Launched very early doors with uncle this morning for various reasons, firstly to beat the crowds and the heat and ultimately to troll up an early morning mack. No luck on the mack front but there was some good bait balls on the sounder so they hopefully wont be far away if the bait stays and the water warms a bit more. Another good sign was the lack of surface weed behind the three mile.

Heading back to Ocean Reef we came across a good school of SBT's giving some small bait a hammering. Managed to winkle one out on a 1oz leadhead but the rest had lockjaw. Finally cracked the code when we dropped down to 1/2oz leadheads. Good fun on the light gear.

Back home and in the pool by 10.

Happy Australia Day all!

 Gday fishoes 

has anybody got the latest model 150/175 hp Suzuki motors

just wondering if any one has had any issues with them and how they would rate them

am looking at buying 2 end of march

ive heard they are a very god motor so any feedback would be appreciated 

cheers 

DWAYNE 

Did a dawn run down to Mullaloo beach this morning with a few mates. One of the guys had seen someone doing ok on the Herring a few days earlier just out the front of the clubhouse so we set up there and had a play.

I was amazed at the different species we caught in a few hours. Herring, Whiting, Flathead, Silver Bream and a few baby Pink Snapper. (as well as the must have, a blowie)

All bar the herring was released with a couple of whiting going out as bait. Had a few hits on the whiting but no hookups so there must have been a chopper or two cruising past also.

Bluey with a little Silver Bream

Must have been the smallest snapper i have ever seen.

 Well our yearly run upto the Ningaloo area has been and gone. This year was a little different as we normally take the Tinny into Ningaloo Station. We left at 3am Boxing Day & stayed at Carnarvon on the way up and were in Coral Bay at about 10:30am the next day. Got a ripper tailwind up there.

The ripper tail wind wasn't so good when we got there though. New Years day was looking promising, so a few days on the beach with the kids was in order. Got out on New Years day a little rusty but keen. Went out the north passage and trolled out to the 70m area looking for fish on the sounder. Found a few healthy looking shows and dropped on them. The only thing I got past the sharks was a small Cod. The wind picked up, so I shot inside the reef for a Squid. Got the biggest Squid I've ever caught, it actually took off around the front of the boat and had me chasing it around the anchor line. While this was going on my unwaited bait got nailed by a nice Spango, so dinner was sorted.

Next day I did the same thing, out to the 70's this time I managed to get a nice Rankin past the grey coats. His mate on the bottom dropper wasn't so lucky though. Trolled back in as the wind had picked up and managed a nice little Spanish. Woo hoo finally got to test out my new Madfish Bag. Awesome bit of kit!

The 3rd of Jan. was looking to be the best day, I had promised the young fella a run, and so it was, the bay was glass. I trolled just outside the reef where I had picked up the Mackie the day before, no luck this time and with the youngun' on board I decided to go back inside the reef and target some Spanglies. I stopped the boat to rig up a couple of lighter rigs. I had only just finished his rig when a massive Whaler turned up at the back of the boat with about 6 or 7 Cobia hanging with him. So out goes an unwaited Whiting head and I watch a nice Cobia slurp it down and I'm on! A pretty quick fight really & we've got a nice Cobe in the boat. High fives allround, so I say to Scott "you keen to catch one?" he's all for it. So another bait in the water and bang he's on. His is fighting a lot harder than mine did. So Dad takes the rod thinking the shark had grabbed his. No just a better sized one, so I hand him back the rod and help him catch his best fish to date. Woo Hoo!! more high fives. I'm sweating like a pig by this stage so we left mister Sharkie with 2 less hangers on.

We came back inside the reef and picked up 3 more nice Spango's. Another fish added onto Scott's growing list of catches, he's got a bit of a knack. The wind came up again for a few more days. So back to the beaches, it's a hard life. I went out solo again on the 9th and got 3 more good Spanglies. My mum was keen to get onto the Spanglies so the 10th was our last day before leaving for home on the 11th. Mum and Scott joined me for another session on the Spanglies inside the reef. It was a bit quiet at the first spot and the little terns and fish smashing bait only a couple of hundred metres away was getting the better of Scott. He practically begged me for him to have a cast at the commotion. So we idled over to what I thought were small Longtails. I cast out for Scott as he couldn't quite get the distance. Handed him the rod and told him to wind as fast as he could. Got smashed on the first cast in about 4m of water, turned out to be Shark Mackeral, another new species for him. Loved watching him pinned in the back corner grimacing as these little speedsters took off! I let him catch & release 2 then went looking for another spot to try. I think we ended the day with 6 Spango's a Red throat and another nice Squid.

So even though there was a fair bit of wind about up there, we still managed a few nice fish. A few red fish would of topped it off nicely. Great spot, might have to try and talk the missus into going again next year.

Cheers

Chris.

Not much being posted lately so thought I would do my first ever after being a long time reader here.
Not a post about big duhies or sambos sadly but a few fish none the less.
I mostly fish the 3 mile off and around Hillaries targeting Skippy on light gear (and anything else I can get) which is awesome fun and not bad to eat too IMO. Had a few good trips in the last few weeks when the wind has allowed it.
Anyway have just been burlying up in 7-15 m along the reef in a few spots and waiting for them to turn up. Was having a ball with my adult son 2 wks ago catching 40cm skippy when amongst all the excitement a few Kingis turned up. Not sure who was more excited me or the kingis chasing the skippy, me I suspect haha.
I didn’t have any live baits to throw out so just lobbed a half mulie on my 4-8kg gear, hoping for the best and hooked a couple amongst the skippy -who were now getting full of burley and going of the bite. Managed to land one kingi (see attached movie -75cm) and got smashed by its bigger brother.
The movie is the last bit of the fight, unfortunately missed the first long runs, but he played nicely and kept out of the reef. Man they go off!
The trip last week I was lucky enough to have a small school of SBT ( I think) moving into casting range. Ive seen them working on previous trips but can never get close enough to them to have a cast. Well these ones did it for me and my first cast was hit immediately, not big fish (55cm) but on my bream gear was almost out of control. It was turned into very delicate sushi and sashimi over the next few days. The skippy played the game as well and got a feed of them.
Funnily enough ½ dozen 60-80cm kingis were following the tuna around at the boat. Of course they had buggered off by the time I got it in the boat!
Each trip there has been plenty of good sized skippy as well, I thought they were mainly a winter target in close but has been a lot of fun lately. Maybe the cooler water has kept them around, although noticed it was 22.5 last week so warming up a bit. Anyway bloody good fun and made more enjoyable during the week when the ramp is not so ridiculously busy!
Hope you enjoy the vid -if the link works- maybe copy and paste if it doesn't. Sorry the photos are crappy :(

Cheers

https://youtu.be/ewkO7afvYQQ

We all know summer isn’t the best fishing weather but it’s nice to just get out there or get away. My cousin Jimmy asked if I wanted to come up to his holiday house again in Cervantes and with a twisted arm I hooked up my boat and headed up there!

I enjoy Cervantes as a nice quick holiday destination and with a lot of family up there over the New Year it was very enjoyable. I took my Baja petrol powered car up also and ran amuck on the oval and up in the dunes!

We had a great time with the ski biscuit, electric helicopter, kites and very relaxing indeed. Fishing was good with a handful of trips out and bagged out on Dhufish and bycatch every trip including baldchin, pinkys and black arse. It was nice to fish half a day (if that) and then head in to clean fish and do other activities!

First trip for the season today, no monsters but a good feed.

Have been going to the same spot for 18years now and always seems to produce. Hopfully get out a few more times this season.

Last  week

If Ya thinking of going to herron point crabbing might pay to give it a miss .Had to be around 40 people there scooping.

Took the boat there but to windy. Plenty of Under size

 Hi All

Thought i would share a few pics from my Christmas Holidays in Albany.

Had some pretty good weather for the week leading up to christmas but turned pretty terrible between chrissy and new years.

1st week down there was just me the missus and 2 little ones and i got pretty lucky and all the young bloke wanted to do was go fishing and catch squid.

Bit windy so took the young bloke to Emu Point to catch some Bream. Pelicans are a bit full on there so ya have to be quick with the fish.

Sitting and waiting and taking in the sights.

Showing his siter the Squids

She had to give it a go aswell. 

Monster pushing 40cm hood. Good fun off the rocks.

Good feed of Blueys from the harbour.

Chilli garlic buter squid and cray fish.

All in all a quality week spent with the family. 

Was really good taking the young bloke fishing and him being keen as mustard to learn and catch some fish. Was happy as larry sitting and fishing then just playing in the sand.

Cheers Jayce

 It had been a while since I wet a line so it was good to get a trip in over the break.

Enjoy the pics.

The Chinamen looks like a new board leader at 89cm.

I'll post some more videos up at a later date. Meanwhile check out this one of mine via FB.

https://www.facebook.com/mark.gwynne.796/videos/10155672030289196/

tried out a new spot and it paid off...  

 Been here for a week now and the fishing has been hard work but   today it payed off. 

Have been here once before and the fishing was a lot better then. 

Just out in the harbour have been getting whiting skippy and herring. 

Today we did a beach launch of little boat harbour and got rewarded for our efforts. Found a a bit of decent ground close to glassy island burleyed hard and this was the result good fun on light gear . 

Days catch ended up with 4 leather jacket 3 queen fish and breaksea cod yellowtail kingfish and a skippy. 

 w

 plenty around now... 8 minutes 10 big crabs

 Went of Two Rocks yesterday for our first go for 2017. Great way to start the year.

Picked up a couple of Baldies early which is my favourite. Then later in the day pulled a nice dhuie at 85cm.

Mate then pulled in his first ever dhuie with a double header happy days. Released one well for another day.

Back to work today.

All the best for 2017 everyone

 Any reports on Tuna or Spanish Mackeral around Rottnest? I've heard of some getting caught recently but just wanted to confirm??

Just saw someone's boat thats been flung off the trailer and landed in a paddock on Duffy street in Woodvale. Might have been stolen? Boat name is Redback has a Johnson outboard. Hopefully its no one from fishwrecked, what a shit way to start the new year. My mrs has reported it to police

hi everyone. Just letting u all know that last night at Yanchep the weed was horrendous. Drove all the way from south of the river to see everyone getting there, having a couple of casts, and packing up and leaving again. Wasn't worth fishing on the beach there. 

Got an invite to go out on mates big boat Monday coming...

any word of water temp or activity out wide?

looking at trench run for olde-spiky-face if weather suits, Anyone tagged one this season yet?

Also, know if anything holding on FADs yet?

cheers

 starting to see some bigger sizes around, bloody cold and windy out here but keen for a feed.. got 9 so far so 11 to go

 Would’ve preferred that to read yesterday’s banger ... got out with duges66 about 9ish from woodies a bit lumpy early but she settled down later . Found myself wearing thongs on the deck early arvo the carpet was getting that hot . Anyways found some good shows of fish but it was hard going tempting them though , ended up with this harlequin , a decent nanny and blackbum , few good size skippy and half a bucket of sandwhiting in the bag . I haven’t kept a Harlequin before so looking forward to giving this one a taste test .

 Had a quick dive off Mandurah on a mates boat Yesterday, struggled to find any nests of whites,  these 2 balds saved the dive. Delicious 

Righto, gave the cray thing a go. Tick.

Surprisingly good fun despite getting up at 4.15 am.

Thanks Bodie, Scano, Den and Carl!

 Went out diving on the Bouvards last Saturday with a mate. Decided to try some ground west of the reef on the 15m contour. After much deliberation amd discussions. 

Very clear once we got in the water and very diverse life, corals fans fish. Few crays about. I wouldnt say it was choked though. Hard pressed to get 2 crays from out of a ledge. The creature blowing in the black suit that took their mate made them think twice about hanging at the front of the ledge.

Hadnt seen much decent fish but some small fox fish and an undersized dhuie. Whilst trying to coax a cray into my catchbag a decent fox fish appeared and ended up impaling itself on my speargun. Got back to the boat followed by my mate whod shot a female blue which surprised me in its size approx 70cm. 

With a dozen crays between us we headed to some ground hed seen crays and dhufish the Saturday before the ban. Hed seen some decent KGs also. Anchor down and off we go. Swimming past a cave suddenly my mate is deep in a cave but without his speargun. With me thinking hes shot something big and now chasing it. Finally he catches his speargun and a good KG. 

Ambling around a bit more we got a few more crays, mate shot a small pink going 55cm. The whites were the biggest ive seen with some going 800gms.

With the breeze in and the drive back home we left and got had a quick tin at the general store

Hi all

Just got back from a week in Walpole with the family and thought I would post a small report unfortunately didn't take any photos.

Spent first few days chasing flathead on plastic's and ended up with 6 fish the all around 38cm, it was tough finding the fish with each spot taking multiple casts before finally getting the fish to show interest. Caught the odd herring, one bream and a salmon about 60cm long which was good fun on ligh gear before it finally busted me off.

After the first few slow days using plastics I decided I would try and target some yellowfin whiting on bait after a bit of local information from a guy at the Walpole boat ramp, he mentioned that they were showing up on the flats near the mouth of the Nornulup inlet. He was fishing on the boat ramp jetty using a small slice and getting alot of herring, that isn't really my thing but I thought I would mention it incase anyone else was interested. I headed out to the mouth of the inlet and did try fishing the flats with know real sucess it was about 10am so trying to catch whiting in shallow water with the sun almost over head probably required more stealth than I was capable of at the time so I decided to give skippy rock a look. 

Caught some keyring sized skippy at skippy rock and overall was a little dissapointed with the days effort, decided to make a move and as I passed the small jetty near skippy rock noticed some shows on the sounder so decided to give it a go a see what they were. After anchoring and setting up I casted my double hooked whiting paternoster in the general direction baited with some coral prawn and had immediate interest. Winded it in and ended up with a double header of king george whiting not monsters but at this stage of the day I was pretty chuffed. The next hour or so was a really good session on king george catching 30 or 40 fish and ending up keeping 8 legal fish between 28cm and 32cm like i said not massive fish but the made a greed feed for the family. 

Headed back the next day with the hope of getting my 2 year old onto his first king george and the same spot produced for both him and my wife, they had fun but its hard work with a young child on the boat so we pulled in at a small beach right near the mouth of the inlet. If you haven't been to Walpole and in particular the mouth of the Nornalup inlet then I think you are really missing out this particular spot is only really accessible by boat and there is 4WD track to get to the beach on the opposite side of the mouth but we had this little protected beach all to ourselves and it really was an amazing setting.

I walked along the hedland side of the inlet mouth and noticed thick schools of juvenille snapper right in the channel only meters from the waters edge which was amazing to see, I also watched a boat coming in from sea and  for those who know that stretch of water the mouth is almost closed. The channel out usually runs along the rocks on the hedland side however at the moment the way out veers away from the rocks by 150m or so if you are going down over christmas it would pay to be careful and maybe follow someone who knows the way out. Its doable but it is quite shallow, while I was there I saw a small commercial boat do it and he seemed to be getting stuck a bit.

I have been going to Walpole for nearly ten years and I have had some great bream sessions on plastics and some trips were just non stop fishing action the last couple of times were a little slow and plastics don't seem to be the go, I didn't really fish far up the Frankland River this time around but in the past i haven't had to get action. I was just wondering if anyone else who go's to Walpole has noticed the action drop off over the last 5 years or so or is it just me. I did catch a blowie for the first time while at the mouth of the inlet and was also wondering if anyone else has caught them, I hope this is note a sign of things to come.

Overall we had a great time and really enjoyed the time spent in the two inlets.

Cheers 

As with most travelling anglers, I've got one of those internal 'bucket lists' that I keep adding trips to faster than I can complete them. Whilst the list keeps growing, there are a few trips that have been right up the top of that list for a while now. The kind of destination that you dream about long before you get there, and Ashmore Reef was one such destination.

Ashmore is an extremely remote reef system near the border between the waters of Australia and Papua New Guinea. In short, it's a real prick to get to (in total 8 flights and some sea voyaging for me). But as is often the case, these hard to get to places are renown for great fishing – and so as soon as I read the report about the first trip which Nomad did to Ashmore some time ago, I decided it was somewhere I needed to go!

A couple of years went by before I locked the trip in - but over a number of beers in London one night my mate Tim Howe agreed to join me on the mission, and the trip got booked.

After my fourth (and Tim's fifth) flight of the trip thus far, we finally caught our first glance of the mothership Odyssey which was to be our home for the next week.

As we sat around on Horn Island waiting to board, it is safe to say the anticipation was pretty damn high.

As anyone who has read my previous reports may know, I have a reputation of getting atrocious weather on almost every trip I attend. 20-30 knots seems to be par for the course. So it was with some skepticism (and relief) that the Nomad guides assured us we were in for some glamour weather on our trip, which thankfully proved to be the case. After a quick beer, the tackle prep began, and we steamed out overnight to where the games would commence.

I had two main goals for this trip – beat my PB dog (which sits at 50 odd kg) and bag a Napoleon Wrasse on the casting gear. On day 1 of the trip, we set off to try and accomplish the first of those challenges. We were to start the day by jigging some steep drop-offs in quite deep water, and from the get go things looked promising. Plenty of bait on the sounder, and some large marks down there too – so our hopes were high. We lined up for our first drift, and straight away it was on. Triple hookup on BIG fish, at least two of which were doggies. As we looked at each other we knew that there was no chance all three of these beasts would get landed – and as we watched the line rapidly peel off our spools under sunset drag, it became a matter of who would lose their's first.

Unfortunately we didn't have to wait long to find out. Quite simply we got our asses handed to us. We had one fish reef us, another get sharked, and a third one get lost to line digging into the spool under immense drag – all within seconds of the fight beginning. I'd like to say that this was an isolated incident – but truth be told, this was to be the status quo every time we dropped a jig in deep water for the rest of the trip. We spent a good chunk of the morning doing everything we could to get one of these monsters to the top, hoping that by sheer luck we would get past the sharks or keep the dogs away from the reef long enough to land one – but it just wasn't to be the case. I lost count of how many hookups we had, but after a while it became time to pack it up and do something else. Strong though the lure of landing a monster doggie is, it is something that's easy to get disillusioned with, as in the pursuit of it you find yourself in countless situations where you can do absolutely nothing to beat the sharks or the reef other than hope you 'get lucky' and finally get one up.

 We saw massive Yellowfin bustups all around which may have been a contributing to the shark factor. Every cast into those messes of tuna and bait resulted in an immediate hookup of a large tuna, followed by an equally immediate pack mauling of that tuna by hordes of oceanic whitetips. We swiftly realized that any lure you put into those bustups would never be seen again, and decided to move on.

As we skulked off to lick our wounds (with jig bags and lure rolls worryingly depleted for being one day into the trip) we decided to head off for a cast on the reef and leave the deeper water alone for a bit. Thankfully this was the right call!

What followed was a consistent (if not wide open) bite on GTs, coral trout and the other usual suspects. A number of nice Geets landed, so a fun finish to what had so far been a painful day. The Amberjack lures getting a lot of love in that afternoon session – the Dreadnought and the Spitfire in particular.

During our stint on Odyssey, we also fished every night off the mothership. There were fish landed every night, but two sessions stood out. The session on night one, was made possible by the fact that we anchored out at a very deep mark near a dropoff that we'd fished earlier in the day. I have to say, that I never thought I'd experience fishing like that off a mothership at anchor! During a session that would have lasted around 90 minutes, we had over a dozen hookups on F*CKING BIG dogs. The difference here versus the day, is that astonishingly the sharks were far better at night. The result was no different though. Drag 'done up with a crescent' and two thumbs on spool using PE8 would do nothing to stop these monsters.

There was one occasion that I thought I was in with a real shot as I hooked the fish quite close to the top whilst retrieving my jig, but it still smashed me. A run of at least 150m without slowing at all – ending in a collision with a reef. Reels too hot to touch and broken dreams were the order of the night, but there was something pretty surreal about getting dominated by an XOS dog and then being able to go and pull a beer from the keg on the mothership whilst you were re-rigging. A night I won't forget.

Day 2, and the plan for our tender was to hit Boot Reef first up for a cast. Second cast in and BAM – great strike from a GT on my rod. Mid fight, and it happened. The bastard sharks turned up again. It isn't often that you have a size GT sharked – but the greysuits were on form. Couple casts later and I hooked up another rat GT, same result, so we decided to move on.

After persevering through some bycatch on the casting gear we went back out to the deeper marks for a jig, but had exactly the same results as day one. Reefings from dogs on the jig, sharkings on the tuna while casting, really a lose lose scenario for all bar the tackle manufacturers.

We decided to move away from the more usual jig/pop targets, and focus more on inside edges and channels chasing the Napoleon Wrasse I wanted so badly. After releasing a few odds and sods (the usual trout etc) my FCL Labo CSP got swiped off the surface by something very large that was very keen to get back into the reef. The thing hit in under 5m of water near the edge of a large dropoff. As we were targeting wrasse, I'd been warned to run 'no mercy' drag, and so I had my Stella cranked up to less than a turn off locked down. After a lot of back and forth (and a marginally avoided unintentional swim) I finally managed to get him away into the deeper water. The victory was mine! But the fish had other ideas, and summoned the strength for one last surge for the reef which no amount of spool grabbing could prevent. He found his hole, and gained both his freedom and my lure. Our guide reaffirming our suspicions – that I'd been 'wrassed' by a sized specimen fish. Devastated is putting it lightly!

So we carried on working the reef edge (as I continued to slowly die inside) with the hope of another shot at our prey. We were casting into every likely looking bit of structure – hitting the channels – when Tim (also working an FCL Labo stickbait but this time in the form of a TBO) got tight. Having seen what just happened to me, he was giving it no quarter in a locked drag tug of war that got the fish away from the reef and kept it there. As we pulled back into deeper water, the battle was won (for real this time) and Tim had opened his Wrasse account. A cracking fish.

After we ran out of reef edge to try we went out to try and hit another point that our guide Jimmy had fished before. At first things were slow, but as the current began to push up the bite switched on, and we encountered an awesome bustup of fish smashing bait in shallow water. This bustup included all kinds of fish including GTs, red bass, and (a new species for both Tim and I) the Maori Sea Perch - with Tim landing this awesome specimen.

Day 3

Today was our last session out at Boot, and the plan was a full day of casting. Jigging kit was left behind, and we headed straight for the spot where we'd found the Geets the previous morning. As luck would have it, they were just as easy to find this day. Lots of sharks around again but I landed my GT of the trip at this spot, with Englishman Alex losing another very nice fish (and a Carpenter with it) right at the boat.

The biggest GT I landed at this spot got followed by sharks on the way in, but he was too big for them to charge in without caution, and he ended up swimming around just under the boat for a full ten minutes after he was released – regaining his strength, for his run back to the reef. I've never seen this happen before, but he was at most 30cm under the surface of the water this whole time, whilst the sharks circled a little farther away.  This was a really hot session for a while with almost a fish a cast of GTs, as well as some very big and angry dogs which (on a number of days) followed our lures right up to the boat, but could not be tempted to commit.

After this we went to give the 'wrasse spot' another go, but no luck, so we popped inside a huge blue hole and had a very hot light tackle session on Jobfish, Maori Sea Perch, Red Bass and Coral Trout on stickbaits. The Sea Perch was a first for me – and had me all but defeated (by burying me in a hole) until by luck slackening the line had him come out again while I still had some semblance of a leader left.

Our time for the day was up so we retired to the boat and after another great meal, commenced the nightly mothership jigging ritual. Little did we know, this was to be the second of our noteworthy mothership sessions. In what the captain described as 'the best mothership fishing he'd seen in his time at Nomad' we hooked dog after dog after dog. Most of these however were of a much more manageable size (around the 5-12kg range) and we were fighting them on increasingly lighter gear. Towards the end we had double and triple hookups going, fighting them on super light gear. I had a number of them up on a Temple Reef Mytho LJ510 rod running PE2 line on a tiny Wiki Jigging 900 reel. Seriously awesome fun running around the boat, dunking your rod deep into the water trying to keep line away from the boat and generally having a good laugh. No trophy fish landed of course, but everyone including the crew got in on the action. We must have landed well over 20 rat doggies in this session – certainly one to remember.

The fourth day was a quieter one for us. We started fishing around Ashmore but nothing much was happening in the morning. The wind was forecast to pick up, so we had to leave Ashmore and head into the hard line. Once we got to the reef, things started looking way better. Unbelievable amounts of bait around, but lots of sharks again. We landed loads of small to medium GTs, plus a few makkies (Spanish and Shark Mack) as well as plenty of the usual bycatch in particular Red Bass.

Day five was a much more prolific day. We started out on the jig and whilst it took us a good while to find the ground – when we did things fired up and became (in terms of fish actually landed rather than hooked and lost) our best day on the jig. Included in this jigging action was a double hookup of a doggie and grouper to Alex and Tim – as well as plenty of Spaniards on the jig to keep us entertained. I was testing out some prototype Cerulean jigs that proved to be very productive and one of them (in 150gr) hooked up one hell of a dog, which unfortunately won its freedom after I thought I'd finally turned its head.

After half a day of jigging it was time for a cast, and straight away we knew it was going to be a good session. The average size of fish was small, but it was non-stop action on Spanish macks, random reef dwellers and around 35 GTs landed. No real trophy fish there, but a great deal of fun.

On our way back to the boat we came across a tiny sand cay in the middle of nowhere, so we stopped in for a look. I decided to spend a bit of time on the camera while Tim & Alex got in some casts from the shore. Plenty of GTs around! A couple of missed opportunities and a few follows, but none landed unfortunately. Would have been nice to get some landbased Geets that's for sure, and the spot was incredible.

For our final day – we decided once again to leave the jigs at home, and focus on the cast. The main aim was to get me my Napoleon. To cut a long story short, it was a failure. We spent half the day casting at likely structure and whilst a massive hole did open up behind my lure in around 4 metres of water (which our guide called for a wrasse) in the first hour of fishing, the rest of the time was very uneventful aside from a little cod on PE3.

It was shaping up to be a dud of a final day, until we stumbled across one of the GT spawning aggregations (or mobile bommies) we'd heard so much about. Then things changed drastically for the better!

After we'd pulled a few of the fish up we knew the average size was small, so I decided it would be a good idea to drop down to my PE3 gear and flick a lure out. What ensued was one incredibly fun session, with Tim and I having multiple battles against large numbers of Geets and Macks, all on the lightest casting kit we had on board. Despite loads of wince-worthy rod angles being performed as GTs dived around under the boats, plenty of deck dancing and boat maneuvering ensured that we each got fish up – and the Yamaga Blanks Blue Snipers we were using (77/3 and 81/2) didn't miss a beat, with Tim taking out the PE3 battle. Surely one of my favourite rod series of all time.

After a couple of hours of great fun the bite dried up and I thought the trip was done, but we had time for one more spot. We found a likely looking shoal and flicked our lures, and I immediately hooked up to something that unequivocally kicked my ass. Straight back to his hole in the reef and my lure was gone. OK – there were some serious fish down there, time to break out the heavier rod. It didn't take long until I was on again – this fish had some serious power from the get go – I could tell it was a reef dweller, but couldn't pick the species – going too hard for a red bass – maybe a donkey trout, who knows, but what I didn't expect (and was delighted to see) was another 'first' for me in the form of a Chinaman. I'd actually remarked to Tim a couple of days earlier whilst looking at a photo of one in the dining room on Odyssey that one of those had been on my list for some time, so it was great to tick one off on the last cast on the last day.

With the fish released, it was time for our last steam back to the mothership. Beers were cracked, stories were told, and the long voyage back to reality began. Counting down to the next one….

A year ago, I found out that my cousin was getting married in December 2016. I wanted to attend the wedding in Hong Kong, and at the same time use this excuse to travel in southeast Asia some more. My sister and I decided on Indonesia and Cambodia after looking at several options.

We spent a week in Indonesia splitting the time between Komodo National Park and Bali. Komodo was definitely my favourite of the entire trip.

This is the first part of our trip. I'm in the midst of sorting pictures for the second part of the trip.

Here's the link to the series of blog posts starting with Day 1. I encourage you to visit the blog to read about the adventures and see additional photos. I've changed my blog layout a bit. So the Blog Archive is on the right side panel now. You can find the links to the rest of the days there.

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2016/11/2016-asia-komodo-day-1.html

Let's start with some scenery and wildlife pictures first.

Komodo National Park

































Panorama

Palau Padar



Komodo Sunset



Palau Sebayur



YouTube video of Manta Ray

https://youtu.be/RJvloh4cnrc

Bali











Panaroma

Tegalalang rice terraces



Mount Batur



~~~

Now onto the fishes...

Komodo National Park is surrounded by the most biodiverse marine ecosystem on Earth. Needless to say, the fishing was fantastic! I fished an hour here and two hours there over 4 days in Komodo can caught 48 species!

I was expecting the fishing to be great as well in Bali, but it was very disappointing. After fishing a total of 7 hours, I only caught 3 new species and maybe 6 fish in total.

Here are the Komodo new species...

Golden Damselfish (Amblyglyphidodon aureus) - Species #635



Small-toothed Whiptail (Pentapodus caninus) - Species #636



Cheeklined Wrasse (Oxycheilinus digramma) - Species #637



Chocolate Hind (Cephalopholis boenak) - Species #638



Moon Wrasse (Thalassoma lunare) - Species #639



Orange-lined Triggerfish (Balistapus undulatus) - Species #640



Bluespotted Hind (Cephalopholis cyanostigma) - Species #641



Longfin Emperor (Lethrinus erythropterus) - Species #642



Halfmoon Triggerfish (Sufflamen chrysopterum) - Species #643



Yellow-tipped Threadfin Bream (Nemipterus nematopus) - Species #644



Lattice Monocle Bream (Scolopsis taenioptera) - Species #645



Giant Prawn-goby (Amblyeleotris fontanesii) - Species #646



Fork-tailed Threadfin Bream (Nemipterus furcosus) - Species #647



Orbiculate Cardinalfish (Sphaeramia orbicularis) - Species #648



Juvenile Mullet - Species #649



Damselfish species - Species #650



Milkspotted Puffer (Chelonodon patoca) - Species #651



Silver Moony (Monodactylus argenteus) - Species #652



Yellowmargined Triggerfish (Pseudobalistes flavimarginatus) - Species #653



Zenarchopteridae species - Species #654



Pennant Coralfish (Heniochus acuminatus) - Species #655



White-shouldered Whiptail (Pentapodus bifasciatus) - Species #656



Redbreast Wrasse (Cheilinus fasciatus) - Species #657



Spottail Coris (Coris caudimacula) - Species #658



Wahoo (Acanthocybium solandri) - Species #659!





Saw-jawed Monocle Bream (Scolopsis ciliata) - Species #660



Cardinal species - Species #661



Spotted-gill Cardinalfish (Ostorhinchus chrysopomus) - Species #662



Spotted Hawkfish (Cirrhitichthys aprinus) - Species #663



Damselfish species - Species #664



Tail-spot Wrasse (Halichoeres melanurus) - Species #665



Bowtie Damselfish (Neoglyphidodon melas) - Species #666



Floral Wrasse (Cheilinus chlorourus) - Species #667



Sixbar Wrasse (Thalassoma hardwicke) - Species #668



Yellowstripe Monocle Bream (Scolopsis aurata) - Species #669



Streamlined Spinefoot (Siganus argenteus) - Species #670



Green Wrasse (Halichoeres solorensis) - Species #671



Black Blotch Emperor (Lethrinus semicinctus) - Species #672



Two-spot Red Snapper (Lutjanus bohar) - Species #673





Yellowspotted Trevally (Carangoides fulvoguttatus) - Species #674





Leopard Coralgrouper (Plectropomus leopardus) - Species #675





Grey Large-eye Bream (Gymnocranius griseus) - Species #676



Southeast Asian Blackstripe Dottyback (Pseudochromis perspicillatus) - Species #677



Honeycomb Grouper (Epinephelus merra) - Species #678



Red-toothed Triggerfish (Odonus niger) - Species #679



Ornate Emperor (Lethrinus ornatus) - Species #680



Darkfin Hind (Cephalopholis urodeta) - Species #681



Redbar Sandperch (Parapercis bimacula) - Species #682



Speckled Sandperch (Parapercis hexophtalma) - Species #683



Here are the Bali new species...

Oceanic Puffer (Lagocephalus lagocephalus) - Species #684



Common Bluestripe Snapper (Lutjanus kasmira) - Species #685



Onespot Demoiselle (Chrysiptera unimaculata) - Species #686

Brother and I decided to dust the nets off last Wednesday and catch up over a few beers while soaking our nets. Plenty of mullet around and saw some decent sized prawns about so well worth kicking for them if that's your thing.

Herring are still firing quite well on the lumo tube just before sunset, no need to walk too far to get them about half way out is the go. Remember the herring quite often fire the best on the windy side ( Dunsborough side ) when it is blowing a southerly or from the SW, a bit difficult but rewarding. After dark the herring are on the chew out towards the end of the jetty use a bit of yellowtail for bait. Squid are not super thick but there are some good sized ones around for those willing to put in a bit of effort, right on the bend where the weed begins after the first shelter seems to be firing the best for them.  There is the usual sambo action first thing in the morning for the young fella's wanting to have a bit of fun, use live squid if you can get one. The tailor are not playing the game at the moment on the jetty. Unfortunatly the blowfish have made their way onto the sandbar so fishing for whiting is a bit difficult.

Tight lines.