KALBARRI ELECTRICAL SERVICES ULTRALIGHT

A big thankyou to Paul Maindok who is Kalbarri Electrical Services for his sponsorship and naming rights this year. The weather was one of the worst yet, not dangerous but very windy! The 2-day Ultralight runs in conjunction with our local comp, sponsored by the club, and also ran over the two days.

The boat section of the local comp was very thin due to the weather with regulars not fishing. No bottom fish were recorded the first day, but good snapper and 3kg tailor by the dynamic brothers Simon and Daniel Tarasek fishing the and based section set them in the lead. Laurie Malton had a good session at Chinamans on the Friday night catching and releasing 5 tailor, keeping the biggest that weighed in at 3.9kg being the biggest for the year to date.

[img_assist|fid=13609|thumb=0|alt=Steven's Shark|caption=18kg Shark]
[img_assist|fid=13615|thumb=0|alt=Laurie's Tailor|caption=3.9kg Tailor]

The river section was a bit under represented and was difficult to fish due to the muddy water flowing out into the ocean from cyclone Clare earlier in the year. Brett Bain did well though with 2 bream brought in live for a total weight of .858kgs.

[img_assist|fid=13612|thumb=1|alt=Rebecca's Tailor|caption=Winning bottom bouncing tailor]
[img_assist|fid=13618|thumb=0|alt=Simon's Morwong]

The second day was even windier with only one fish recorded from the bottom senior section. Rebecca, a bit embarrassed, weighed her little tailor and picked up the bottom section prize. Steven Eley also had a bottom fish and weighed it in under the junior section picking up the prize for his 18.65 dusky whaler. Di Stewart has 4 live bream from the river and took the section from Brett to win. Simon’s thumper land based morwong was notable.

The only 3 game fish were weighed in for the Ultra Light. Steve Wiseman aboard “Top Deck” with Tony Smith aboard showed a small mackerel caught on 6kg line but was not big enough to score. Laurie Malton with his usual family crew of Sue, Rebecca and Jared hid behind Black Rock and soaked baits for mulloway. A lucky break for Laurie saw him hook-up and land a 12.15kg mulloway on 3kg line, which was big enough to claim a National line class record with ANSA. Lots of other fish were hooked but lost by the crew. The second day was the same swinging on anchor with “Top Deck” and “Bulawayo Buoy” out at Black Rock again. “Top Deck” gave up early but it all went off later aboard “Bulawayo Buoy” with numerous hook-ups on heavier gear still resulting from bust offs. Must have been sharks, but Jared Malton had the lucky break after losing one and hooking up almost immediately again to a 5kg mulloway on 4kg gear. This fish is also a pending National Junior 4kg line class record.

[img_assist|fid=13621|thumb=0|alt=Jared's Mulloway|caption=Mulloway on 4kg line]
[img_assist|fid=13624|thumb=0|alt=Laurie's 3kg pending record|caption=12.2kgs pending ANSA record on 3kg]

The “Mug of the day” was won by Tony Smith with his bleeding finger from a tailor bite. John Stewart won the $50.00 worth of scratchies in the raffle and Cheryl Eley won the restaurant prize from the Grass Tree Restaurant.

All junior prizewinners won trophies and $10.00 vouchers. The senior winners all won club stubby holders and $20.00 gift vouchers.

Every thing is flowing smoothly for the big Kalbarri Classic at the beginning of March and info packs and entry forms can be obtained from the Kalbarri Visitor Centre free call 1800 639 468.

Next local comp is on the 18th February followed by the Kalbarri Classic on the 3rd, 4th, and 5th March.

Laurie Malton