4 times before the jig was up and the bream left and didn't entertain my free cheese anymore.

 

I walked about 10m to my left where there were more pylons and cover and tried it again.  Tossed in small cheese pieces and immediately a medium sized bream came out and started happily munching alone.  I tossed in 4 more pieces along with my baited hook at the same time after seeing how careless this bream was - didn't even stop to look at the cheese, it just ate it straight away.  It ate 4 of the cheese pieces then came to eat my baited hook before stopping short to look at it then turned around and swam away into deeper water.  I threw in more cheese pieces after seeing this but the bream didn't return.  I found that pretty interesting, it was eating the cheese so fast before without pausing, but as soon as it came across my baited hook, it knew something was different and left.  I didn't think it would notice based off how fast and greedy it was eating.  After this, I didn't catch any additional fish even after heavily burleying with cheese and also trying out lures. 

Another nice unexpected day of fishing out and being able to watch the behavior of bream.  I suppose the big ones are big for a reason 😉

 

[Larkin]

Nice observations 

its always interesting watching fish feed.

[linewetter]

42 minutes ago, Larkin said:

Nice observations 

its always interesting watching fish feed.

I like doing the same with bread at wharves at night. I’ve tried similar with the yakkas. They’ll circle around like piranhas and bump the bait with their bodies and wait for someone to take a stab at the bait then once one does, they all go feral for it

[lhan]

a fun session and vivid report!

[XD351]

Great report and observations! 
Was the cheese the hard stuff like cheddar or that rubbery processed stuff like in a cheese stick ? 
I had a similar frustrating session at crowdy head many years ago. We were fishing off the wharf using unweighted pieces of mullet gut trying to remove some of the horse size bream that live in there . 4 hours of trying with zero success and I don’t know how many times a big bream swam up to my bait only to turn away at the last second . We finally gave up , packed up and the last thing I did was chuck the remaining bait in the water - a good fist sized clump of mullet gut , the biggest bream I have ever seen cruised out and engulfed it then casually swam back to its hiding spot ! I can’t repeat on here what I screamed out and devastated doesn’t quite describe how I felt !

I have seen some good bream caught on pudding bait as well - one time at parsley bay I had the pleasure of watching an old bloke pull a couple of good bream out from under the rock I was standing on - basically a luderick set up with  bigger hook . He did teach me something with the few words he said to me though and that was the day I learned that the bream are literally under my feet hard in against the rocks .

[bessell1955]

A great refection of Bream feeding habits.

[Steve0]

That was an interesting exercise. Thanks for posting. 

Rather than straight cheese, have you tried using a made-up dough/pudding?

 

[ireallylovefishies22]

Yes the big bream are big for a reason. In the past while trying to sightcast larger bream, I always burley hard so the small-medium ones have had their fill and eventually stop being so aggressive. This allows the bait to sink down into the strike zone of the larger models and eventually, they'll lose their guard as they watch free food falling past them. Good luck on your next attempt!

[Larkin]

17 hours ago, linewetter said:

I like doing the same with bread at wharves at night. I’ve tried similar with the yakkas. They’ll circle around like piranhas and bump the bait with their bodies and wait for someone to take a stab at the bait then once one does, they all go feral for it

When the water is really clear in the Hacking I watch how the squid feed - what makes them attack, what scares them ect. 
it really does improve your fishing

[linewetter]

16 hours ago, XD351 said:

Great report and observations! 
Was the cheese the hard stuff like cheddar or that rubbery processed stuff like in a cheese stick ? 
I had a similar frustrating session at crowdy head many years ago. We were fishing off the wharf using unweighted pieces of mullet gut trying to remove some of the horse size bream that live in there . 4 hours of trying with zero success and I don’t know how many times a big bream swam up to my bait only to turn away at the last second . We finally gave up , packed up and the last thing I did was chuck the remaining bait in the water - a good fist sized clump of mullet gut , the biggest bream I have ever seen cruised out and engulfed it then casually swam back to its hiding spot ! I can’t repeat on here what I screamed out and devastated doesn’t quite describe how I felt !

I have seen some good bream caught on pudding bait as well - one time at parsley bay I had the pleasure of watching an old bloke pull a couple of good bream out from under the rock I was standing on - basically a luderick set up with  bigger hook . He did teach me something with the few words he said to me though and that was the day I learned that the bream are literally under my feet hard in against the rocks .

I was using cubes of tasty cheese - it seems more hard when cold out the fridge but soft when room temp, so I think that would be considered a soft cheese? By the time I was using it, it wasn’t cold anymore… I tried to mould it around the hook like I would with bread and that was worse than just hooking small cubes. Took some finessing to get it on without splitting the cheese still though. 
 

Your last comment about fish being under your feet - that’s something I never took quite literally till I saw it myself as well. Fish are everywhere, sometimes they blend in really dang well that you just can’t see them. I remember seeing whiting on sand flats for the first time close at feet, I only saw them once they started cruising but if they stayed still, they just blend in with the environment. Same with bream depending on their colors, at times they can really blend into their environment until they move 

[linewetter]

5 hours ago, Steve0 said:

That was an interesting exercise. Thanks for posting. 

Rather than straight cheese, have you tried using a made-up dough/pudding?

 

Oh yes I have tried pudding bait before as well. It was a mixture of flour, water, tasty cheese, fresh minced garlic, and some raw sausage taken out of its casing. The fish were eating fancy and loved it. The tricky part for me is getting the water ratio right though. Once the flour hydrates it can be too wet, then I add flour then it’s too dry. But if I get it right and put it in the fridge to firm up then use it, it stays on the hook long enough. The only thing I hate is the smell of garlic on my hands but can attest it works very very well. Do you have your own favorite recipe? I just tried one I saw on YouTube since I hadn’t heard of pudding before at the time. 

[linewetter]

3 hours ago, Larkin said:

When the water is really clear in the Hacking I watch how the squid feed - what makes them attack, what scares them ect. 
it really does improve your fishing

What are some of the observations you’ve made with squid? I’ve rarely targeted squid and have only one squid jig in my arsenal but have been meaning to put more time into it just because I’ve never actually caught a squid before and want to be able to say I’ve caught one. Just one of those cases where I haven’t caught one with a few attempts so I end up swapping lures to something else but I think with a bit of patience and persistence I’ll get there!

[Little_Flatty]

Always good to try a new bait. I haven't done much with cheese myself.

I find the same as what @ireallylovefishies22 mentions. The big bream seem to hide on the periphery and a lot of catching them on bait is to present a bait on the edges of the school and hope the bait survives long enough to reach them sitting down just a tad deeper.

[Steve0]

1 hour ago, linewetter said:

Oh yes I have tried pudding bait before as well. It was a mixture of flour, water, tasty cheese, fresh minced garlic, and some raw sausage taken out of its casing. The fish were eating fancy and loved it. The tricky part for me is getting the water ratio right though. Once the flour hydrates it can be too wet, then I add flour then it’s too dry. But if I get it right and put it in the fridge to firm up then use it, it stays on the hook long enough. The only thing I hate is the smell of garlic on my hands but can attest it works very very well. Do you have your own favorite recipe? I just tried one I saw on YouTube since I hadn’t heard of pudding before at the time. 

 I used to use a mix of sausage mince, flour and Parmesan cheese, cooked in muslin like a Christmas pudding. No water. I forget the flour/sausage ratio. The cooking firmed up the sausage mince, so it stayed on the hook well. Occasionally, a few drops of essence gave it a bit more smell, but it didn't seem to work any better.  When you pulled in to check, after a fish ran but didn't set the hook, it would have teeth marks carved into the surface but didn't break up. Where I used it (right under a wharf) didn't seem to get many small fish.

 

[Larkin]

16 hours ago, linewetter said:

What are some of the observations you’ve made with squid? I’ve rarely targeted squid and have only one squid jig in my arsenal but have been meaning to put more time into it just because I’ve never actually caught a squid before and want to be able to say I’ve caught one. Just one of those cases where I haven’t caught one with a few attempts so I end up swapping lures to something else but I think with a bit of patience and persistence I’ll get there!

My observation is to always let the jig drop all the way back down - they (southern calamari) would chase on the way up, but would mainly attack when the jig would drop back all the way down. Like they were trying to catch it before it could reach cover and get away.

Always wait a few ‘extra’ seconds before flicking the tip up on retrieve - let it sink all the way.