I was thinking of going and catching some squid.

Are there any around perth?

city beach - herring, yellow tail and whiting also a few port jacksons realeased and a massive sting ray realesed 5/6th march over night

KALBARRI SPORTS FISHING CLASSIC REPORT

26th February to 28th February

24th YEAR 2010

This was a “Classic” to remember! 36 boats ranging from dinghies to 8m boats and 24 river anglers, of which 9 were juniors, all competed for $10.000 worth of prizes over the Labour Day week end.

The three day event started with perfect conditions as a coastal trough formed on the Thursday evening. The glassed off conditions allowed the boats to disperse to their best and furthest spots at first light on the Friday morning, with the resulting great catches at the weigh-in at the Kalbarri Motor Hotel that afternoon.

The river anglers had a few fish but without the opportunity to fish into the night it was not a big weigh-in.

The boat sections in the under 6 metres, 6-7 metres and over 7 metres all found fish with a surprising large number of red emperor landed.

A great catch by Mitchell Westlund resulted in him winning the Skywest Top Gun Award of a free Kalbarri/Perth return air fare for his red emperor.

Darren Cooper and Gut Morris had reds as well

John McCarthy picked up Men’s Meritorious for the biggest red emperor, adding good points to his team, “Jakshitt”.

A lot of dhuies were landed with a few big ones scattered amongst them.

“Lets Go” team boat 6-7 metres had good dhuies among their catch with John Morgan and Danny Vanderthing scoring the bigger ones.

Guy Morris had a burster of a comp, landing the biggest dhuie on the second day weighing in at 11 odd kgs only to beat himself on the third day with a 12.16 kg monster.

A big thanks to the organisers who put a lot of their spare time into this the biggest organised event in Kalbarri each year and not possible without the support of our very generous sponsors. Please support them when you can.

The 6 junior boat anglers found lots of fish. Bryce Parker landing a personal best baldchin groper of 5.79kgs fishing aboard the over 7m boat “Lauren Rose”. Lauren Rose skipper and comp regular, Norm Godfrey, down from Karratha also landed good fish as well as this snapper.

Junior, Beau Ivey, fishing aboard “Hurricane” a 4.5m dinghy, did the hard yards but

Made good with the heaviest not game snapper of 7.03ks as well as the Rod Mitchell Meritorious award.

Heaviest cod went to Brian Beales for his 15.01kg estuary cod, while the heaviest samsonfish of 15.8kgs went to Darren Westlund.

The game section was heavily contested this year probably due to the limited number of category one fish permitted to be caught, thus anglers switching to game.

Day one saw the team “Bulawayo Buoy” take the lead in the 6-7m game category with 4 mackerel caught on 3kg line.


John Hoye, Laurie & Sue Malton with 3kg line caught mackerel and Jared Malton landing a 10.5kg mackerel on 3kg line to win him the Highest Point Scoring Mackerel as well as the Highest Point Scoring Game fish for his efforts.

Team “El Barco” over 7m boat with Sue Olive, Stan Sutherland and daughter Anna Sutherland had good fish as well. Anna Sutherland holds her 1.38kg tuna caught on 1kg line winning her Ladies Meritorious.

The second and third day team “Proplan” and “Couta Crazy” travelled a long way north and found the mackerel adding big points to the boat scores.

Team “Proplan” day two and three, Daryn Visagie, Deon Visagie, Dominic Levzzi, and Sean Potter with their catch of mackerel caught on 6kg line.

Bradyn Stander was the Champion Junior Game angler fishing aboard “Couta Crazy”


Champion Angler Game went to Colin Wimpress who had the most individual points.

Colin also won the Skywest Top Gun Award for game on the last day.

Highest Point Scoring Snapper went to Caron Stewart for a magnificent 8.00kg snapper caught on 4kg line.

Highest Point Scoring Tuna was landed by Adam Bangay with 225.83 points for his 13.55kg Yellow-fin on 6kg line.

Meritorious Bottom went to Dean Wilcocks for his 20.76kg cobia

Team “Bamba Zonke” did well especially as they had 3 novices aboard and landing tuna on 3 and 4kg line consistently and ending up 3rd overall Boat Game over 7m.

Team “PMY24” with Paul Loffler and Mark Flannagan landed good snapper

While regular anglers from Ajana aboard “You 4 Reel” were consistent

Skywest Top Gun day 2 went to Brett Bain for his 7 fish from the river and Skywest Top Gun day 3 was awarded to Colin Wimpress for his great catch of mackerel on 6kg line.

The second day saw the river anglers bring their catches in after a full nights fishing when most of the better fish were caught.

Brett Bain took out the Skywest Top Gun award for the river section, landing 7 fish to give him good points, but not good enough to beat Karen Hartig who had better fish as well as the biggest black bream of 980 grams

Meritorious River was won by Craig Wise

Ash Goddard and Kane DeGrauw show their fish.

Champion Junior River was Marlin Heaney with Ash Goddard runner up.

Junior River Meritorious went to Luke Dooley

The $150.00 voucher for Safest Boat Award went to “Reel Colour” for the third time for their innovative and practical safety gear/boat layout.

The Blind Mullet Award for the angler who does the most stupid thing over the comp went to Harvey Gatt aboard “Secret Spot”. When out 30km from Kalbarri realised that he had forgotten the bait, and then did it again on the second day!

The presentation dinner at the Golf and Bowling club with a sit down dinner served by local girls and boys from the school supervised by Olivia Nye and prepared by our local Pizza & Pasta restaurant owner John La Faro was fantastic. The prize giving was well presented by Cheryl Eley and a great video presentation by Jason Van Viersen rounded off the evening nicely. Overall it was a very successful competition, only possible with the support of all our great sponsors. We would like to thank them most sincerely. Please show them your appreciation by using them whenever you can.

Final results and runners up

Champion Angler Game:

Colin Wimpress 844.33 points

Runner up: Sue Olive 804.62

3rd Sean Potter 790.17

4th Deon Visagie 765.50

5th Laurie Malton 748.00

6th Don Stander 711.00

Champion Angler Bottom:

Dean Wilcocks 258.40 points

Runner up: Bruno Delucia 243.76

3rd John Morgan 180.88

4th Nik Bramwell 168.92

5th Paul Loffler 152.88

6th Darrell Baldock 151.36

Champion Boat Game over 7m:

Proplan 2904.5 points.

Runner up: El Barco 1961.00

3rd Bamba Zonke 1577.00

4th Top Deck 100.50

Champion Boat Game 6-7m:

Couta Crazy 2305.83 points

Runner up: Bulawayo Buoy 2077.83

3rd U4 Reel 1106.50

4th Reel Colour 247.00

5th On Strike 225.85

Champion Boat Game under 6m:

BW 282 366.75 points

Runner up: Painted Black 341.00

3rd Baggy Minnow 292.25

4th Pig Trough 160.00

Champion Boat Bottom over 7m:

Reel Addiction 157.96 points

Runner up PMY24 138.56

3rd Buckshot 118.63

4th Lauren Rose 107.14

5th Jakshitt 102.81

Champion Boat Bottom 6-7m:

Lets Go 131.43 points

Runner up: Play Pen 111.63

3rd: Red Raider 92.68

4th : Lilyvale 84.48

5th: Reel Colour 62.89

6th: Secret Spot 39.58

Champion Boat Bottom under 6m:

Painted Black 202.54 points

Runner up Hurricane 135.80

3rd: Wifeless 56.92

4th Pig Trough 52.72

5th Efishency 52.31

6th Baggy Minnow 20.32

Highest Point Scoring Game Fish: Jared Malton 350.33 points (10.5kg mackerel on 3kg line)

Champion Junior Game: Bradyn Stander 478.33 points

Champion Junior Bottom: Mitchell Westlund 139.36

Champion River Adult: Karen Hartig 102.88

Champion River Junior: Marlin Heaney 51.04

Ladies meritorious: Anna Sutherland (1.38kg tuna on 1kg line)

Men’s meritorious: John McCarthy ( 9.86kg red emperor)

Highest Point Scoring Mackerel: Jared Malton 350.33 points (10.5kg mackerel on 3kg line)

Highest Point Scoring Tuna: Adam Bangay 225.83 points (13.55kg tuna on 6kg line)

Highest Point Scoring Snapper: Caron Stewart 200 points (8kg snapper on 4kg line)

Meritorious Game: Laurie Malton (4.42kg tuna on 2kg line)

Heaviest not game snapper: Beau Ivey Junior 7.02kg

Heaviest Dhufish: Guy Morris 12.16kg

Heaviest Groper: Bryce Parker 5.79kg

Heaviest Cod: Brian Beales 15.01kg

Heaviest Samson Fish: Darryn Westlund 15.87kg

Meritorious Bottom: Dean Wilcocks (Cobia 20.76kgs)

Heaviest Whiting: Brett Bain 130 grams

Heaviest Bream: Karen Hartig 980 grams

Meritorious River: Craig Wise, Mulloway

Well, knocked off at 3, got the boat in the water not long after 3.30 with Deepwater.  Got about 500m out of the marina and there they were, tuna after school of tuna feeding on the masses of baitballs.  After seeing the action last Saturday we knew they weren't going to be far off.  First few casts had hookups to be sharked after a fair while.  Second lot of casts were with stickbaits which also got destroyed, we then went to plastics and got destroyed.  A few sharks moved in so we moved to another school (schools everywhere over a 5km radius that we checked) We ended up landing a few, hooking heaps, loosing a few and sitting back and watching the mayhem quite often just not casting in awe at the feeding frenzy on the baitballs.  Highlight was Jeffo hooking a tuna at the boat and 3 10ft tigers chasing it to a screaming reel (caught bits of it on vid cam) and a solid 1m ++++ queenie coming up to check out Jeff's lure in the middle of the tuna feast.  Here's a few pics, will edit up the video when I get some time. We caught and released all fish landed, awesome fun.

Cheers,

Adam

The plan was to head to the monte's for 3 days over the long weekend thats just been.

Watching the weather everyday to make sure we did not get caught out, and the Friday before the weather was looking awsome!

Packed Friday night ready for the early start from Dampier to head over to the Monte's. As none of us had been there before, we made sure we carried enough fuel and safety gear for anything that may happen.

Went over in a 25ft Blackwatch console and which held 400 ltras of fuel and we carried an additional 200 with us.

Fuel strapped in

Wanted to leave Dampier by first light, but we were a little slow moving in the morning and took a little more time getting the boat set.

Finally headed off by around 6.30am.

The weather out past the Dampier islands was pretty good, very little wind which made a good start to the trip. By half way over a South westerly had set in at about 10-12 knots, which made the short sharp chop a little rough and wet, but still managing to sit on 26-27 knots.
Made the islands in 2 hours 20 minutes which we thought was pretty good timing.

We were considering which of the 2 locations we had chosen as possible camping locations to stop at, and finally decided on 'chanpagne bay' as what looked on the charts, as a good sheltered bay, as we were expecting light southerlies for most of the long weekend.

As we had not been to the monte's before, we made our way through the islands slowly, getting our bearingson the place, and understanding the layout of the islands. By this time it had heated up and the temp guage was sitting at 35 degrees at 10am!

I got itchy feet and wanted to start fishing, even before we had dropped the gear off, so i rigged my light 12lb gear with a pink plastic and started to flick around some shallow water as we made our way past tramoulie island. 2 casts later and i got a big hit. After a 10 minute fight, i got my first Chinaman to the boat and netted and guessed at 6-7kg. Made for some good photos too.

we pushed off to our destination and droped our gear off and setup camp. Champagne bay made for a nice clam location to setup in.

After the camp was setup we went for a cruise around some of the islands with the intention of trawling a few lures and throwing a few plastics to see what was about.

We heaed to the east side of Tramoulie Island trawling a couple of gold bibs around in hope of finding some trout.

First hit on the lure, and result....bricked..... couldnt believe it, not sure what it was, possible GT i guess, but mate the 65lg gear look like 6lg gear. First lure down.

In the next hour i think i lost 6 lures to fish in the same shallow location, and some lost to sharks.
My bright orange and gold lures were dissappearing fast, but i finally managed to get a fish onboard, which was the biggest GT i have landed (Nothing in the likes of what Brad gets, but none the less a good fish)

After this we managed to land an assortment of mackerel, with Spannish, spotted, and sharkies coming aboard, but all a bit on the smaller side.

Moved over towards some shallow water in the hope of finding something different, we started to flick plastics around, and believe it or not huge blue bone were smashing them, but we couldnt get one board, but many sighted. A heap of different cods, perch, emperors were landed which was aheap of fun on the light gear.

Tide was running out, so made the decision to head back to camp before it got too low and being our first trip, was a very wise decision

Sat down that night to some fresh fish, a few cold beers and a great sunset to finish off the first day.

Next morning we rose to excellent conditions, light southerly maybe 2-4 knots and looking good... But we soon realised we had not left the boat in enough water, and she was belly up.

Luckily we had thought the night before wer might run out of water, so we positioned her on a nice shandy patch so no damage done.

After the tide came in a bit she flated and we made our way out. Again this time targeting species on the trawl, on poppers, and softies.

Again plagued by small mackies of all kinds, hitting lures contantly.

Managed to get some nice rankin on lures which was a first for us.

Found some nice rocks sticking out of the water, and with fast moving water thought we were in with a chance of finding some queenies and maybe some more GT's.

First cast first hookup on a gold twistie.

Nice little queenie came up.

Had a ball on these things, they fly around when they are in a feeding frenzie. Got to the stage where i could jig the twistie right on the side of the boat, and the queenies were jumping out of the water to get it. Pretty amazing sight.
Plenty of other fish landed on the same area. Trout of many kinds, perch, emperors, queenies, and more.

Decided to move on again and try a few more lures.

got a huuuuuuge strike, and i called it for the mother of all trout as i could feel long winded bumps and she was heavy.
Well lets just say, i got the shock of my life when this came up!! didnt see it until right on the boat.

Quick bit of fancy boat work and plier work saw the big girl get back un-harmed. Man those things have some beaks, woudlnt want to get too close!

Tide was getting low again, so time to head back to camp for more brews, more fish and another great sunset.
We had kept 1 queenie for bait, but just after we had cleaned our fish back at camp, a 8-10 foot hammer haed showed up. Well couldnt reassly resist, as he was hungy as!! and was only swimming in a foot or so of water! So out went the queenie (on rope, no hooks) and we watched this shark hoe it down...what a sight that was!!!

Rose the next morning for the last time, and the idea was to head out the west side for a look sea.

Instead of going outside the islands we went through, and being a rather high taide were pretty confident we would make it through with no real issues. The water was gushing in.

Made our way through and found a nice little rock just inside the reef to throw some plastics about. I knew we were in with a good chance of finsing some good sized spangles, and it didnt take long for them to show.

But it also didnt take long for the sharks to show either. When a fish was on, it was 5 seconds before the shark was on him!

Didnt want to give too many to the sharks, we managed to get 3 or 4 in with losing 2 to the sharks, so we called it quits.

We decided to take a tour of the islands and check out more of this amazing place. With great weather we saw many places we will visit and fish next time, and 3 days was just not long enough.

We definately be going back to visit the monte's again!!

Made it back to Damiper in 2.5 hours, but we did hit a 20-25knot NE wind 20 mile short, and wow that was rough!!! but still managed 25 knots holding on :)

ps: sorry si grammar is bad, was in a rush to type!

I have been hitting the three mile a lot recently.. mainly two rcoks, mindarie and ocean reef. heaps of birds out there attacking baitballs. everywhere ive been fishin there hase been a lot of bait on the sounder and on the surface. from two rocks i caught 1 under size dhuie, 1 sized dhuie, break seas, undersize baldies, and 1 seargent backer. Also got ontop of a school of undersize snapper which was good fun on light gear (All undersize fish released!!!). coming back from two rocks last week.. I saw some birds when i went to check it out mackrel where hammering the baitfish. i got busted off on 2 mackrel (no wire). 

went out from ocean reef on sunday... and couldnt stop getting break sea cods (makes me wonder why the bag limit is 2). I kept one big one and the rest went down on the release wieght. after drifting some wrass got a doubl header of undersize dhuies (only in 10m, fish where in great condition and released). I then drifted a big fillet of wrass on a set of gangs.. within 5 minuites i hooked into a hammerhead. kept drifting around and was greeted by a tiger shark which wasnt intrested in anything. on the way home the same thing as in two rocks.. baitfish just getting hammered, got a double hook up with nothin to show for :(

so far every trip to the three mile with a wrass fillet in the water has produced a dhuie (mostly undersize and all caught 10-17m deep)... next time a wrass comes onboard chuck it back down as a fillet!!!

please feel free to add your report of any inshore fishing.. there has been a lot of activity lately it would be intresting to see what everyone else is getting into..

gidday guys and girls just curious to know if anyones been geting onto any kingies lately or know of any captures ???..

millscharters

and a youtube video....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GFHmGfmSVc

hi all

after a windy sat and sun seabreeze forecast was a good mon after 10am and they got it right again headed out from woodman point at about 9am  had a quick stop at our normal squid ground but not much happening managed only 3 in about an hour so off to the norm fishing ground arrived to a beautiful glassy ocean and the fish didn't let us down fished for about 2 hours and got a beauty baldchin going at 52cm first up then the duies joined the party after a few undersize got one at 60cm so this weeks dinner was a good mix next up got 3 sweep around 2 kilo probly not the best eating but bite good and hard to finish things up got a snapper 57cm a queen snapper53cm and i think it is a blackass going 37cm so a good day fishing had a 2metre bronzie hanging out the bak of the boat all day and some times ther was three of them which was a good sight so all in all agood day off perth

cheers warren

Hi everyone this is my first posting on here,

Has anyone seen any signs of the salmon migration around the south west dunsborough or augusta area. I went out last weekend to dunsbrough but didnt see any

With last Thursday and Friday being pupil free days, we packed the camper, tinnie, our young one, mutt and headed north early on Thursday for Sandy Cape (just North of Jurien Bay).  I knew the place would be packed, so it was a good move to get up before the crowds arrived.  Well, we only just squeezed in on Thursday (it is first in, first served there and no bookings can be made). We set up our camper and hit the beach for an arvo of swimming…it was hot!

Early Friday morning we set up another families huge tent on our site, so it was ready for their arrival about 10pm that night.  Other friends arrived 4pm and setup on our site aswell (yeah we packed them in).  About 30 caravans came through that arvo/evening looking for a spot to no avail – the place was full.

Roast chicken in the new baby Q for Friday nights dinner.

Did I mention that it was hot.  Spent most of the day in the water swimming and snorkeling and catching the odd whiting.

Friday night was an absolute scorcher….spray bottle, 12 volt fan helped a little, but the howling hot easterly did not allow for much sleep.

Saturday was, you guessed it HOT.  Plenty of swimming again.  The whiting were plentiful in the shallows and kept myself and the kids entertained and the mutt very happy as he got some fresh fish too.  Woohoo, the seabreeze came in about 3pm, but ran out of puff about 5pm.  By 6pm he ocean was dead calm.

The bay packed out with fisho’s - Herring and a few tailor were landed amongst the anglers;

But for me, it all looked too hard, so I kicked back;

Sunday was a cracker of a day.  We packed for the day and headed south, 4wd’g along the beach to a nice bay, where an island is only 2oo metres from shore.  The female seals lived here and the goal was to snorkel with them with the kids.  We had a great time…and so did the seals.

Did some scurfing on the flat water and had a ball catching big bull herring on slices.

Our Mutt’s first time on a boat;

Swimming with the seals;

Kissing the lens;

I've got some video, which I'll sort over the next few days.  Can't wait to get up there again soon.

Monday, pack up time, lunch, last swim and hit the road for home and a rest!

Cheers Pete

Went fishin last night down the cut and as soon as i arrived the tailor were on the bite.
Between me and my girlfreind we took home 5 keepers.

Lost a couple of huge tailor aswell. released around 10 that were just under.

Also caught a occy and Lisa managed to catch a scorpion fish which had to be handled with care.

Great nights fishing.

Thurs night i went down to the river and landed this guy, weighed in at 12kg

Friday night: with the easterly blowing i headed to the beach for a fish, Ended up catching tailor almost every cast most just under legal but there were a few bigger ones in between. Released all except a 40cm fish which was gill hooked.

Saturday night went down to the beach again and ended up catching a couple of bronzies around 1.2m

Sunday night i took the tinny off hillaries for a late arvo/night fish. Headed south and anchored up and got the trail happening. Didnt take long for the fish to come. Me and a mate caught a couple of undersize pinks (43cm), tailor (45cm+), skippy, snook, cuttle fish and another bronzie for the night. Condition were perfect with the light easterly winds. Perfect way to spent a hot summers night.

Monday morning i finished the long weekend off with a dive off hillaries, saw a few crays but size was small compared to a couple of weeks ago (im thinking the full moon has pushed them well inside their holes). Didnt get any sized crays but managed to loop another harley which ended up being 45cm, Ate him for tea tonight and was beautiful... i think it tastes similar to baldies

Was a rather interesting day up here, the report was for 1-3 knot southerlies which changed late last night to 6-8 south westerlies and with a 10-13 overnight south westerly, the water on the west side really wasn't going to get any time to rest.  Regardless we got up at sparrows and went and checked 'disappointment hill' to see somewhat choppy waters, but not enough to stop us from continuing the drive out to Tantabiddi.  As we drove on an ominous looking haze started covering the horizon and on arrival at the ramp, we saw an empty carpark and weighed up the options; no one else out, hardly any water to launch into and no bog mats to retrieve (ie, stuck out there for another 5 hours) if it did turn pearshaped, which it certainly looked like it could quite easily.  The option to head back was one made relatively easily, considering I only had elephant killing gear on board and nothing that would be any fun for inside the reef.

Arriving at Bundegi we were again the first in the carpark, but with a light south easterly blowing (yes, as many of you experienced Exmouth visitors would know, the wind blows in opposite directions quite often).  Anyway, the aim was to bottom bounce with trolling as a backup option as I wasn't confident with the surface due to the full moon.  Heading out through the slot was rather messy with 2m + of incoming tide and a mixture of s.west/s.east slop forming on the top which made it relatively hard going.  We decided to push on even though there were many times where the f. it, lets go back came into play and if it wasn't for it being so early and most probably a few other boats launching we more than likely would have headed in.  

Finally getting to the first spot with a little bit of fluff on the sounder and a little nugget I made the first drop to be almost instantly bricked, getting it up off the bottom I was calling good red with the trade mark run to the bottom, get head up - coupla winds, run to the bottom type fight.  I was taking it pretty easy on him as I knew it was a good fish, of course half way up I had to get codded and that was the end of that, the whole area shut down and on the troll to the next spot was the decision.

The next spot was out in 62m and a nice little pinnacle in the middle of nowhere, again, first drop sucked down, strike and straight into a hole, ka-ping.  I had my second rod ready to go (new banax kingpin which I was quite happy with, yes BJ ;) ) and got sharked within seconds of being on the bottom.  Feeling a little deflated after fighting him for 2 mins (not long enough to get video of the reel in action unfortunately)

I decided that it was time to make the run in before the heavy north wester that was forecast came in.  Out went the spread of lures, no teasers, and into discussion mode we went for the next 20 minutes before we both got a shock with the right long corner getting dusted off in serious fashion.  After some rather fast chat as to how we were going to run this (not prepared at all) we went into action and watched another 300m of line get stripped of whilst the other lures came in and a fine little black marlin danced off into the distance.  With a little bit of anxious coaching we got all the line back and started to plane him up to the surface where he showed himself off a little, but nothing like we had hoped.  After a quick couple of laps around the boat and some skillful manouvering we got him boatside and had him leadered, dehooked and ready for photos instantly.  After a quick couple of snaps we had him chewing down on my hand for release, probably one of the most healthy releases I've done actually.  So all in all, Renae captured her first marlin after 14 months of trying and being let down for one reason or another (probably a dozen or more hooked, including one of around 120kg that pulled hooks at the boat)  I'd originally called this one at 35kg, but reckon it was more like 40kg in hindsight, very short but rather stumpy, regardless, a good fun sized fish.

We put the lures out for one more attempt and had a little saily come up and chew on the lumo short corner but not hookup, not that we were too phased.  Once we reached the 35m mark we pulled the lures and belted home as the north wester started pumping, all in all a satisfying day and was good to have the boat cleaned before 1pm.  Even though we lucked out on the fillets part of the mission, the billy more than made up for it and now I just have to go out there again and try and catch us a feed next time the weather's good.

Cheers,

Adam

got board last night had a look at the wind & was looking good thought i would go out for a pinky bash got out there & all i could find were dhufish everywhere caught 13 in four hours i moved around alot trying different spots i normaly get pinkies off as soon as my line hit the bottom got smashed by dhuies was a good night every one that came up were fat as & spitting out squid & pilchards must have been on a big feeding frensy

Hi There,

I had the misfortune of spending the weekend trying to fish in Bunbury. Not knowing Bunbury very well I went into BCF to ask them some advice. Everyone there said that there wasn't really any good places to fish in Bunbury and that it was ok 10 years ago....that didnt help me much. One guy told me to fish near a rock groyne and that there were fish there. I caught maybe 200 whiting but they were about 6-10cm long - just fingerlings. I tried other places around the harbout, the cut and other beaches all to the same success. It was too windy - very strong breeze to launch the tinny so was stuck on the land.

Note to self - If i want to catch nothing (or close to nothing) go fishing in Bunbury...

just came back from hillarys.. there was legal size tailor caught...

and fat herring.. but tailor were scared of by a local dolphin..

just thought id let you know the tailor are still on...

went for a fish at my local jetty tonight, lots of choppers ranging from just size up to 40cm...Filleted a fat one and sent out a fresh slab, wasnt long before a got a solid run, set the hooks and i was on to what i thought was a mulla-plenty of headshakes and a long solid run.

Everything was goin welll and the fish was starting to slow down to a stop so i put some pressure on then i lost all the weight, wound in thinking the hooks had pulled but my 80lb leader was bit in half..... re rigged with sum wire and 2 8.O gamas and sent a live tailor out but all was quiet so i gave it quits after a bit as the missus was getting tired lol.

On a bad note it was a shame to see a guy down there catching tailor after tailor without checking the size limit..what was worse was when his wife came down and wrapped the 20+ tailor he had in newspaper and left and he continued fishing! catching at least another 12 before he ran out of bait and asked me if i had any spare? i refused and he left- or so i thought... he returned 20mins later with more bait and brought his wife with him and proceded to pillage more tailor!

At this point i was getting fairly angry with this guy and if it wasnt for my missus i would have thrown him in the water, instead I calmly approached him, reminded him of the bag limit etc and told him i was reporting him and his cars rego to fisheries- he shrugged and kept fishing... what a night huh...

sorry about the rave but i cant stand these people..... hope everyone one else had a good night. 

Hi Crew,

Not a specific report as such, but just a whats biting and been happening around the place.  Went out today and had a bit of a troll around for some dollies, plenty of weed and current, but no love unfortunately.   The surface has been pretty quiet of late and there hasn't been a lot of marlin reports around, mainly because we haven't really had the weather to head wide.  The back of the reef on the westside has pretty much been a no-go zone since the new year with very few good days going.  I've heard a few reports from the inside, some good painted crays in the shallows up near the accesses and last week some donkey GT's were in around Trisel.

Theres been plenty of life in the gulf, heaps of meter long queenies up on Bundegi flats with livies being the best.  Theres been quite a few queenies along the beaches as well (as Deepwater showed this week)  When launching from bundegi this morning there were 2kg GT's smashing up oooodles of hardyheads, when we got back 4 hours later they were still there and easy to sight cast to in less than a meter of water.

The marina has been fishing well for jacks (apart from the prick that went spearing in there and cleaned out one of the rock walls) some good fish coming on the right tides.  A work mate has been fishing it hard lately and got spooled on 2kg by a 15kg+ GT last week and local Bluewater reports suggest its not uncommon at the moment.  Another interesting find was the same mate on the weekend had his bait chased into the rocks by a 20kg black jew, not unheard of in Exxy, but definitely uncommon.  Along the shores of the gulf the yellowfin whiting have been thick if you can be bothered filleting lots for little reward, still a very easy feed though.

The tides have started picking up this week which has slowed the diving down a bit.  I went twice last week after work and managed a few small bluies and trout in great vis and plenty about which is promising, hopefully I'll be able to get out the next set of neaps for another look.  A mate said he also managed to get 6 squid the other day, but had to work hard for them so I would guess that the waters still a bit too warm.

I have to say its the quietest I've seen the longtail tuna in ages, they just seem to have disappeared, mind you, I haven't been chasing them regularly.  Heaps and heaps of the small tuna around, but not much chasing them.  Another random catch was a monster sailfish down at Schofield shoals and quite a few spaniards down around the islands.  If your up here and blown out fishing wide, then heading down the bottom if you get good tides is more than likely worth a shot!

Cheers,

Adam

just wondering if anyone has been down there lately was going to go tonight? soak a mulla bait for a few hours

Been a member for a while now n never posted a report so figured this was a good night to start.

Being the last day before I go back for yet another year of uni, i thought id make the most of it and head out for a solo fish. Scouted out my local beaches and trigg point was looking good, but when i went back to fish at 7:30 the gutter i planned on fishing was still full of surfies. Waited around for 15 mins before deciding to head to my regular sharking spot. Having picked up some some of the nicest mulies I've ever seen from Oceanside the week before i thought id let the sharks be for a while and try for some tailor. Within ten seconds of the first mulie hitting the water I had a solid bite, I missed that one and brought in half a mulie. second cast hooked up and brought in a nice 43cm tailor. This went on for about half an hour landing four decent size tailor as well as a few small snook which went back, before the tailor dissapeared. The biggest tailor went 48cm and a some that were lost felt a lot heavier, but i guess the ones that get away are always bigger

So having caught a feed of tailor and knowing how many sharks come by that area i swapped rods and rigged up a tailor head to slide out deep on a non return clip while i cleaned up tomorrows dinner. After 20 mins the fish were cleaned and I was ready to head home, with the tailor head un-touched. Just as I was bringing in the first head ready to pack up my old man came down, which meant another fish head out as bait and another beer, now with my old man as a drinking partner.

With a smaller head out this time i thought my chances were good, sure enough about 15 mins later my rod doubles over and my reel screames!! I run over and grab the rob, striking straight away and setting the hook.... Feeling the solid pull and watching line dissapear from my reel i knew i was on. It took about 5 seconds to realise it was a ray.... and maybe another 15 to realise it as one of the resident "unstopables". While I have enjoyed catching large rays recently and with an on going challengs between a few of the regulars at that spot to land the biggest ray I was still dissapointed it wasnt a shark. I was even more dissapointed when the thing took about 300m of line then dropped behind the reef and busted me off 

All in all a nice night fishing, very different to my usual 6 hour stints with big baits out waiting for a beast of a shark to swim by. Lookin forward to the day one of the guys with gear heavier than mine lands one of these "unstopable" rays though. have had little problem with 45kg rays so excited to see how big these guys are. It'll probably have about 6 of my rigs in its mouth lol...

Hope the photos and everything come out ok 

Cheers,

Adam

Hey All Went out on spinners charters yesterday for the first time, down here in Albany.

My target fish for the day was nannygai, and I got one!!! Yay!

I caught a baby one first, and then about 20 minutes later caught the big one!

On my way to my usual fishing spot today, i stopped in at BCF to buy myself an anchor for the jetski and a rapala x-rap. Also bought myself a popper, a Starlo Pro skipping prawn surface lure, designed for catching bream. After 5mins of casting the rapala with no luck, i decided to throw on the popper to have a look at the action it made on the water. After the first cast i knew i was going to catch a fish on this lure, it blooped perfectly and swam naturally, although i was a bit worried at how small the trebbles were. A minute later a school of around 50 salmon hit the surface 5-10m infront of me, with small bait fish fleeing in all directions. The popper landed right in the middle of all the comotion and after a few twitches 3 or 4 salmon smashed in on the top and i was on. landed the fish after a few minutes and chucked it straight in the bucket. 10mins later the school was back and on my second cast i was hooked onto another. this fish uncharacteristically pulled 15m of line on its first run and swam straight to the bottom, then the fish was gone. the salmon had straightend the hooks on both trebbles!! Going back tomorrow, hopefully will have some more pics to upload :D

This is long overdue due to my laziness and my tendency to procrastinate. LOL! Anyway, went to Busselton jetty last thursday with a three of my mates, two of which were inexperienced, and it was a really good night. When we got there at about 11pm, the water was firing with skippies. So we just dropped our rods and caught a few just sized skippies, with a couple ones close to 30cm. one of the biggest ones was caught by a girl who came with us out of boredom and her 1st time fishing. Could see that she was rather awkward with her rod. However, for a first timer, she caught 2 skippies and a rather large blue manna on hook! which was a really good job I must say. So amongst the skippies, we also caught a couple of yellowtails and these served as liveys. We had 2 big rods out, mine on a bottom rig and my mate's on a balloon ( it was the right wind that night). After quite some time, my bottom rig went off. I immediately hit my big rod and fought for a while, managed to bring it in somewhat close but it decided to spit the yellowtail out and swim off. After looking at the bait, I concluded that it was a mulloway that I lost. I was disappointed cos I striked at it too early, yet stoked as it was my first mulla hook up. So I put another yellowtail livey out but all was quiet until near dawn, the line peeled again. This time, I waited for the second run after it stopped but it didn't run anymore. Reeled it back and my livey was chomped into half. A really clean cut it was. All the time, the balloon was really quiet. And I nearly lost my berkley rod cos my inexperienced friend just left my rod on the floor without loosening the drag and a skippy took it and almost dragged the whole thing into the water. Toward dawn, I saw a mulloway swam out from under the platform we were on and out into the ocean. Then my experienced fisho and I switched to metal slices and I brought in my first garfish on slice, and my friend brought in a small barracuda. Then he complained that his barracuda curse followed him from Singapore to Perth. 

My other mate then caught his first big thing on a big rod. We are proud of him. We de-barbed the ray and released it.

All in all, it was a good night out fishing.

(sorry, will post the photos later) =p 

Headed out in the dinghy today with the expectation of some nice weather, and we weren’t disappointed with a four hour glass off. We headed out to mewstone first to try our luck on the tailor and found they were on the bite, I landed 5 in 10 minutes on SP’s before the bite shut down and we decided to head out in search of some table fish.

After sounding around for a good half hour we decided to stop and fish a nice lump which produced thousands of little flathead which became very frustrating, after a good hour we decided to head in a little onto a large reef I found, as soon as we arrived we saw an abundance of fish life. We stopped and started drifting the reef when a school of bait fish surfaced, this school was at least 50sqm and the fish were breaking the surface which made it look like it was raining. We hooked a few skippy when we noticed a school of Spanish mackerel, this school consisted of around 15 fish most being around the 20kg mark. Shaking i tried tying a line in time however they took off and were not seen again. We then decided to head in a little and try for some squid, we quickly caught 7 and drove home before the breeze came in.

The next few pics are just stills from a pretty crap video but you can see the outline of a few of the mackerel

Hey guys, im heading up to Moore river this weekend and will be there Fri and Sat night. Has any1 heard any reports from around there recently???? Will be mainly beach fishing but dont mind flicking around in the river too and i also have a 4x4 so can head up the beach. Thanx

Hi There,

Went crabbing with my brother in Mandurah in the estuary -  after 1.5hrs in the water dropping 6 nets - we got 13 crabs which were sized - some of them were just size, but others were quite a bit over - it was rough as guts on the water and the wind was blowing quite badly - we probably would have got our limit of 20 had we stayed out for longer.

One thing that we found was that the yellow markers were far more visible than other markers in the choppy water (with the worst being the white ones which blended in withe the chop). We also found that there were heaps and heaps of blowies and that they were attacking the bait. In some of the nets I have those black baskets which we put trumpeters in for bait cut in half, and in the others on the bait clips I put chicken wings.

 Was a good time out but would probably go in better weather next time. I also tried for the first time putting the crabs in an ice/water slush and found that the crabs went to 'sleep' and were easier to handle, and were also kept better for the trip home to perth.

Got this report in from my mate AndyLoops:

Where to start! We had a blinder of a day last Friday out of Nelson Bay. Joined a charter on a boat called Calypso with Captn Tim Dean and Muzz (these guys have Champion Boat at the Port Stephens Interclub the last 4 years and one of the most successful running out of Port) we were hopeful as most boats been getting 4 or 5 a day in the week leading up to Friday.

Anyway I didnt even bring a camera as I was flying solo but there was a guy joining the crew who writes for a gamefishing mag in British Columbia.. As a result I was very lucky to be able to produce these two pics! (I was stoked when he sent them to me as the fishwrecked logo is nicely presented - You and I had joked about this over a year ago!)

The first pic is a small black about 60kg - we picked him up first line in the water at 9.05am and had him to the boat quicktime. First Marlin and first black for me so I was stoked! That fish had been a long
time in the making! Anyway, the second photo was my third fish for the day - a better Stripey of about
110kg - unfortunately cant see him as the skipper went a bit nuts on the reverse and straight into a nice bit of eastern australian current generated chop! Muzz got the leader and we let him go. The guy that took the pics reckons that water shot is going to be a full pager in the magazine article!

Anyway - little did we know that first little black greyhound was the start of 2 hours of fishing MADNESS. From 9.15 to 11.30pm we raised 14 fish and had multiple double hookups (3 times double hookups and we only lost 1 of the 6 fish..!) with 11 fish to the boat from 12 strikes. We were exclusively skipping Bonito around bait balls 20-40m on the sounder and pitching the odd Slimie mackeral to a fussy fish.

Some highlights from the day include:

* Pulling a holographic shoal teaser to the back of the boat only to have a lit up striped Marlin swim up to it and whack it with its bill - right in front of me!!!
* Tracing a +100kg striped Marlin at the back of the boat while the fish still really green - I was $hitting myself - this thing was bigger than me and was tail walking in the prop wash!!! I reached out and the leader popped as soon as the glove made contact - went off like a rifle and I was half relieved...!
* Watching a guy nail two big striped Marlin without the use of his legs wheelchair bound.. He went to work with a bent but stick on 80! Champion effort.
* Cant speak highly enough of Calypso. Those guys are the best over here and I learned so much just watching the deckie all morning.

Anyway this is only the start of the season as we have a couple months to go yet. I will be back up there all March.

Mate - I am heading here in April http://www.goldeneaglefiji.com/ for 5 days of liveaboard action on the deep seamounts.... Primarily chasing monster dogtooth tuna but wouldn't mind a Blue haha. Will be packing the
fishwrecked shirts for that one as well :-) Leaving in 6 weeks! Happy Days. :)

Hey folks,

The Surfcasting and Angling Club of WA did a Hill River run over the weekend as I have a mate in the club thought I would head up yesterday to join them for a fish. Friday's report before my arrival was a few herring, patchy tailor and a couple of whiting. I think I heard there was one 2.4kg tailor taken but conditions were pretty average due to the breeze.

With this in mind, I hit up Cervantes jetty for a look when I arrived yesterday arvo. Bagged out on herring within about an hour - they were thick as. Also had a bit of help from a local (John) who helped fill the bucket. Went up to Hill River to meet the guys who were catching some black bream in the river - but again wind was keeping most rods out of the water. Dropped off some herring to keep them happy and decided to make Cervantes my spot for the evening.

Caught a few live herring and put one out on a balloon. After about an hour I had a good run and it was my first ever shark - a white tip reefy. Unfortunately it wrapped around the ladder of the jetty and took off on me, snapping the braid. Mate reckons it would have gone about 1.2 - 1.3m but I didn't get a decent look. It pulled hard though, even on the big gear (120lb braid, OF95 reel and big OzFlex rod!).

All went quiet after that so started baitcasting. Got snagged, or at least I thought I did - but I actually had a reasonable occy on the end that had taken me back into the reef. Occy was cooked and pickled this arvo (another first for me). Bloody yum. Although it seems to be a fine art cooking them...

Shortly after, another run on the big rod. Another reef shark - this one either a black tip or maybe a spinner - I'm still trying to ID. I do have a pic that I will post later but it is only with my phone as the camera batteries died at the crucial moment! This one was 85cm so I kept it for a feed. Feisty little bugger, but just happy to get it on the jetty given I didn't have a gaff! Enjoyed a fillet for lunch today - very tasty!

Another reef shark probably 30 mins later...this one a bit bigger maybe 1.1 - 1.2m. Fought well, and with help from a local hauled it out of the water again without the use of a gaff. Didn't get a pic unfortunately as I was running on adrenaline and it was returned to the water to swim again.

Baitcasting for tailor after dark I got into the sharks twice more - and lost both times as I was on really light gear.

A few lads joined me from the club after dark as the herring were still jumping at 11pm when we left...and probably still going now.

All told I came home with a bag of herring, reasonable occy and nice shark - a very happy man.

All sharks caught on a live herring ballooning off the NW corner. Apparantly 5ft hammerhead landed on Friday night on the jetty - interesting as the locals there reckon sharks are pretty rare on the service jetty.

Anyway, great day out for me. Lots of firsts and after half a dozen trips up that way it was nice to finally get into something bigger!

Cheers,

Rob

I'm heading out tomorrow afternoon/night to fish the hillarys north wall with a mate and was wondering how it has been fishing lately?