Bate Bay Tailor

[Larkin]

Gday raiders,

Decided to head out this morning for a quick fish. Weather was pretty bad - 30klm winds and large swells rolling in from the south. 
Thought the wind would drop, but it didn’t, so I decided to fish an area that was in close out of the wind/swell.
Found a small school of yakkas, caught a few and dropped down a livie. On the second rod I fished salted strip baits on a paternoster.

Didn’t take long until the tailor came on the bite. All but one taking baits off the bottom. Caught 8, released 4. Caught a couple of small flathead, one just legal - and a just legal pinkie. Both released.

Tailor ranged in size from 38cm to 42cm. Plenty of them around atm.

[jenno64]

Nice catch Chris...will you smoke them?

[Yowie]

Similar size to what I pulled out of the Hacking. A few cruising about.

Try out of the swell and fishing is a bit easier.

[Larkin]

1 hour ago, jenno64 said:

Nice catch Chris...will you smoke them?

Thanks Rob, I was thinking whole on the bbq plate with some herbs, lemon & butter. 
 

I haven’t smoked fish since I was 15. I remember I purchased one of those shoe box smokers from the tackle shop - used it once and the fish turned out so bitter 😂. I had no idea what I was doing. 
Ive been planning to give it a proper try.

54 minutes ago, Yowie said:

Similar size to what I pulled out of the Hacking. A few cruising about.

Try out of the swell and fishing is a bit easier.

Found a decent school of them, they were like piranhas. I foul hooked a 15cm reddie and it came up missing its tail. 

Definitely much easier in closer today. 

[bessell1955]

Those fish are in great condition.

[Little_Flatty]

10 hours ago, Larkin said:

I haven’t smoked fish since I was 15. I remember I purchased one of those shoe box smokers from the tackle shop - used it once and the fish turned out so bitter 😂. I had no idea what I was doing. 
Ive been planning to give it a proper try.

Find it hard to believe you'd stuff anything up in the kitchen Chris! Probably worth another go.

Nice catch of tailor there.

[Yowie]

Chris, I bought a shoe box sized smoker many years ago. Used tailor fillets in the smoker, added some wood shavings, lit the fire and it did it's stuff. The fillets were very edible.

Mate and I tried smoking barracouta fillets once. The fillets were average, though better than just plain cooked barracouta fillets, and rather boney.

The wife had a cleanup of the garage some years back, the smoker is not there any more. 

[james Cutler]

@Larkin Great report & top photos.

I had a look at the scene here Friday. Rain & 4 to 6 Mtere swells

[big Neil]

Hi Larkin. Your post brought back a heap of memories for me. When I lived in Sydney I used to head to SWR every July for the Tailor fishing. Apparently, they head north to Fraser Island each year to breed. The rock fishing was great and we used to get heaps of Tailor. Did have some smoked and they were good. Only issue with them is that they don't freeze very well so best eaten soon after catching. Great fun to catch...used to use Pillies on ganged hooks.

Cheers, bn

[Larkin]

On 6/15/2024 at 7:45 AM, bessell1955 said:

Those fish are in great condition.

Yeah they’ve been eating well. Nice plump ones!

On 6/15/2024 at 8:25 AM, Little_Flatty said:

Find it hard to believe you'd stuff anything up in the kitchen Chris! Probably worth another go.

Nice catch of tailor there.

Thanks Mike!

This needs to be revisited 😉

On 6/15/2024 at 8:39 AM, Yowie said:

Chris, I bought a shoe box sized smoker many years ago. Used tailor fillets in the smoker, added some wood shavings, lit the fire and it did it's stuff. The fillets were very edible.

Mate and I tried smoking barracouta fillets once. The fillets were average, though better than just plain cooked barracouta fillets, and rather boney.

The wife had a cleanup of the garage some years back, the smoker is not there any more. 

Haha, not sure I’d be smoking barracouta 

did your wife try it? Maybe why she got rid of the smoker 😂 

I think I had the same one - with a sliding lid.

On 6/15/2024 at 12:56 PM, james Cutler said:

@Larkin Great report & top photos.

I had a look at the scene here Friday. Rain & 4 to 6 Mtere swells

Thanks James!

was rough outside. But found a nice spot out of the weather.

16 hours ago, big Neil said:

Hi Larkin. Your post brought back a heap of memories for me. When I lived in Sydney I used to head to SWR every July for the Tailor fishing. Apparently, they head north to Fraser Island each year to breed. The rock fishing was great and we used to get heaps of Tailor. Did have some smoked and they were good. Only issue with them is that they don't freeze very well so best eaten soon after catching. Great fun to catch...used to use Pillies on ganged hooks.

Cheers, bn

Good fun aren’t they Neil!
I Haven’t caught tailor for a while. Cooked them up tonight!

I remember watching vhs fishing videos where there would be people lined up along the whole beach fishing for them.