Hi all heading down to Austalind on the llong weekend 

are they scooping any crabs at the  moment  info on where to try would be appreciated 

 Hi all,

Went down to the local store in Perth today and was told there is a bit of pollution in the Murchinson river at the moment with accounts of dead fish and ill health upon locals. I would just like to confirm this news with anyone here that's up there as I've planned a trip to Kalbarri in 2 weeks time. 

Thanks in advance,

B

 So after takeing a couple of mates for a while now, decided to join them in the wet stuff. 

Did my first cray dives over the weekend, those loop thingys are harder To use than it looks. After a couple of dives I'm starting to get the hang of it but. My mate got 3 on the first day, we managed 9 keepers between 2 on The second day's attempt. 

Headed up to Jurien bay on Saturday afternoon with the weather meant to be awesome on Sunday. Stayed in the Caravan park in town in the swags and hit the pub for a counter meal and a few beers before getting a few hours sleep and up bright and early.

Up at 4am, and on the water before 5am saw us heading out well before light.

There was a little wind early on, but nothing to complain about, and headed out at 25+ knots. Decided to check out the barges on the way out for a little sambo action to warm up with. It was jigs only today, no bait onboard.

Plenty of sambos showing up on the sounder mid water, so swung the boat around and lined up our first drift.
First drift resulted in me landing a 50cm flattie, which I thought was bloody weird in 50m of water, only to get another on jig on the 2nd drift at 55cm! First for me to land flatties on jigs.

Swung around for the 3rtd drift and finally a couple of solid hook-ups, both Scano and I were on. After a few minutes these 2 came up, which was a surprise. I knew they were about but didn't expect to get any so easily!

High 5's all round as it was our first mullas on jig.

Decided to swing round for another drift, and I hooked up solid again. I expected it to be another Mulla, which I really didn't want as they don't release well and we already had 2, but to my surprise up popped this 9-10kg fish!

Was pretty happy with this one, my best dhu on jig to date.

Did a couple more drifts trying to find some sambo's but they just didn't want to play today.

so moved out a bit to some ground I had found in the past and sounded about on a new area. Plenty of fish about, with us landing fish on every spot, even venturing out to the 70m finding more fish.

Scano landed a nice Dhu on jig as well.

We ended up getting our bag on Demersals with 2 dhus, 5 black ass and 1 pinky.

On the way in decided to give the barges 1 more go to see if the sambo's would fire up.

First drift, both me and Den were on.....but not your typical Sambo fight... and up popped 2 more mullas.. So we called it a day and headed in

All in all a great day out, plenty of fish caught with us landing 16 Dhu's included and all released fish were healthy and released well.

Had some Mullaway last night, and it tasted really good, I was hesitant but was happily surprised with the taste.

Bodie

 Hey went out Saturday morning to a spot at wonnerup and got 8 good sized males in 40 mins threw 2 smallest ones back as 6 was plenty for me, they were full of meat was a good feed,

Just a short report on my Exmouth trip last week with a mate.
Weather was pretty good, hot obviously, and we seem to catch more fish on the days with a bit of wind/swell.
We trolled off Tantabiddi early most mornings for some big Spaniards, caught 5 and released 3. We lost another one right on the strike to a shark. We lost 2 fish to sharks for the whole trip, but they were never far away.

Had a Trevally session inside the reef one afternoon which was great fun. Caught some big Gold Spot Trevally and heaps of Queenies and Bludger Trevally. One Gold Spot turned into a large whaler shark which I got boatside before it had one last dive under the boat, snapping my jigging rod. (not cheap a PE8 Seed Shiren!)

Fished the beaches most nights for some Spanglies, Queenies and Baldchin, also a couple of sharks landed and released and a Coral Trout caught from the beach.

Here's some of the better fish.

Cheers, Pondy

Hi All,

Just wondering what the Cray movements are like at the moment?

Have they started coming back in close to the FFB yet

Cheers

Ash

 younger bro caught this in the swan.

Very interesting is missing a back paddle leg

Saturday morning arrives and the wind is still humping, the same as it has been doing for the past couple of months. The only decent days seem to be during the week when I have to work. I tried convincing my boss to allow me to work from Thursdays to Mondays, and I guess you know what the answer was.

After consulting WillyWeather the evening before it was evident that the afternoon would see a small window of fishable weather as the wind changed from an Easterly to a Southerly. Regular crew member Nic was unable to make it, the missus had an assignment to complete, and it was short notice to find anybody else interested. So it was another solo session, but what the heck! I had been becoming grumpy (or grumpier as the missus would say) and needed to get the smell of fresh Indian Ocean up my nostrils and escape the reality of the crazy world around us for a while.

I launched from Woodman Point at 10:00 and made my way toward Seaward Reef on Five Fathom Bank. As I approached the area I noticed two large schools of Tuna smashing the bait fish and tried unsuccessfully to entice them in taking my Halco Twisty. Being solo it was difficult to keep up with these fish as they were constantly changing direction. I decided to rather drag a couple of scalies behind the boat in anticipation of a good take. After two drifts I gave it up as a bad job and made my way to a bommie on the 40m mark about 10km further west in an area where I had seen activity before. When I arrived at this bommie the sounder indicated activity, but nothing compared to the previous time that I had been there. I tried a couple of casts with a soft plastic (7 inch Gulp Jerk Shad) with no success. By now the wind had abated somewhat and I decided to throw caution to the wind (literally) and race off to a spot near Rotto where I always seem to get a decent fish or two.

When I arrived at “the spot” I dropped the parachute anchor to slow the drift whist dragging a weighted scalie behind the boat. After a short while I picked up a bronzie and as I was bringing it up from the depths below I noticed a kingie following it up. I dropped the weighted plastic into the swim and continued fighting the bronzie which eventually bit me off (thankfully). The next moment the rod with the SP started protesting and I set the hook into what I believe was a YTKF, as it reefed me within seconds.

Without further action I anchored upwind from a fishy bommie and started burleying scalie cubes. Within a couple of minutes I started landing undersized (only just) pinkies and hooking up into a few bronzies. A little later I hooked into a YTKF which almost took my rod overboard before I eventually landed it. For the rest of the two and a half hours that I spent at this spot, I managed a decent sambo, a breaksea cod and a pinkie for the pot. By 18:30 the wind started picking up again and I decided to call it a day and make my way back to the ramp before either the wind or darkness caught me.

Even though the session was of short duration, it was good enough to satisfy the craving for another week, maximum two.

YouTube clip - http://youtu.be/tW-3RN-rEqk

So a good forecast for Friday saw an early finish at work, and the boat was in the water heading behind Garden Island with high expectations. Seas were good, but there was a reasonable swell running, nothing over the top. Warm humid and overcast conditions added to sense of expectation.

After reaching the five fathom bank, the plan was to follow it North trolling, with the occasional stop for a bottom bounce. Out went Decky Dave's laser pro 190, and not a minute later it was hit. I started bringing it in, then said "nah, it's off." There was no weight on the line, but I could still feel occasional head shakes, so dragged it back in, wondering what it could be. As it got near the boat, I could make out an elongated silver form, with a long mouth full of sharp teeth. First thought was a baby mackie, but when it came on board was a 70cm snook, that had been foul hooked through the eye and gills. It looked terminal, so instead of being released it ended up as some nice strip baits for next time. It was good to at least see some teeth marks on the Laser Pro, and we thought it was a good sign that there was some action about.

Next stop was Casuarina shoal for a bottom bounce, and I think it was my second or third drop and up comes a nice and fat black arse, you rippa, and into the ice slurry. Decky Dave is complaining about the swell, and following my advice from previous trips (if you're going to spew, you might as well make it taste good!) starts downing the coke zero and rips into a packet of Salt & Vinegar chips. The decision is made to keep moving, hoping that will make the poor dear feel a bit better.

No more hits on the laser pro, but as we approched Seaward reef, the birds gave away some action. As we got closer the excitement started to build, and dear old petal was starting to feel better. Big splashes on the surface, and bait fish jumping high to escape the predators below. The tuna were out to play, and they were playing hard! Huge surface splashes with fish clearly visible, and some big fish in there. We couldn't entice them to hit the laser pro without driving right through them and spooking them, so I pulled up the boat short of the action, and Decky Dave grabbed the closest rod that was already rigged with a gold 30g twisty. (It just happened to be the lightest combo on the boat) First cast heads towards the school but falls about 5m short. Dave startes the retreive and then BANG! it is on!

The poor little Shimano didn't know what hit it, and I can honestly say I have never seen a fish take line like this thing did. The hookup only lasted probably twenty seconds or so, before pulling the hooks, but man, what an adrenalin buzz. All thoughts of seasickness gone, we drifted and kept casting near the schools as they busted up, at times there were schools on both sides and ahead of us, absolute madness. Couple this with the swells breaking at times over the top of the reef made for some pretty hectic action, but we couldn't manage any more hookups. DD even tried his own special blend of burley, a mixture of coke zero & salt & vingar chips, without success.

The decision was made to have another go trolling, yes, DD was looking green again. After several laps around the school towing the laser pro and a popper, we couldn't get any action. The schools seemed to be getting used to us, and we could get in closer and closer without spooking them. We finally got another hit on the laser pro, but no hookup. DD did a pretty good job of steering the boat in close to the school, watching the breaking swells and berlying all at the same time, but eventually it got too much and he called it.

So we left masses of tuna busting up, on a rising tide, aproaching sunset without even trying for a bottom bash, to head inside garden island and out of the swell. I was quite pleased to note that on the way in, even though we weren't trolling, he was still giving the burleying a massive go, leant over the side just as the boat came down off one of the swells and he managed a nice saltwater mouthwash, hehehe...

Back inside the island we anchored up for some bread & butter stuff, but apart from a couple of 35cm pinkies (obviously returned) the only thing to show was a thumping occy that took, you guessed it, a piece of occy. A couple of beers as we watched the sun go down, and talked about the tuna madness we had just seen, when I mentioned to DD that he must forever wear the panties of shame, for calling mercy on such a promising trip. With a look of resignation he said "yeah, I was expecting that, but I nearly passed out and went all tingly and stuff" - whatever!

So now, FW crew, it's over to you. All suggestions for panties styles & colours will be welcome, and he will be forced to wear them on the next trip (over his boardies, don't need any wardrobe malfunctions thank you very much!)

I headed out with the old man tonight on the swan for a crab despite hearing a few reports they had died off in the last few days we went out regardless.  Left Pt Walter ramp around 5:45 pm and after some shit chop we rounded the marks and were off around the spit and into the lee of Blackwall reach.  We only had 8 nets and on unwinding one the old man saw the mesh bottom depart to the bottom so we were down to 7 nets.  Two tuna heads in each pot saw us off to a slow start with no crabs in the first two pulls.  

On the third run we got our first size crab with a few undersize and berried females thrown back, then another two size crabs.  It still wasnt hot and there were a few boats working Blackies so we picked up two of our nets and repositioned them off chidley pt which was also quite calm.

From then on it just took off with at least 3-4 crabs per pull of the 7 nets, often with two size crabs per pot. Headed in by 10pm with 19 nice swan river crabs.  Another top night on the swan with dad.

Bryan 

 My boat arrived from Brisbane today delivered by CBC Interstate Courier. They really did a great job, boat arrived without any problems definitely recommend them.

 Hi guys Any beaches producing tailor or anything else around busso at the moment,just looking for somewhere easy access and close, as I might be limeted for time,I may get a chance over weekend if all fails I may just try the jetty,be gratefully for any reports or suggestions cheers!

Bit of a late report from a couple of weeks back and the photos are pretty ordinary as they were taken on an Iphone. Some good fish landed across the 3 species and good to see the Fingermark are on the chew.

We got one 'small' Fingermark around 60 and the rest were over 70 cm. The biggest went 81cm. The Nannygai were about 6 and 7 kilos and Narelle once again got the biggest fish of the trip with a 12 kilo Gold spot, my favourite eating fish.

Hey guys went up too Garvey park today with my cousin to catch a few bream. Got there around 6am and began to fish. Got a lot of small bream and a lot of big yellowtail grunter earlier on but then we had a bit of a dry spell so we decide to move long the river a bit to a few more snags.So I was sitting there holding my 3-5kg rovex air strike rod and then all of a sudden it doubled over and my reel started to scream. I instantly thought BIG BREAM! I fought the fish up and down the bank for about 2 minutes then started to worry when it started heading towards some big snags along the bank. I got a bit of line back on him when he ran me into the snag unsure emoticon (fantastic I thought) I tried to get it out but with no success it snapped me off. I tried and tried to get him to bite again but had no luck. About 1 hour or so later my bigger Rod with a live trumpeter on it which I put out hoping to get a mullaway got tight and started to loose a bit of line very slowly. I pick it up and striked and then what ever it was took off like a rocket for about a 15-20 metre run then bit straight through my 80lb leader. Then I got thinking would this have been a bullshark that far up river I don't know. But all in all it was a great days fishing and also great to get out of the house just before school starts again.

 Hi guys

Just a heads up to anyone going past Binningup that there are a few big schools of whiting schooling up right in front of the boat launching area and swimming beach. I went for a dive amoungst them today with the Go-Pro - it is a pretty shit video due to not getting down there until after the sea breeze came in, but I will try to upload it to Youtube anyway and will post a link. There are thousands in the school (some are big!!!), and would be great for the kids to have a dive amoungst them (only 5 - 10m from shore). I dont know how long they will hang around for, but they have been there for the past few days and if they move too far along the beach the pros will net them...

Would be great fun with poppers....

I decided to have a crack at Yellowfin Whiting popping after reading so many articles on the topic both from fishing magazines and FW reports.

Fellow FW member (John) is kind enough to show me the ropes. According to him, there are no hard and fast rules. So I rocked up at the estuary, armed with my bream outfit and a bag full of tiny lures, I was ready to give the ‘tings a serious bash.

To my delight , we arrived at the spot with glassed out condition but John was concerned that might put the fish off. We walked about 2km into the flats and started casting from the middle of the flats towards the shore. The lure of choice for me was Sugapen 70F in tiger prawn colour. I had replaced the Owner Trebles with twin assist hooks. After a few retrieve the mirror surface was shattered by a mini explosion and I was on! My heart nearly skipped a beat!  After a short fight, I landed my first Yellowfin whiting on popper. I was stoked to say the least, managed to deflower a new lure! 2nd cast, pop, pop, pop and bang! Another hook-up, another fin landed.  Although I had my polarized on, I couldn’t spot the fish but was merely blind casting to prospective spots. By the 5th fish, I said to Johh that it’s time to give other lures a chance.

CHECK OUT THE MIRROR CONDITION.

On my next hook-up, I backed down my drag such that the fish would peel some line off the reel. Finally my Complex Ci4+ 2500S F6 screamed in protest – sounded like sweet music to my ears. 

I went through a handful of lures and deflowered a good number of them. By noon, the fish were fired up and it didn’t matter whether the tide was incoming or outgoing or if the wind churned up a chop. These feisty litter buggers were shouldering each other to get a piece of the hook! At one stage, one fish actually went absolutely air-borne and crashed onto the lure before hooking up. That was absolutely insane!

I had an absolute ball and between both of us we landed at least 30 fish, biggest measuring 35cm. We released all fish less than 30cm and kept a few for the table. Add in those that missed the hooks we are looking at 50 over strikes for the morning sesh!

There were several highlights of the trip :

1.     John landed a mullet on his Atomic surface lure. Not foul hook but bona fide hook-up.  Who says mullet doesn't take lure ? Lol.

2.     I hooked up a whiting on micro metal squid but the fish threw the hook whilst I was unhooking it, so there’s no photo to show. (bugger!)

3.     I also landed another whiting on Rapala Husky Jerk minnow!

4.     I tried micro jigging and landed one foul hooked on Saurus micro jig of 5g!! Obviously the fish made an attempt to eat the jig and got hooked in the process.

Micro Jagging or Micro Jigging ??

5.     Last but not least, double header on my Sugapen! How good is that ?

6.     One fired up whiting actually made 5 attempts to inhale the lure before hooking up! It went boof, boof, boof, boof, boof, BANG!

These are the thoughts I’ve gathered from this short sesh:

1.    Most whiting popping articles advocate working the lure consistently to mimic a fleeing prawn. They claim stopping the lure will result in the fish shying away. My experience tells me that ain’t true. In fact, I’ve caught whiting on the pause or when the lure sits completely still in the water! The twin assist one being shorter than the other also ensured a secured hook up. It is not uncommon to have 2 hooks in a fish mouth, or one in the mouth and another outside. There’s no way the fish is getting away no matter how hard it thrashes around.

2.     The same articles also advocate mono over fluoro carbon leader claiming the latter will sandbag the surface lure, dampening its action. I was using 8-10lb FC and that didn’t seem to discourage the tingz.

3.     I also read somewhere that the lure should track straight ‘cos that’s how shrimps behave when they skitter across the surface to escape predation. So I tried walking the dog in a zig zag fashion but didn’t seem to put the fish off either.

4.     Use a rod of less than 7”. My MajorCraft AirRock Kurodai (black bream) Special is 7”3 - too long for this purpose. I find it difficult to stab the rod side ways to induce walk-the-dog action because the rod tip will be poking into the water. To compensate that, my rod was held high pointing towards the sky all the time, resulting in sore shoulder and upper back.

5.     Change the trebles for singles or assist hooks. In fact the latter will fare better than the former due to the downward facing mouth position of the tingz. They are designed to suck up worms and prawns from the sand, not snatching prey from the surface.

6.     They are no prawns visible in the estuary that I fish. I reckon the fish just struck the lure out of aggression and hunger. So any preys small enough to fit the gob will be food. That may explain why the Rapala Husky Jerk got nailed!

Thanks for reading. :)

 Friends of mine just got home said they got over 14 fish at the reserve today, flathead an bream all returned to water. Sounds like be worth visiting this week.

Never been there myself but off to check tomorrow.

Went down to Harvey last night for some marroning.

Overall was fairly quiet and the wind was up a bit, but managed these two jumbo's. Both had 140mm carapace's

 Popped down to Herron point for a baitfish miss and got afue mullet for bait and as I was netting there was afue squid getting around ,so on went the jigs and I got 3 squid 

 a good mate just got back to the ramp as I was getting back to the car and he had got afue prawns and gave me a handful  ,that's Macca 

 so the end result was 30 mullet ,3 squid and a hand full of prawns , a god way to kill some time Exmouth style 

       Jeff 

 Did a bit of early morning scooping along the Coondanup foreshore and Dampier Ave with pretty disappointing results. Only managed 9 crabs between the 4 of us. Barely any crabs out, even undersized ones were few and far between. Coondanup also seemed pretty weedy compared to last year, not too many sandy spots. Even chucked the mask and snorkel and dunked my head under to have a better look and nada. Hoping it might just be this particular weekend.

Not sure if it was because the tide was going out, or if because the weather's been a little on the cool side lately, but it was sparse pickings this morning. Had a chat to an older couple walking the flats and even they've never seen it this bare. Anyone else had any luck early morning scooping in the estuary?

A group of us went out this morning with Allan from Shikari charters (0412131958) to hunt some pink snapper.

After a some-what slow start they came on the bite big time, with plenty of snapper to share around. 
Was a morning of great fishing & great company. We might have even got some tuna, if "Wiggy" hadn't spooked them by planting his ballista popper right in the middle of the school on the way back!

If you want to experience some crazy snapper softplastic action right on our doorstep this weekend give Allan a call.

Visit www.shikari.com.au 

Even those afflicted by sea-sickness managed to catch fish! (well sort of).

Largest fish went 85cm

Softplastics did the damage (gulp/madeye paddle prawn/zman)

 We left last Saturday to start our new chapter in our life. I had a decent night the night before so instead of leaving at 4 am we left at 8 pm .

First stop Horrox. Went for a walk along the beach with my girlfriend and dog to find some gutters. 

Got excited when i saw a monster fish head on the beach which i intislly thought belongdd to a mulloway from a distance. 

Ended up being a cod of some sought possible a queensland groper do back to camp to grab the rods and fish the beavh outside the carvan park. Had now bait so i used gulp bloodworms and 1 inch grubs which i converted into dart, herring, sandwhiting and tarwhine.  

Now with bait sorted it was time for the big rod to come out. 

The dart fillet resulted into a decent 40cm tailor which i strippef baited and managsd another 6 tsilor between my girlfriend and myself. Also landed 3 stingqrays and had a possible mulloway run which spat the hooks  3 mins into the fight. 

The next day it was Coral bays turn. I had kept the tailor on ice as its a great bait

Hi all,

I'll be taking the boat down to Augusta next week and was thinking of launching from the new marina. Does anyone know if there has been much action recently down around that way ?
If so, would I need to go out far ?

Cheers

I’m just back from Bremer Bay, on WA's south coast, where I spend last night and yesterday.

I haven’t been rock fishing in years and spontaneously decided to head down for a quick solo fish.

The spot I intended heading was bottoming out the Triton, so I reluctantly gave it away and had to suss out a new spot.

New spot didn't have very deep water for kingfish and snapper, but was safe and contained plenty of species to keep me intrigued on light gear. Most fish released, but got a feed.

Pretty amazing variety of species, makes every bite interesting. Breaksea cod (black arse - nice on the fang), wobbegongs, skippy (silver trevally and this one turned yellow for a photo), leatherjackets, herring (tommy rough), western rock blackfish, zebra fish, wirrah cod, buff bream (silver drummer), sea sweep and different wrasse.

Also saw heaps of seals, 2 mallee hens and vibrantly marked tiger snake.

A big effort/drive (6hrs one way) for an overnighter, but just swimming in that big rock pool with beach all to one’s self was worth it.

 Went out early yesterday for some crabs. Got 7 crabs all over 150mm, with the smallest one kept measuring 135mm not bad size for Mandurah. Spent 2 hours out there but took our time to make a few upgrades. 

Fish box too small. Deckie has a heck of a time getting it in.

 Good trip south for our once a year Marroning trip the wind was  blowing it,s head off but it keeped the fly,s away and Mozzies at night 

"You don't get in life what you want.
You get your life what you ARE....not what you want.
We can always become more while working to develop ourselves."

"What give your life a sense of fullfillment,
a sense of joy.
What does a full rich life mean to you ?
What is that you could love doing seven days a week that will bring
a smile to your face.."

" Live your DREAM."

Hope to share my dream with you guys here.

"This is my DREAM."

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpC3b6g2mBI

I've been chasing and fishing wild snakehead for a long time, my big break came in 13th april 2013.
I finally achieved my long time dream.... to attain the IGFA World Record for Giant Snakehead.

With God blessings and hard works, I've lived my DREAM.

IGFA WR for snakehead 2013.- Biggest achievement in life.

Others  big catches of my life.

Giant Mekong Catfish.

Giant Freshwater Stingray.

Sebarau (Jungle Perch)- Hampala

Arapaima fish on topwater popper lure.

Hi,

Anyone catching any Tuna around Rotto or out wide towards the FADS and the Trench?

What sort of sizes, are they still small footballs or are they starting to fatten up a bit?

What is the weed situation when trolling?

Cheers

WB