Just spent the weekend down in Busselton as a short boys trip for my birthday. 

We stayed in a holiday house in Abbey Beach which was perfect, particularly the fire pit in the backyard.

The plan was to use the Abbey ramp each morning and just fish in the bay, first attempt was Friday morning when we found the whole ramp totally sanded up, pretty much to the car park so no chance we were attempting that, frantically searched google for another option and spotted the ramps in the marina East of Busselton town.

These ramps were great! such calm water and steep ramps and plenty of them.

Being further East though when we came out of the marina we were copping the Westerly winds harder than we had hoped, didnt go too far and sounded some ground which produced two nice king georgies, good enough off to the pub.

Saturday was a total blow out, thumping Westerly even in the bay was rough as! So we scoped out the other ramps in the bay in the hope to pic one for Sunday.

Also went for a quick squid off the jetty for about an hour in the miserable weather which produced 3 nice size squid, again good enough and back to the pub.

From our scouting on Saturday we had decided to launch at the Old Dunsborough ramp (Quindalup and Abbey both being totally sanded up and the Marina just being too far East for where we wanted to fish)

Sunday morning it was glass in the bay! The Old Dunsborough ramp is nice and steep from the carpark but then at the water it is such a shallow angle on the ramp, had the car well and truely in the water to launch the boat (dont know if it is better with a lower tide as we were an hour before high tide).

Quick ride out into the bay, anchor and burley, casting plastics into the burley trail and managed 3 pinkies, first 55cm, second 75cm and third 51cm which went back.

Two hours on the water then back in to clean up the house and head home.

All in all was a great weekend really, managed a cook up of the squid and KG on Saturday night and spent every night around the fire pit just talking absolute sh*t with the boys, topped off with a fish just before heading home haha.

I think it was a really good mental break for a lot of us and we may make it an annual trip now.

Cheers for reading :) 

-Jase

 After a very extended lunch on Friday with the Exxy crew, woke up Sat morning with a fair size hangover..... Look outside and weather was epic, so text went out to the lads and 5 of the 8 managed to crawl down to the Marina by 10.30am and the plan was to head to Rotto for a pie and clear the head. Conditions were epic, 40 knot run out on the Reg got the cobwebs out. 

We all took one whiting rod each and had a quick drop on the way..... 90 minutes of some of the best fishing for ages, 2 nice pinkies that went hard on the whiting gear and 14 fat KGs. Left em biting for next time, blast to Rotto and a quick pie, back home by 1.30pm.

115L of unleaded is the best hangover cure I know

 I was starting to get abit crazy as I hadn't been fishing in weeks I had even started casting in the lounge room which isn't the best idea with brand new hooks. So before work I loaded the boat with my berley and rods had bait in a bag ready to grab in the freezer, knocked off work and raced home and headed down to woodies. The weather looked OK but as I headed out it got better so was pretty stoked picked my spot just off the western edge of the reef out on the sand and got to work getting the burley going. The current was really strong  so I had to cut my rigs and add a small ball sinker I was getting worried it wasn't going to be my night as the burley was getting pushed west at a rate of knots.

Then on sunset my lighter rod got afew taps I grabbed it and cranked the handle a couple of turns bang connection a quick tussle and I see what I thought was a just under snapper but when I put him on the lie detector it went 52 so sorted him out and into the esky. Cast out again and within a couple of minutes the same rod buckles over peeling off line then stops, spewing wound in to find the bottom hook of the snell rig gone so I just started putting half mulie's on that rod.

Things went quiet for awhile caught a stingray, bastard new rig required then at 6:30 my heavier rod is bend over grabbed it and set the hooks and line starts peeling off straight away I could tell it was a snapper and not a bad one a good fight with plenty of runs in the 13m we were in and I netted a 82cm model was pretty stoked to say the least and was having abit of trouble getting the fish out of the net when my rod with the half mulie bends in half and is peeling out line another good fight with me trying to fight the fish with one hand and use the other to try and get the other fish out of the net, got the fish to the boat 3 times but could not get the other fish out of the net and eventually the fish which was about the same size as the other chaffed through the 40lb leader oh well I was going to release it anyway as I had my 2. Was a great hour and a half session in the end and back at the ramp by 7.

 G'Day all.

Recently back from our annual trip North up to Gnaraloo and thought i would put up a small post.

We were lucky and headed up directly after the recent lockdown after a week of thinking our trip would be cancelled this year. The weather was totally awesome and some of the best we have seen there over the years. Got a bit lucky dodging a few fronts on a few days but generally really nice conditions. The new regulations really changed things and we were quite picky with our demersal catches. We fished seven days straight ticking of all methods and target species.

Day One: Out wide in 110 to fish for Goldband, Reds and Pearl Perch. Both bottom bouncing and jigging. A pretty good day out wide with some good fish boated. 

Day Two: We headed South to some spots in 45 m we have not fished for a while. Found the Robbos and reds on the chew, however, the sharks were equally hungry and anything red was a real target. The sharks left the robbos alone which was interesting so we down sized hookes and baits and were very happy to take home a feed of the super white flesh. Can't believe how big the shark are. Crazy and got some epic footage og them underwater. 

Day Three: Time to hit up someMackies onthe troll then head out to oue SW spots in 50m. No problems boating two good Mackies in the first five minutes to put on ice then headed out to find good sized Rankin Cod holding out on these spots. We could not get away from them and found ourselves catching and releasing quite a few. Topped off with a couple of reds in the esky was once again looking good. Yes, the sharks found us again. They found us evey day in 10m,40m, 80m and 100. We literally could not get away. 

Day Four: Time for a day targeting the reds. Headed out to some spots NW in 45, these have produced quite well ver the years, however, can be a bit hit and miss. Sounded up some good fish and things were looking good. We landed six good reds in the first hour and a couple of good baldies. Then, that's right, the taxman found us again. lucky to get that hour in. Time to pack up and we spent the rest of the day playing with cobia, Northern Bluefin Tuna and sailfish on the stingers. All in 50 mtrs so it was good to see a few sailfish in close. 

Day Five: The Demesrals bag was already looking good between the four of us so we decided to troll some skirts around to temp the billies. No luck on this day raising with the billies so we headed out to 80mtrs to mark some new spots in areas we have not fished before. Found somenice ground and decided to have drop with a few jigs. Managed a red on the jig here which is not that common up at Gnaraloo. A nice easy day relaxing in good weather with a few nice spots waiting for us in 2022. There is so much ground out there and the fish life was pretty amazing this year. 

Day Six: Time for a jig only day. Headed to a lump North West of the bay again to play with the Amberjacks and Trevelly. The weather was almost too good with hardly any drift at all. We found some pretty good bait and the jigging was on for young old. Big fish hooked and lost, mackies smashing jigs, sharks amongst it as well, but an insane fun day on the jig. Cobia were also out in force as usual which always make for some fun on the jig. We also brought out the soft plastics and vibes which also went off. Amongst the catch on this day were a few unlucky Pink Snapper who also like the plastics an jigs amonst the pelagics. 

Day Seven: With the bag almost done and dusted, it was decided to head to one of our Mackie spots close to shore just South of the bay. We were looking to keep one or two to top off a great week bagging our quotta under the new regulations. What a pain it is to keep the skin on the Pelagis fish, especially the Cobia. This spot is in about 15 - 20mtrs and sounding good arches below we started to troll through. First hit was huge and took off North with speed. A good 100mtrs back from the boat and a huge shark smashed what ever we had hooked. We guess a Wahoo which were around and it definitely took off like one. Another sharking and we were not very hopeful. The next two hours were incredible. We caught around 20 plus Spanish Mackerel (lost count). We trolled deep and shallow divers, soft plastics, jigged them, threw poppers, stick baits and poppers which made for some special aerial acrobatics. We literally had travelled 4km to enjoy the best fun fishing can throw at you. It was insane, the Mackeral were all over this spot and willing to play with us for hours. We kept two decent mackies and the rest were released. There were a few that got sharked, especially on the lighter gear, however, the sharks on this day did dot seem to want to come close to the boat, so once the fish was near by, the sharks would hold off. We were simply laughing it was that good. 

There are so many options up here it is not funny. We only scratched the surface again this year and even had an extra day fishing than usual. We all got amongst the fish, however, some key catches were Sailfish, big Reds, big Goldband and a huge Green Job fish that was well over 20kg. Fisheries were on board on the beach this year which was good to see and in good spirits. Some unusual things for the week. No trout or Coronation again. Pearl Perch have made a resurgence back to Gnaraloo, catching Atlantic cat fish for the first time up there and the huge Green Job fish. Also jigged up another squid in 50m, very tasty.

There were plenty of whales playing close by most days with dolphins visiting us a couple of times throughout the week. The track is in really good shape heading from Quobba and even all the way up to the homestead, however, the track to the bay is in its usual poor condition. Once again, a great year for us at Gnaraloo. The families we have met up ther over the years are always good value making for a social aspect to our fishing trip as well. Enjoy some of the pics. Cheers. Dave, Sab, Davo and Andrew.

One little note about the taxman. He was everywhere and never has it been so bad. Not sure why it was so bad for us this year, but they found us each day no matter where we went. Easy to deal with, however, just annoying and they were huge. We have been lucky over the years with the sharks so we cant complain. Just wonder if the boat, sounder strength or motor sound has increased our visits this year. Maybe time to try out some shark repellant for 2022. 

 Booked for 2022 

 Other post wouldnt let me post all the pics.

Spent a few weeks up in Exy in May, it was some of the best fishing I've had up there. I have never caught so many trout, good size ones too. Caught trout in 5-15m, Reds Rankins in 75m and Rubies in 300m.

Thankfully I didnt have any of the reported problems with sharks. It was one of those trips when pretty much every plan we made worked. 

 Hi Guys

Anyone had any success at the newly installed Artificial Reef Module off Ocean Reef ?

Brad

Hey Guys and Girls

Hope you are all well!! 

We'd love to do a giveaway for the fishwrecked members and get some more content going on the site.

We will give an "Emission logo" Hood to who we think has the best report for the month of June 

You can check out the hoody on our website  www.emissionapparel.com.au 

We want to hear about any of your fishing escapades you have had this month. "June 2021"......... Good Bad or Ugly.

Just post up a recent trip with a good backstory.

Pics would help too, but not necessary .... We will go through them at the end of the month and choose a winner.

Please just put   ** Emission Hoody **  In  with your title so we dont miss anybody's report.

Sizes availible  M-XXL 

All The Best !!!

 Schooling metro dhuies and sambos, lost quite a few jigs on big sambos and possible big dhuies before landing these two. Probably as hot a bite as we have seen metro. Den in picture also got a nice baldie and we capped off the bag with baldies and pinkies. 

Bodie in the background got a few nice dhuies  and bagged out as well. 

 Bit slow with write up this year but as follows!

Early weather reports were Friday 21 May was a must fish day with some iffy weather coming, so brought forward the trip to Thursday night, drive through and fish Friday rather than first day Saturday. Myself, Stick and Barra headed up in the car with Tony to fly up (as only flew in Thursday night from site) Friday morning. After 30 years a trophy was finally on offer for best fisherman. Points system based on type of fish caught eg reds 5 points being max.

The trip started with a nice rock to the windscreen around Badgingarra, oh well, insurance job when we return, hiccup #1.

We safely got to Edaggee rest area camp grounds around 2am and given we couldn’t fish until ~ 10am when Tony arrived we decided to get a couple of hours shut eye and be partly refreshed for day 1 fishing. All good, few hours shut eye, arrived Coral Bay around 8.30am, only to find a message from Tony that the planes delayed and head out without him! Hiccup #2 (and thankfully last) we could have ben on the water already in near perfect conditions.

Without day by day accounts the fishing was slow in that we never had them "on the bite". Just ahd to work the spots, pick up 3-4 fish a spot and move on. It wasnt from alck of trying that's for sure. The pics can tell the story. Water temp was reading around 27 degrees and my experience is the fish shut down and again found this to be the case. Fished 7 of 8 days with some joint day efforts squidding.

We fished north, we fished south, we fished deep we fished shallow. We had easterlies, we had southerlies and we had northerlies! What was really interesting that the only common fish caught south vs north were spanglies and red throat. Sharks were annoying rather than plague proportions as a lot of people say! Still managed to find some new spots amongst it all. In saying that we worked hard for our fish and we got 10-15 fish per day and came home with ~ 17kg each. In addition we got over 5kg of squid each with them being around in huge numbers anywhere we looked.

Highlights were;
- Barra’s kebabs yet again, straight out of Plakas in Northbridge!
- Harry’s (other crew up there) beer battered fried crispy fish wings
- Matches ~ 8kg saddle tail
- Justins (other crew) bday party
- Free jumping and swimming marlin
- The pure hysteria of not being able to control squid ink being sprayed on you / my boat!

Lowlights
- Lack of big reds
- Don’t recommend drinking two bottles of baileys then fishing next day in sloppy conditions

For the record much to Matches disappointment he didn’t win the trophy, Tony did

Why is it so nice in Vallarta in June? Fantastic fishing and some of the nicest people in the world to mingle with.  The inshore fishing has been in high gear with all kinds of pelagic fish being caught.  Some of the good-eating fish are California Bonita, Spanish mackerel, tuna, and the tough fighting mahi-mahi.

The fishing techniques have ranged from slow live bait troll to deep diving ralpalas, jigging, and cut bait. All three have kept the rods bent. It has just depended on what the fish were looking for on a given day. 

The water temperatures have been all the place. Up and down with most places holding around 78 degrees in the bay. Overall the Nuevo Vallarta fishing has been fantastic.  Most of our trips have been from four to six hrs. The most popular boat has been the 28 ft. super panga and the 40 ft. offshore boats.

Offshore fishing has been like a baseball game. A lot of home runs hit over the first week of June. We saw some god fishing in May but this is just off the charts fishing here in Nuevo Vallarta.   The major difference is the water temperature is moving up little by little and some refreshing light rains. Each week we get closer to summer fishing conditions.  Then the fishing turns on and just doesn't stop. Everyone enjoys the nonstop action. From inshore to offshore the fishing will be hot.

It's nice to know you will be seeing hook up all day long while enjoying the perfect Nuevo Vallarta weather.  What's wrong with landing huge fish and sucking down a cold Corona beer is this 80-degree weather with sunny skies.  NOTHING

It's all good when fishing in Nuevo Vallarta during the summer months.

So if you are looking for a sailfish, roosterfish, Mahi Mahi, tuna, and marlin come to Nuevo Vallarta.  We have just what you need to get your summer rolling.

Hope to see you soon here in Nuevo Vallarta Mexico

http://www.puertovallartas.com

Capt. Pete

 After weeks of pestering from JF, am finally around to getting a writeup done for the 2021 boys tip to Exmouth. We've been heading up to Exmouth for the past 12 years, with some new comers coming into the mix over recent years and now having a fantastic bunch of blokes to spend 2 weeks a year on a fishing trip with and we fish hard!

Last year was a bit of a flop due to covid, so we intended to make up for it this year. 3 large boats and a tinnie in tow with 8 blokes.

Other than a small trailer issue departing on a Saturday morning, the drive up was completely uneventful, just the way they should be. We had decided to stop a few hours short of Exmouth somewhere and swag on the side of the road. This is usually a lead in to the next 2 weeks of drinking and as always, settled into a few cans (maybe more than a few) around the camp fire.

Next morning, up reasonably to trundle the rest of the way into Exy. The weather was looking pretty good, so made good time so we had a chance to fish half a day

Our trip starts the same way every year. We Dump all the gear off at the house and straight to the water for an arvo jigging session not too far out, mostly chasing a few rankins. This year we decided to try some stick baiting first for mackies. Whilst there were no pictures taken, 2 mackies were landed before heading out for a Jig.

It was pretty quiet on this particulr jigging ground, over the years the number of rankins seemed to have reduced, but did manage a couple for dinner that night, top gong went to Scano on day 1

The next few days are a bit of a mixture, with the weather being very good, we headed up to the Islands for a day in the deeper water, with great success, with the Fury bagging out on Goldband and the whalers having a half reasonable day on Goldband and a few reds

I think it was Day 3 we hit up the gulf chasing some prawns. Changed it up a bit and took the Fury down into the gulf for a day whilst 2 took the tinny down into the gulf and 2 went out jigging and plastics out in the deeper gulf waters.

John handed over a mark he had in the gulf (which he probably regrets!!) and we managed to hit this up first. I think it was drop 1 on the mark, nice slob of a trout in the Gulf on jig!! lunch sorted

It was a little windy in the morning, but the weather turned it on as we headed down into the gulf. Having not ever been down that way, I had no ground what so ever to fish, but did come across this in shallower

Needless to say it was covered in BIG fish. Running PE2 and PE 3, we were getting monstored with multiple dustings on big fish. Did get up a couple goldens and a big Estuary cod, go hard in 11m of water!

Moved down and fished in close to a couple of islands and found some more BIG fish, goldens, other types of Trev's, Queenies all in very shallow

Ended up right down in the gulf watching the boys prawning, was a great arvo with the boys getting 15-20ltrs of pawns in a couple of hours.

Worth noting at this point, before the trip started we had decided to add a little more fun into the mix this year, and created a few different comps between the group. From memory there were 4 new ones and our regular skipper V Deckie day...Skipper dont get scared!!

The comps

- Man lines...as it sounds we bought 8 large hand lines, loaded them with 80lb mono and you were into it, biggest fish wins.....what could go wrong??

- Pink combos - 8 kids pink combos from BCF were bought, loaded with PE 2 braid..again biggest fish wins...again what could go wrong?

- Best and worst jigs - Everyone was to put r buy the best or worst jigs they had or could find between 120-200gms and was drawn out of a hat who got what (needless to say all Jigs were shit). But the suprising part and as a report goes on, the fish caught on the 'shit jigs' was amazing

- Skippers day - As it sounds, the 3 skippers get on one boat and the other 5 on the acrss the 2 other boats for a day...to date this has been a 1 sided event... simple, skippers dont get scared and skippers don't lose!

There are limited photos that i have of the comps but someone did comment on the tinny photos in Johns post, yep thats a pink combo bending!

1st Day chasing bills was a disaster...we didnt chase bills. Prbably shouldnt say it was a 'disaster' as it could have been a hell of a lot worse. I'd picked up my new VX Landcruisers a few weeks prior to the trip and 2 days before hand i had suspension air bags put in the rear suspension to support the heavy load on the way up...well lets just say the install a local Perth shop did was not great.. Doing 100kms an hour, with 4 blokes in the car and a 3+ tonne boat on the way to Tanta's and this happens

Th rear trailing arm suspenion bolt on one side comes out (luckily it was the rear bolt) and drops to the deck. After pulling over and on close inspection, all 4 bolts front and back were loose, and one of them only just holding on....the Bolts had not been tightened up on any of them. Not sure how i got 1,300kms from Perth without an isues. Luckily no major accident but it would have easily been that. A few of the guys are handy bush mechaincs, so a bit of on the side of the road work and i was able to limp back into town, but it did write off the day.

Moving on from that, the next week was sensational, perfect weather and great fishing. We spent a few days up around the islands, stick baiting for Mackeral, Tuna, Trevally and everything else, along with some stella days out deeper. The fishing was as good as I've seen in Exmouth. It's up around the islands the shit jigs got a work out. Plenty of fish caught and plenty lost. Cracking days fishing, with Rankin, reds, Goldband, Saddletail, Trevally, Spangles, chainman you name it, we caught it. Weather was first class

 Yep Johns Comp jig was actually 2/3 of a jig, bloody funny

Saddletail / largeouth Nanyagui?

Surface Long tail in the morning

Now with the shit Jigs comp, there was a clear winner on the day out Jigging in the 70's... Daryl retreiving his horrible looking green Jig only to have a saily follow it right to the boat...he quickly free spools and this little saily goes tearing off after it and was hooked up in a second.. after some aerial work and a lot of laughing, the little saily was boat side for a quick pic and released pretty green. We were bloody amazed the hooks stayed in!

Whilst up around the islands we spent a bit of time in the shallows, with some good sized trout hitting the plastics.

We did manage to fit in 2 days of bill fishing and given the reports in town were not great due to the cyclone only 10 days or so earlier, we had a cracking time. Over the 2 days we went 6-5-2 then 8-7-3 (From memory) Along with a few Hoo flying through. On the 2nd day we had only seen 2 fish all day (and we started early), we were holding out for that Arvo bite, and did it happen, going 6-6-2 in the last hour of light. Struggled to get the lures in the water!

Now on th 2nd last day of the trip, it was decided this day would be Skippers V Deckie day. Both John F and Troy lumped onto the Fury and we decided to head out for some deeper jigging given the weather was absolute magic. Needless to say, this turned out to be the day of the trip. After fishing a few known spots early with very little to show for it, oh and this was an 'artificals only. day we headed out wider chasing some Pearlies (we had caught a few earlier in the trip in other areas). What a cracker of a day we had, jigging Pearlies like they were a school of herring ina burley trail, just very deep! Couldnt hit the bottom without multiple hookups. Ended up with our bag of pearlies and calling the deckies over to have a crack who also scored some good fish! (skippers did have to give them a spot tho!!!)

All in all, cracker of a trip. Heaps of fish, heaps of laughs with a bunch of absolute legends. I didnt touch on the drinking, but we definitely gave it a nudge!!! there were a lot of sore heads many a mornings!! including one night where 6 bottles of vodka and atleast 1 bottle of Gin dissappreared! 

Stopped at a station on the way home for the night, great little stop over to break up the return trip

Bring on 2022, if 2021 is anything to go by!! took all of 2 days for everyone to re-commit, house booked, cant wait.

Couple more pics

Cheers

Bodie

Annual boyz trip to Exxy has been run and won, but we are still waiting for our patriarch to do up a trip report on FW..........Bueller......Bueller. 

Anyhoo, here is a few snips of the trip I took on my phone while we wait for Bodie to get his shit together and put a proper post up.

 So, the annual trek north to Coral Bay done and dusted again...What a year...Left down South on Good Friday at 3am trying to get through past Perth before they all woke up and got moving-perfect timing..rolled into Northbrook Farm Stay late arvo for a well earn't coldie- uneventful day  except apparently Gero ran out of Diesel at a lot of places due to increased traffic...pays to be ahead of the rush. :)

Day two , off to CBay...  [  hopefully no one on here - sorry if so..]..but passed a nice fibreglass boat sitting on the side of the Brand highway instead of its trailer with  A LOT of fibreglass embedded into the Bitumen the previous 50 m...ouch...they already looked like that had enough people to help so off we rolled into CB mid Arvo to 40 degrees and water at 28 degrees- too lovely..Rum time !!!

Forecast looked average at best -   but fishable in a reasonable sized boat so in we went the next day. Fished the first 3 days been selective with what we kept and pretty much the same result for all 3 days..worked  through plenty of boated  fish to keep our bag of nicer eating fish-   reds were plentiful and really good size. Sharks where bad, but we only had one drop on each mark to minimze chances-pays to have plenty of spots and find new ones..   Cobia were as thick as i've ever seen at CB. So, off to a good start with plenty of Reds in the freezer plus a lot more Robbo's than we normally see. Spangos where plentiful and much larger size on average than normal..some in the low 70cm's, a lot in the 60's. 

A cpl days of family time taking the boat to Five Fingers for a snorkle and a squid, four wheel driving all all round relaxing...

Enter Cyclone !!!  We where never worried about it hitting CB with every forecast having it pass by and hitting  lower down.  The media did a fantastic job of scaring out half the towns tourists. We lost 4-5  days to a bit of wind and rough weather...nothing that rum and card games couldn't fix !!!  Mood was a little down around town with the passing of the local who was electrocuted with the unfortunate accident at the Pub. Condolences to his family

To all the fishos in Kalbarri and Northampton etc- hope you all pulled through. It was devistating driving home through the damage..

Fished the last 4 days of our holiday  post  Cyclone for some great fishing to end the trip on a high. Reds where thick and on the chew..easily getting our bag limit of top quality fillets each day...we took out the neighbours on the last day as over the years they are in the same house next door  at the same time and have become friends of course over this time...great guys...- they had a pretty shit trip fish wise and  then had a mechanical failure on the second last day..over a rum that night we said we would take them out the last day and get them on a cpl of fish..Great to see them get on the fish and tick off a lot of PB's for Reds/Robbos/Goldband etc.  I love to see others having a great day and i just skippered the whole day..loved it !!   Full bag for the boat...don't judge me for having a Tomato Cod in one of the pics...they had never seen one and wanted to show their kids...yuk !! All the good red ones where already on ice and didn't make the photo that day too..

So all in all, it was the least amount of days we got out fishing for the 2 week window from the last 10 years- but the quality and size of the fish made up for that. Didn't get the window of weather to head out the 80 km's North  to the big Ruby spot for a throphy fish day...they can wait till next year. A cpl of points below for any that are interested or heading up there soon..hopefully answers a cpl of questions before they are asked

FYI- we don't troll as not super interested in trolling, but we did throw skirts out a few of the days as it was that rough we where only going slow anyway...Hooked a sail fish only for it to drop the hooks - plus a few other palegics.

Comments

We fished both North and South..South been the better direction this trip where as North has been favoured the last 2-3 years. Depth was between 70m and  120m mostly..One day out to the 200's for Goldband, reds where thickest in 68-80 metres [ for us anyway ] 

Sharks - People winge about the sharks all the time..YES, they are bad and have got worse and something has to be done..but the same stories every arvo  are told at the filleting tables of people going to the same spots day after day and hooking 20 fish to land 2- Don't go to the same spots !!!  We fished most spots for 1-2 drops maximum.....in fact i think we prob caught 50-60 % of our fish on new spots found this trip..I hear people say there aren't any spots left..well my advice is if you don't look for them...you won't find them....plenty to find if you know how to work a good sounder.

Baits outfished jigs as normal up North..but Peral Perch def love jigs..  Herring and mullet fillets doing the damage for bait. freshly caught across the year , filleted and cryovacced. But as usual, fresh fish baits always are best !!

Rigs- the ole simple 2 hook patnoster with 3 way swivels always are the best...plus we run only 60lb on the hook leaded as the sharks tend to either break this or go through it easier than the 80lb we use for the main lines..

Great to see Adam and Bernie on the 2 charter boats getting clients onto some good fish too...these guys are always happy to chat and pass on some 'general' advice..Not many towns that Charter operators do this and they should be applauded..Adam is alweays the first on FW to give advice on CB too ...

Kids had a blast as normal running a muck..good times

Heaps of turtles when snorkling..don't need to talk about the 5m+ Tiger that was stalking the kids and wifes..that we haven't told them about yet either..!!

Great to catch up with the friends you make and go there the same time every year. This is what makes CB awesome.

Covid has definetley had an impact on the staff around town..the same guys who have worked there for years are great, but the normal backpackers who always light up with their attitude etc...not there and replaced with others who lets say where not so friendly...a lot of people talking about the staff issue..but still love the place. It's hard to get shitty on holidays there isn't it ??

Absolute love Coral Bay...counting down to next April already..

Asnormal, we don't take many photos, but here a cpl that made it on to the phone..

Have been hitting the inshore reefs off OR for a few months now looking for snapper but have not had any luck apart from the odd shark. Went out Friday night with low expectations but confident that sooner or later the snapper would decide to make their way inshore. I anchored on sand near a bombie about 4.30pn and started the burley trail going with a chicken from IGA, pellets soaked in tuna oil and mulie pieces. Got my first run at 5 and up comes a just size Dhu which I  returned.   The SSW started blowing up which made conditions ordinary but it just looked fishey. Then the sharks came which I think were black tip reef sharks and I hauled one in after the other for about 30 minutes.   Thinking I had hooked another shark I didn't give much respect to what ultimately was a nice 650mm snapper. In between another few sharks I hooked my second snapper and ended the night at about 6.45pm with sore arms and two snapper on ice. Looking forward to the rest of autumn/winter months to have a good crack at the pinks. 

Headed out with a strong easterly behind us and it wasn't too long before a couple of black arse and an 80cm dhu were onboard.

The wind began to settle and I decided to make the most of it and push out to the 70s and search for new ground near where I had recently caught a 16kg dhu.

Heading west at 30 knots thru the 50's where it's usually quite barren in the corner of my eye I spotted a tiny bit of fluff on the furuno. Instantly did a u-turn and sounded up the area.

Nice small lump in 57m of water, no bigger than a car, perfect scenario for perhaps the holy grail that no one has been over or at least managed to spot it at speed.

No fish showing but I don't look for fish, I strongly believe in if you find the ground you will find the fish regardless of whether you can see fish on the sounder or not (unless the spots been flogged of course).

The wind was dropping and variable swinging around making a drift with the sea anchor not ideal and hard to get right. 

I made the call to hold the boat on top of the spot, with my left hand controlling the throttle and my Murasame rod with a saltiga LD40 in my right hand I dropped my bait down. Literally within 30 secs my bait gets hit by a Mack truck and my rod loads up nicely, none of the usual suck and spit and playing with the bait like I find dhuies like to do, this fish nailed the bait and then took off.

I could feel the big paddle tail surges with every run so I was confident I had a big dhu hooked up, took a bit to convince the fish to get off the bottom but once I did I backed the drag right off and let it run as much as it wanted to. It fought all the way up to about 15m from the surface, the water was green so I couldn't see any colour until it was about 5m from the surface, it looked big.

Classic big air bubble purge as it came up, it was a dhu, a big dhu, but was it the magic 20 kegga that I've been trying to catch for many years (previous best dhu was 17.5kg). The fish hit the surface and the first thing that stood out wasn't the length, yeah it was long and over 1m but what stood out was the size of the head, shoulders and girth of the fish.

I looked at my deckie and we both said at the same time that's gotta be 20 surely? Amongst some swear words. Of all days you forget the gopro.

It was a new personal best dhu for me, I had spent so much time on the south coast thinking that's where I would have the best chance of a 20 plus dhu but it turns out it was my own backyard that I would achieve the goal of a 20 plus dhu.

108cm long and weighed 23.35kg. Fish was weighed at the ramp with a small crowd of other fishermen watching including fisheries officers that inspected me, they didn't bother to measure it.

Photos don't do this dhu justice, first stop on the way home was a trip to see my dad, talk about a proud father/son moment.
 

 Two drifts same area!

 Up in kalbarri with the wife and young bloke for 3 days then heading off to Monkey Mia for 8 nights. 

Went out for a for a fish today to prove to the wife mackeral do exist Haha, had the lures out for a bit by sand patch for no luck, decided to drop a line and the missus hooked onto a pinkie but unfortunately was just under but she wall still stocked! Moments later I landed a nice sized one so that's dinner for the night

Towed the Reefrunner to Exmouth for her maiden Gamex, had our first Black at 80kg tagged at 10am Sunday so Monkey was off the back with no chance of Donuts for the competition. Monday nothing, than a Sail on Tuesday before an incredible 3 days of big fish teaching us a lesson. Was smashed by two big fish on Wednesday before finally tagging a beautiful striped Marlin Thursday. Friday morning was an amazing day going 8,8,3 with a smaller Black at 40kg a Blue at 120kg, and finally a solid Black at 140kg, Nor easter was savage all morning making it even sweeter in the 21 footer in amoungst the big boats. Now I know why you fish 80s with 37 kg as often we thought we had brought sticks to a gun fight, especially one fish on Wednesday that took a short corner and we all went F@ck how big was that as it smoked a 50w on 24kg before we could clear the deck. Last afternoon we were down to 3 outfits of 5 which worked in our favour.

Ended with figures of 19,19,6 with 8 big fish teaching us a lesson on 30w, 50w, and Talica 50. Towed bigger lures at 8-10knots with plenty of memories of some insane reel screaming hookups. Cant wait till next year as will be more prepared for the craziness that is Marlin fishing.

All fish were measured with tape from lower jaw to inside tail middle to estimate weights and called in conservative.

Big shout out to all the volunteers that make Gamex the incredible week it is.

 Went out with a boat company owned by Hervey bay Sportfishing. Easiest boat hire i have been own sounder full of spots and had a great day on the water. 

Landed 3 mack tuna one spotty 1 longtail.

Had a big golden trevally eaten next to the boat by a big shark.

Same with a few mackeral.

Lost about $200 worth of lures 

Alot of fun on the 3000 stradic nice to be back on the water after selling our renegade 490 6 months ago.

Highly recommend cost  $380 that inlcuded a minn kota with spot lock and fuel. You literally just hop on and off boat gets washed launched and cleaned for you 

Headed out for the monthly comp with Johno yesterday.  It was an interesting start given the Rotto swim was on and the ramp was quite busy.  One guy in a support boat decided that the best place to rig up was actually in the line-up to the ramps and probably had 50m of empty road in front of him, with the waiting boats starting to clog up the roundabout at Hepburn!  Nevertheless, patience is the key and it was a fairly uneventful launch albeit a bit slower than normal for 5.40am.

The plan was to visit a few inshore reefs first up to see if we could find some tailor.  We were hopeful as the start time coincided with around sunrise, the water still had the residual chop from the wind the night before, and was a little dirty.  We arrived at the first reef, and Johno noted that the water looked fishy whilst I noted that it looked a little treacherous with a relatively low tide, exposed reef, submerged bommies, craypot floats and ropes and the occasional bigger swell wave coming through.  This was not a place for larger boats or anchoring, but having a small boat we decided to get in and hold the relatively small position available with constant use of the engine.  The southerly around 10kn didn’t help our cause, but I have a bit of experience of “holding” with the boat and it seemed worth a crack, if only for a short time to see if they were there – it is always hit and miss with the inshore reefs as they all seem to hold the schooling tailor at some time but experience is that you have to be lucky to be there when they are.

We had some fresh scalies that I had got at market on Friday.  Johno had the relatively light 12lb gear and out when the fresh one on a 4/0 gang.  Well, it didn’t take long and it was smashed and a nice 2lb+ tailor came to the boat.  It was pretty entertaining seeing the fight as we were in nasty country with plenty of reef and tailor are such an angry hard fighting fish that will head for cover.  Johno, in his first 20+ years, never really liked fishing but now he does and it was good to see him tested in this way.

From there, it just kept getting better.  The school was in, they were feeding, the fish were good size and every bait was getting hammered pretty much as soon as it hit the water.  I had to catch my own fish, and Johno is not experienced enough to take the boat in those conditions, so it was a bit of a challenge to land my fish but no problem hooking them.  I got my 3 (2 over 50cm), and then Johno bagged out and we left them alone.  It was a fairly epic 45 minutes and a session we will both remember for quite a while.

We looked after our fish and they were placed in a salt ice slurry as soon as they were caught.  As I have noted before, I don’t really eat fish and tailor is certainly not on my list.  It was really pleasing that I managed to find “multiple homes” for the fish and they were all eaten fresh.  It was also good that WA Fisheries were at the club and they processed all of the tailor we had under the Send Us Your Skeletons program.  They even took the cheek flesh for genetic testing.  The biggest fish was 1.65kg, and they were all over 1kg.

We fished the rest of the comp for a fairly unimpressive return in increasingly windy conditions, but with the tailor session first up it didn’t really matter.  We are very lucky to have such a healthy fishery right on our doorstep.

 Caught my bucket list fish on Saturday at rfw5 fad. Landed 2 , dropped 2 before wind picked up and we called it quits. Large one measured 1020 , smaller one 850. Cheers 

After sitting in a huge queue for nearly an hour to launch we got to our spots around 8.00 am WNW on direction bank in the 30 -40m marks. First drop in and got an undersize pinky straight away, we all thought great gonna be good day then after that nothing till 11am. Fish all over the sounder, nothing big biting. Went out to the 70 -80's and found some good coral. Got 3 big baldies,1 big breaksea, a queen snapper (put back) a few undersize pinkies and small nannygai, small flat head. Went dead so we came back in to 30- 40m zone for a couple of hours for nothing. Fish all over the sounder but no takers. So in the end came home with 4 keepers between the three of us. How did others go out off two rocks ? slow for you as well?

How would that guy feel. Working on old ex military house. Digging stump out found 7.5 kilo gold bar in back yard. Be interesting to see how it unfolds

Hi all, gonna head out of two rocks to direction bank early sunday morning, haven't been out there since last summer, anybody got a recent report on where you found some fish ie what depths to have a look in - we usually hit up the 30's - 40's metre area just wondering if should go deeper this time of year cheers for any advice

 Got onto the Snapper with Heath on Tuesday morning on sunrise. All over by 7am. Boat went well, Snapper went hard, biggest 79 cm. All caught on Scalies and heaps of burley...

 Got onto the Snapper with Heath on Tuesday morning on sunrise. All over by 7am. Boat went well, Snapper went hard, biggest 79 cm. All caught on Scalies and heaps of burley...

 Bit slow to put this up, but had a fairly successful day with two of us fishing in the 40s from Hillarys on Saturday. Little bronzey for fish and chips, two good baldies and a decent breaksea. Surprise was a beast of a flathead. Measured 57cm. My biggest by far. Unfortunately no sign of the ever elusive dhu though!

bonus when pulling the pots on the way in. Total 16 crays. 4 undersize went back.

 Anyone had any recent luck in the Swan River catching Blue Manna Crabs?

I cleaned up late February 2020 & wanted to know if they are in earlier this year

Last year were big full crabs

 Got into a few early then had a visit from the police doing safety checks where I became aware our flares had expired and I was directed to return to base with a caution. Reminder to stay on top of this.