2 nights in a row!!!
I just got back from mandurah and we were cleaning up on 300mm to 380mm tailor and herring. We kept our bag limit them went home leaving them still on the bite...

Loads of tailor and 3kg salmon!!!

Christmas for the Dreamweaver family promised to be a quiet affair, with only one of our four children making the trip down to Mount Barker. Emma, our eldest daughter had promised to come down - minus the partner and duly arrived on Christmas evening, accompanied by all the presents - hers and everyone else's. The plan was for her to be the 'present messenger', taking all ours back up to Perth on Boxing Day Morning.

We'd discussed what we would do, and Emma, always ready to have a crack at fishing on the boat, suggested we do just that.

So, after final preparations the day before Christmas, we loaded the boat and set off at 06:15am and were down at Emu Point boat ramp for 07:00am.

As expected, the ramp was pretty quiet, although unlike last year, we were not the first. There was already one empty boat trailer parked and another chap in front of us. 

After watching him doing everything wrong )he obviously hadn't read my Boat Ramp Etiquette article in FWA's November issue ) and preparing the boat, we dipped the hull into a glassy low tide Oyster Harbour:

After some discussion as we made the long 8 knott arc through the channel, we'd decided that, with a SW swell and moderate wind, and the promise of both to increase later in the morning, we'd head out around Eclipse Island, some 15nm from base. Promised conditions weren't perfect by any means - but that's Albany for you.

By the time we reached the mouth of King George sound, everyone was eager to get out there:

The trip to Eclipse Island was fairly slow going, with a fairly lumpy head sea, despite the low seas and swell.

But by 09:00 am we had reached our destination and I'd set us up on a drift across some good structure.

With Sandra and Emma on board, the requirement to assist removing fish, my role as the photographer, and the need to log all the catches, it promissed to be a VERY busy morning for me!

Sandra was first to drop her line and immediately brought up our first for the day - a nice 50cm Harlequin:

Action was aplenty as Sandra followed that five minutes later with a 45cm Fox Fish, followed by Emma 5 minutes later with a double header of swallow tail, then her own Foxy: followed by a good sized wrasse:

Moments later, Sandra's rod buckled and, after some struggle and some grunting and groaning, a very respectable skippy was brought on board:

It was just before 10:00am and things went quiet, so I decided we'd set up a slightly different drift over alternative ground. Thirty minutes later Emma was first down and immediately her rod buckled - indicating a decent fish, with lots of head thrusts and the occasional line peel. I called it immediately for a blue morwong and was right. A nice 52cm specimen came on board:

After that, and only 6 minutes later it was action a plenty with a nice black bum from Sandra, a Foxy for me, and a double header (Nanny and BA) for Emma - all hitting the deck at the same time. I was going to be VERY busy! 

Sandra's Black Bum:

Emma's Double Header:

14 minutes later - Emma followed up with another double header - another Red and a swallow tail - here's the red:

Then Sandra's rod buckled savegly and I could see she was loosing line far too fast and was dangerously close to being buried in the structure below. At Sandra and Emma's prompting, I took over. Try as I may, I could not retreive any line:

I might add that this last hook up was whilst anchored and we found out later that the fish had snagged the other paternosta rig hook on the anchor line.

Like I said, conditions weren't perfect, but they could have been worse:

Between the three of us, we had a fair hall of fish, and called it for home just before Noon.  

Here's the log (some changes to be made):

Went for a dive today at a local marina and broke in the new gear, was surprised to find more crays inside rather than on the outside the rock wall. Caught a few but they were all undersize, and most by quite a long way :(

does any1 no which beach in the metro area is going off with tailor and what bait should be used

Just recieved the photo's and video's from the boys from Xzoga so I tought I would get the photo's up before I prepare to go to my Christmas party. Will try and get some video clips up onto youtube over the holidays. And a Very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all from the staff from SeasonsRods and Xzoga.

Started both days with a wonderful breakfirst that Craig prepared for us, make sure we fill up for the day's work!

Craig giving us our safety briefing before we headed out.

Now getting on our way for some FUN!!!

Brenz eagerly waiting to get amongst the Samsons and must be trying to get some secret tips off Mitch.

Loaded rods and more loaded rods.

Hey Brenz the rod even goes with your jacket! I saw a really good clip of this fight on the dvd the rod was so loaded that it almost went straight! if you know what I mean.... hehhehe Either way you'll just have to see it!! 

Our skipper Craig on the Taka Si5518 

Our battle gear.

Samsons!

Yours truely with the Xzoga Taka JI5518 nicely loaded with a Samson.

Photos of the last few Samsons for our second day's effort.

A final group photo before we headed back to our accomodations. 

After the two days of hard fishing the rods were cleaned and ready for packing for the trip home.

went down to hillarys with Liam(SOI) this morning with it starting off slow then with a bit of burley a nice tailor turned up to the young italian bloke next to us,

a few skippy followed this then the bloke next to us hooked a nice occy and lost it at the rocks but liam managed to hook another occy and bring it in...

after a bit more burleying liam brought up a nice tailor and was pretty stoked with that.

just as i was packing up to go home in enviousness for me having a slow day we noticed a big wobby cruising next to the rocks looking for scraps, liam dropped a whole skippy down on 9/0 snells and the wobby grabbed it. He thrashed about for a while but by the time we had located a gaff he had snuck under a rock....liam fought it for a while before the hooks dropped out its mouth

but it was certainly amazing to see a big wobby inhale a whole skippy

 didnt get much myself but at least i am re assured that there are fish in hillarys after a long run of bugger all

cheers,

Reuben

woke up this morning at about 4 to leave the house. got on my bike and left by 43o, hoping to arrive at hillaries by 5. luck was not on my side though, crashing twice into bushes. on th second crash i scraped my legs and my bike got a bit scratched. then when i got back up to ride, i realised that my crank on my bike had bent otta shape witch ment i couldnt ride. :(
about 5 minutes later, i called rueben (fishoreub) to tell him id be a bit late and that i had realsied that my ROD HAD BROKEN !!!!!!!!!!
thats 2 rods broken in a week. bad luck for me
i got down there at just after 530 to find reub trying for squid. i had a handline spooled up with 12lb for leader ad tied a squid jig on. we then moved to the north wall and we had no luck. tried with poppers for some fun but nuthing wanted to bite. reuben ended up leaving around 2pm and i was a bout to go when someone i knew came so i continued fishing. time got away from me and before i realised it, it was just before 9pm and dad came to pick me up.
14 HOURS FISHING AND ONLY ONE SKIPPY!!!!!!!!!

Yes we finally got out for a fish ,the weather was a little choppy but the fish were out to play, and it didn't take long to get the first fish ,only a sambo but still a fish . Jody was along for the ride and was also into the fish dam another sambo time to move. As the wind was blowing a bit we set up drift, and waited for the wind to drop so we could get set on the patches .But the rods were going off even on to flat .Ended up being a great day with
2x sambo, released
10x dhuies 5 released all fish released were 580-620mm
3x baldchin
4x blackass
and a few sargent baker and wrasse,one large stingray ,and we drop some good fish . An awesome day,so its fresh fish for christmas.

  Feral, ya gonna love this...Told you my my boat was cursed!

Loaded up on Saturday for the good weather and then took the wife out, got home bout 12'ish and put the rods and reels in the cab so i could have a quick start.

How many fisho's do this??

Woke up bout four hours later, threw in the bait...GONE!

3 Shimano Torsa reels fully loaded

3 Shimano Jig Rex rods

1 Shimano Stella 10'000

1 Shimano T-Curve rod

At least they left my squid rod so I could feed the family for Christmas...How's that for a sense of humour?

Anyway,sob,sob, If anyone gets offered any cheap gear please let me know so I can float test them out behind Rotto

Dont hold out too much hope though.

To all the Fishwrecked fraternity...Merry Christmas, IT's been an enjoyable year reading you're posts.

Great fishing and keep you're opinions coming- they match what most fishermen think and feel about OUR RESOURCE!! albeit shared.

Feral...GET A JOB!!!!! Any man who spends as much time in front of the screen as you and IS'NT looking at porn has some serious issues.

To all the rest,See you on the water...WAZ

A nice mix from Sunday.

Well it was a great day out today. I didnt do to well as its my first time jigging lol. Seen some big sambos landed and got some great pics. All in all a great day and it was a pleasure to meet all of yaz today.

Leaving bright and early

A good chance to get some cool pics on the way out..

Some of the quality ammo

The fights on!!

More pics coming...

Took Jess out for a dive off the boat this morning, to a reef north of two rocks. He was a little nervous,but soon got comfortable. Not much to see, heaps of wrase and small cod few crays all undersize ,he did realy well and reached a depth of 10m ,we are doing the pool dive tomorrow for his scuba ticket.Another week and he will be ready for some cray catching .

Dug up sum pics from our first exmouth trip the first two days were flat calm .it didn't last long with the wind blowing every day after .We still had a great trip and got some nice fish.
tandibidi ramp


Jesses first mac

first dollie

shark bait

Hi guys,

Just putting up a quick report to let you know how I am at the moment. Last night I was invited out to fish with some friends at their mate's pond in Singapore. It's saltwater and is something similar to 'Golden Ponds' in Perth, with the exception being the kind of fish its stocked with - GTs, jacks, barra, cobia, cods, groupers, tarpon, and all sorts of other nasty ooglies. A few of the GTs in there are as big as 15kg, and the pond has a generous supply of stakes and jetties to keep things interesting. There is even something of a 'wall of shame' where broken reels and rods of the past are hung up to warn visitors. Anyway, my kind of place

This pond is pretty famous amongst the international sportfishing circuit, with a number of 'celebrities' stopping by from time to time. (Report 1) (Report 2) Even though the fish are confined (to a large pond), from what I've seen they fight just as hard and just as dirty. In addition to this, they seem to have one major advantage, a PhD in lures - and the whole pond is lures only. Trust me when I say they have seen just about any lure in the book. Their vision during night and day must also be a perfect 20/20.

Edward, who runs the pond, is a true sportfisherman in that only barbless singles are allowed, no baits, and unless its a very special fish most of the release occurs without even lifting the fish out of water - just dehooking with a pair of long-nose pliers. The pond is a part-time hobby for him and anglers are allowed to fish for his 'pets' by appointment only.

The trick with getting a fish to hit the lure, and some of these lures could be an intricately carved 80$ work of art, is to wait until the baitfish are released for feeding. Even then, it is the strictest case of matching the hatch - the wrong colour or a centimetre oversize and the fish won't even fart at your offering. There is nothing more frustrating than dragging a 40$ lure through boiling water and not even getting a touch. Only because the colour isn't exactly the same. In the end, we got into a few each (mostly GTs and 1 cobia), but apparently it wasn't as hot as it could be, as some days the fish really let their guard down.

Anyway, for a big city, this is a convenient, quick fix for some clean fun amongst good friends.

Around the pond are also some large aquariums holding some really interesting and exotic fish. These are all freshwater, but some of them (the araipamas) would have been 100kg easy. If only I could catch them. One of these days I should really visit Bungsamram in Thailand.

Anyway, off to NewCal this Friday - will give an update when I get back. Tight Lines!

With the great weather forecasted for last weekend i thought i'd make the best of it. Loby's were the target and Friday/Saturday/Sunday being the go!

Launched Friday with Andrew (Feral) coming along to hit up some crays, we got our 12!

Launched Sat with Frank coming along this time, we got 9 and i got my 6!

Content, i thought i'd do some recon work for Sunday at a few different spots. Brad came out for the day, some big whites found on small ground also that i thought i'd have a look see/you never know. Ended up with 12 crays and most were good whites that weighed up to 850gm each!

My Six, good size whites, clean crays!

Plenty of crabs all undersize by 5mm got only three size but the kids had a ball which i guess is what it was all about .

and yes the bream was released.

first pics dissapeared dont know what happened anyway a trip to the containers

dhue i got in the 30s went 13kg and few harleys

recent trip had a ball

Took Makros(Troy) out for a fish on Saturday. The bottom gear was set on the first drift and I thought I may as well put the 6lb gear out the back. With in the first minute the line was screaming off the little Mitchell !!!!! While Troy was busy pulling in the bottom gear to clear the way I was making some line back.

10 min later the Sambo was at the side of the boat (great fun but back to the ocean you go)!!

The rest of the catch consisted of 2 KG's (one on the light gear) a Queen Snapper of about 3-4kg and a skippy!! So a quiet day on the water!! But using the light gear gets some great bait and a pocket full of fun!!!!

Just got back from spending a the week up at Kalbarri. We hired the 7.8m walkaround on tuesday 25/11 from our friend Laurie at Murchison Boat hire, who also came out with us. Last week i read a report on fishwrecked about some macks and tuna being caught and persuaded laurie to give trolling a shot.

We went south, trolling around wagoe cos Laurie reckoned the weather would get too bad to fish north. An hour or two into it my brother, Shane, got this 8kg beauty onboard, the earliest mack Laurie has ever caught (apparently he's usually lucky to get a couple by christmas if that). After this he said this was a freak incident and that "we probably wouldnt see another one for a few weeks".

Well within half an hour marcus, my friend on holiday from singapore, was hooked onto this 12kg YFT. We soon found out this was his first fish and was really struggling to handle the sheer strength of the fish. It made for a very amusing 20mins where screams like "i dont care about this fish anymore", "someone hold onto me", "i need water, give me some water" and "i cant take this sh!t anymore" were heard. After his near-death experience and some laughs Laurie told me i should take over to save marcus, the fish and my rod+reel. Even then it took another 10mins or so for me to land it with a tighter drag and more experience. Either way well done to marcus!

Lines were back out again after the photos, and within 5mins Andrew hooked up to this 10kg beauty! Laurie was totally amazed by these early season macks, suggesting that this season should be very very good.

Soon after we thought we'd try bottom fishing. Laurie had told me to bring up some okta jigs so i brought up a green shimano one and a red gillies one just to try out. I got this one on the green one on my second cast. This estuary cod really made up for a year of just crap fishing so i was stoked to say the least!

Other than that cod bottom fishing was pretty average with few bites and 1 undersize Dhuie (49cm). Stan was the only one left who hadnt caught anything, but soon made up for it by catching this monster on a whole squid. As it was slightly longer than a metre, it had to be released, which took some time cos it was full of air (but still had lots of life in it). It was successfully released after about 10-15mins.

All in all a great day out!! 5 happy fishermen and a huge thanks to Laurie Malton from Murchison Boat Hire (www.murchisonboathire.com.au) who hired us the boat and showed us around. He really knows the kalbarri waters and is also a game fishing and tailor expert, holding several WA and National line class records for tailor.

(sorry its a little long, just trying to make it as informative/readable as possible!)

HI guys! Up early this morning, hit the ramp at Hillarys at 6am. Had the boat loaded with our cray pots and rods in to hopefully catch a feed for tea!

First headed north of hillarys to wreck rock, and put my pots in to soak, and have a pull tomrw morning..hopefully have crays for lunch. There was a slight breeze, so decided it was a great time for a quick drift for some squid. I was still rigging up my fish spike with a whiting, and claire already had her jig in the water. Im sure her jig landed on the squids head, because as soon as it got down she had a hook up. With a slow retrieve we landed it, and i was happy this time not to cop a shower of ink.

We then headed south down in front of Scarbs, and fished for some whiting just offshore in 6m of water. We had plenty of hook ups, but they were all very small. We decided to head out a bit to see if the size was better out further. Went out to 17m of water, and worked the contour lines, to see what was around. In no time, we were into the bigger ones averaging around 26cm..and caught enough for a feed. Claire also caught a fish that looked like a mulie, but had huge eyes! Not sure what it was...but im sure it will make great cray bait!

Was a great day on the water,and  the route out to rotto was like the freeway at 8am. Will enjoy some squid and whiting for tea, washed down with a couple of home brews.

a 14.90kg, 128cm long mulloway was caught at the narrows this morning at about 2.30am.

more detail will be added as soon as i get them as ofcoz with pic too. heehee~

update update update!!! finally got that A@@ on the fone for as much datail i can remember to ask

so here it is...

arrived at about 10pm where nothing was biting.  therefore rig was left hanging in the air

till about 12am when he finally caught the first tailor. hooked it up and back it went into the water.

at about 1.30pm the 1st run happened. due to that the was on the other side of the carpark taking a pee when it happened.

the rod holder droped and the rod and reel went onto the floor. w/o zipping up, he rushed to the 'resuce' my gear from it

being donated to the fish Gods. anyway, thats was a no hook up. the 2nd run came about 30mins later, same rig, same spot.

BTW, he said he was fishing near some flags. which i have no idea where he is talking about. by back to the report. 2nd run

was no good to as it came back with a well cut up tailor. 3rd run was intresting as it was taken the sec the live tailor hit the water.

being too excited and pumped up by the first 2 runs, 3rd run again return with a cut up tailor.

 4th run was when he got 'him'(he said he could tell that the fish was a male). the alarm when off and he off the alarm with a thump on

 on the spool. letting the fish take out about 1/4 spool of line b4 he tighten the line but this time he did not set the hook as he said soomeone

there told him that the type of hook that was in my box need no setting. only tighten the line and the fight begun.

according to him, it was a weak fish for it size as the fight lasted only somewhere between 15-20mins without too much line being pulled out.

the drag was set to about 4lb and lessen during the fight as he wanted to play the fish well. he ended with about 1lb drag b4 the fish

came to the surface. it was finally landed with his buddy jumping into the warm swan river to lift the fish up.

he too added that he had a couple of guys who came over as ask to have their photo taken to pretent that they were the ones who caught the

fish. LOL...

btw, he's a greedy pig who went back to the same spot to try his luck again on friday morning. think the fish Gods are fair and he did not get another. but some guys

in the middle of the bridge did and he est it to be about 8-12kg. (dont count on that guys, if i know him well enough from class, his est are alway way off the mark but u can be sure that something was landed from the middle of the bridge)

Hey All,

I went for my first cray dive of the season today and came home with six. All caught on the last 100 bar, it took a little bit of swimming to get into the 'cray zone' but once I was there they seemed to be every where. I'll be going back real soon.

reporting this after chatting with a mate who was at the narrow this morning. after work about 1am, he went

to the narrows for some time off. bought along a penn power graph III 2000 with a 2-6lb bream stick. having about

200yds of 6lb line in the spool and a halco 10gram twister (crome). was casting with no result until about 2am when

something took the twister and not giving him a fighting chance clear him of his 200yds line on the 1st run.

all he hear was the ringing of this reel which drag was set to 2kg and the final "ping" when the line was cleared.

he did added that there was alot of bait fish around but nothing  was disturbing them other then some penlicians.

told him i would post what he told me here and he would like to know if anyone would have any suggention on what

it could have been.

' 

First off, sorry for the lousy lack of pics, its just we didn't really get any seriously cracker fish. Punchline in the first sentance, nice work there!

Went down to Dunsborough, mostly to meet a few people involved with an oral history project about fishing the capes. At the BBQ I met Ray Walker who contributed to the project and is a frequent wangler poster as well as other contributors (local abalone divers, longliners, local fishers and caravan park owners) as well as people involved with commissioning and writing up the report.

Mostly my brother Cameron, friend Mark and myself dived for abalone off Shelley Beach, and around the corner to the cape over a couple of days. There seemed to only be roe's there, no brown or greens, but there were some +100mm in the mix. The best spot seemed to be right inshore, at the base of the cliffs, well away from the seal colony!

We saw a couple of crays, but they didn't want to play along!

I could also see a big whale well into the bay broaching, it got right out of the water several times.

In an attempt to give everyone a go on the boat, we came into Bunker Bay and while waiting for Debra to drive over, we had a few drifts for squid. I got quite a good sized one, but then it was the first thing caught on the boat, so over it went!

Next we had a visit from the Marine Police, they wanted to see all of our safety gear and let us off for not having our tickets on us.

We swapped Debra on and my brother off at the beach, then went out to berley up some fish for Debra, she got a bunch of wrasse, skippy and a few huge trumpters. I livebaited one, but no takers.

We then trolled back to the old dunsborough boat ramp, but with no takers. We also saw another whale between us and pt piquet, just a little one.

The next day my brother and I (attempted) to get up early to fish wright's bank. It was a very slow ride out there, the wind and wave directions were at 90 degrees to each other, so it was either water over one side or the other and barely better than 10kn. The seas were pretty big once we got out past the cape and we saw a few bait schools and flying fish. The sounder looked really fishy, but its new and I don't really know what I'm looking at all the time. We hooked a bunch of blackarse and my brother got a good keeper, and a blue snapper, lots of wrasse, sgt baker and blackarse when back over the side.

We really took the wrong bait, there were simply too many pickers on that reef for mulies and prawns, even the side off a fresh wrasse was gone in under 1min. I recommend live baiting or occy, even a fist sized limpet was destroyed, and it was harder than workboots, I had to cut it's foot off to get the hook thru it.

We called it a day there and headed back to the protection of the cape and just as well, some rain came in and I could barely see 50m in it!

Oh well, better luck and better weather next time!

Laters,

till

a pic from a while ago,some more of them spawners for wally

pick up the boys at about 7-7.30pm and went to E shed to get some yellowtail as live bait. manage about 15-18 of them then we took off to the narrows.

arrived there about 9.30-10pm. rig up and cast in which ever was still alive. tailors were not firing up yet and we were having some trouble as our live bait quickly died off and we were at a stage without bait. not till about 12am when the tailors start to bite when we were all happy knowing that we will not have worry about live bait for the rest of the night or should i say morning.

there were a couple of faulse alarm that got our hopes up and down i must add  but come about 1.30am.. the reel went screaming. the fish was quickly set and the battle of the fitter begun.

15-20mins later... this baby was landed.

again, good job OT.

went out wide of the cape today with a few mates and ended up with a reasonable feed .. 13kg dhu, 8.5kg queeny, 2 good snapper and a few good black bums and sweep etc. will try to post pics if lucas sends them to me in the near future .... next good day might have to see us going into the 200m water for a look around again i think.

So, my training continues this week as I learn about fishing in Oz.  After about 6 weeks off with the new baby, I was itching to get back on the water.

A quick trip by the Tackle Shack yesterday, and we were out amongst it this morning!  Ron and Brad wanted to teach me about KG fishing, so it was off to Rotto.  We had our lines wet by about 7:30 this morning.  Next time we need to start earlier, bc the fish were on the bite as soon as we dropped.

 We were fishing weed/sand patches in about 10-12meters of water.  At first it was sand whiting after sand whiting, but then the KG's struck.  The action was hot and heavy for about 1.5 hours.  In that time we caught 8 KG, about 30 sandies, another 20+ herring, 4 legal flathead, and a few each of skippy, goatfish, leatherjackets, yellowtail, trumpeter, and of course a few wrasse and blowies.  After hauling in the first few sandies we noticed that some big squid were following them in, so we popped a jig on a spare rod, and as I brough in a nice flathead, Ron cast behind it and caught a beautiful squid.

It was a lot of fun!  Weird thing was that about 9:30 the fish just completely switched off.  We tried a few more places with no joy, so we packed it in for the day.  Would have been nice to have taken a few more KGs, but all in all it was a great morning.  After developing some serious cabin fever over the last several weeks it was just great to be out on the water with a few mates!

So what do ya reckon my next training trip should be??  Still haven't caught a dhuie, sambo, spanish mack, or alot of other WA greats!  So much to learn....