Reports

Where are they biting at the moment

Calamari for Tonight's dinner

 Took the family out last night , chasing a few squid in the sound, lots of fun with the kids, and even the mrs picked up a couple, as she has no luck on previous occasion.

Weather was great, and king George could not resist some fresh squid.


Albany offshore 15/6

Managed to snag my first decky spot yesterday since moving to albany a few months ago.A few customers of mine invited me out and were interested to see if jigs were as effective as bait. First drop into 120 meters ended up with a doubler header which raised a few of the bait boys eyebrows :) although the weather mid morning was pretty bloody atrocious we managed our bag with a few sambos,skipps and smallish greyband thrown into the mix. As luck would hav it the breeze dropped in the arvo and we skated home at 20knots back to the ramp. After having an empty freezer for a while its good to see some stock sitting on ice again :)

Cheers,

chris


Good set of Wings

Great day out yesterday arvo, came home from out wide in the dark in some of the best conditions we have been out in, a few beers whilst relaxing back and letting the auto pilot do all the work.

Fishing was not bad either. We left the fish on ice overnight and did the filleting this morning with a nice cappuccino. Will put a post up later, gotta take the young bloke out for a quick whiting fish this arvo.


Quick fish out from mandurah tonight... 13-6-14

 all caught within 20 minutes... mate got the lot and I managed a eagle ray which happily swam off.

dhu 58cm
KG 54cm
 
 

No pinkies but...

Last 2 trips out with Heath. No pinkies but caught nice gummy (yum), salmon (5.4kg) and 6kg Queenie - went hard on light gear. I have found that they are pretty good eating if they are spiked and bled straight away, and done in a nice beer batter with chips and beer. Also cut out the red meat. Cheers.


PB Dhu

Dhuie ,norther suburbs .Good day out ,although a bit chilly early..

 

Cheers


Help for a Victorian fisho?

Hi Everyone,

 

I am from Victoria and will be heading over to Perth next weekend (Hopefully the weather holds up). I am going to be going out fishing with my brother who just brought his first boat last week. I know a lot of people are very secretive about their co-ords but I was hoping someone could give me some guidance on where to catch some Snapper or Dhufish. The boat can handle going out fairly wide (max 20nm). Looking to head out anywhere metro.

Thanks for reading and  if you want to help me please pm me.

Ryan


Testing the JM Arrester 630 - Arapaima, Barra, Snakehead and more

I was in two minds as to whether to still post this report as (unbeknownst to me) the majority of my photos had already been posted up here by my guide – but thought I would post up a quick report anyway.

Earlier this year my company Adventure Angler, added the Jigging Master range of products to its range. Many people know about the Power Spell and Monster Game range of jigging reels, but I hadn’t heard much about the Arrester 630 baitcaster reels aside from a couple of positive reviews out of the US.

As I’m living in London for the time being and thought it would be a product that would be popular here, I decided to grab some to put to the test. I wanted to give it a solid workout on a number of different species but didn’t have a whole lot of time to do so, so picked Thailand as the destination. I’d done a previous trip there, and had found it easy to get large numbers of fish in a short amount of time, without being dependant on the weather like you would be for sea fishing.

Originally we had a large group of anglers, however due to the coup being announced 48 hours before the start of our trip, many pulled out – leaving just myself and a mate Patrick. This was a shame, but it did however mean more fish for us!

It is possible to do trips in Thailand without the use of a guide, however as with my last trip, I booked John Ang (BKKGuy) from BKK Fishing Tour so we could maximise our days. We did also do some fishing with another guide for one day, but that day was a non-event in terms of fish caught (1 fish for the day between 2 of us), so I haven’t mentioned it here.

To start off with we had booked a day of Toman or wild Snakehead fishing. This is the type of fishing that the reel is aimed at, so seemed like a sensible place to start. After picking us up at 2am, John drove us out to one of his spots, and we were on the water before first light.

At John’s insistence I’d pulled off the 30lb Sunline casting braid I had put on the reel for the trip, and replaced it with some PE3 which I had handy. Heavier than I would have used for the reel generally, but he said it was advisable given the drag we’d be running over the few days fishing and I still found the casting distance to be fine.

It was Pat and my first attempt at Toman fishing so we basically just had the target of getting at least one fish on the boat. We did get there, but it took a lot of casts! We ended up with 4 fish combined (all on surface lures) with the best weighing in at 14lbs. The reel performed faultlessly on the hundreds of casts we put in, but at the end of the day I hadn’t yet given it the workout I would have liked – but I was assured, that would come tomorrow. After a tasty late lunch, we headed back to get some sleep ahead of our 4am pickup the next day.

The next couple of days’ fishing were by no means ‘purist’ fishing trips, in that we were fishing in stocked ponds. Cheating I know, but where else can you have a realistic chance of catching monster arapaima on lure using a baitcaster?!

Things started out slower than we’d expected, with John telling us the heat was a factor putting the fish off the bite, but it didn’t take too long until I was on. This pond contains a number of species so on first strike we didn’t know what I’d hooked, but after the fish did a tarpon-esque jump in the air, the call of ‘big arapaima!’ was made – a first for me.

Now kilo for kilo arapaima don’t fight that hard, but these were heavy fish, and I was fishing on a reel best suited for PE 1.5 chasing fish in streams or inshore species. To its credit though, the reel never skipped a beat. The drag remained smooth and consistent during the whole fight, even with it screwed down pretty much to max drag throughout.

This was a great looking fish with plenty of red on the side, which the others we caught later didn’t have. I’m not sure the reason for the difference in colouration.

After that we had a couple of strikes (but couldn’t set the hooks) and then things went quiet again. We changed spot a couple of times and before too long, Pat was onto his first. As we’d seen how they fought, we immediately called this for an Arapaima, and no more than 20 seconds into the fight I was on too! Double hookup of Arapaima on lures. My second fish fought significantly harder from the get-go, and I could tell it was a better fish than my first. It took long run after long run, stripping the line off the reel even with as much thumb as I dared to give the spool. Eventually though the fish was subdued, and a few more pics were taken before the release.

We knew the pond contained a number of Alligator Gar, which is a species I’d always wanted to land. We had a heap of takes where we just couldn’t set the hooks – and John called these for Alligators. They have a long, narrow, hard mouth – and I think the trebles we were using on the lures just weren’t getting traction. If I chase this species again, I’ll try out an assist hook rigged off the nose of the lure, as I’ve used this to good effect on Sailfish when we had similar issues.

A bit later on I caught a third Arapaima, and then hooked up to something that fought completely differently.

Early in the fight John (correctly) made the call that this faster fighting fish was another Amazon native, being a Redtail Catfish. Given how hard it fought I was surprised it wasn’t bigger when it came up, as it certainly gave a great account of itself. Once again the reel (albeit not the right tool for the job) was great fun, never faltered and even after having landed roughly 200kg of fish for the day and was performing like it did straight out of the box.

For our last day of fishing, Barramundi was the target species. Again we were to be fishing in a stocked pond, but our aim was to throw as many lures and land as many fish as we possibly could in a day – and that we did! I don’t know how many barra we landed – I think I may have gotten close to 50 before getting bored (with a lunch break in the middle) with the fish at some points coming almost a fish a cast. The reel was lobbing out casts almost to the other side of the pond, and had plenty of guts to keep the Barra under control and away from the many pieces of structure/equipment located around the pond. The fish were taking anything from poppers, to minnows, sinking stickbaits, floating stickbaits, it didn’t seem to matter – but dark coloured mid-water swim baits seemed to win the day.

All in all the trip was great fun, and something I’m keen to do again for a change from the sea fishing. The Toman fishing in particular is really addictive, and the lure of the big one will no doubt bring me back.

So far as the reel was concerned, I was really happy with it. Particularly for the price, I thought it was a great piece of kit and something that’s going to now take up a permanent place in my reel cupboard. If weather permits I’m hoping to give it another workout along with the Jigging Master PE2 reel and the Temple Reef Mytho rods, on a wreck jigging trip off England’s South coast this weekend. Will post a report if I get out, though with 6 of these trips in a row now having been cancelled due to wind, I’m not holding my breath!

Below is a link to a video on YouTube prepared by John, showing some of the action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hn86nYIbRs4

For those of you not located in Australia (I can not ship to Australia) the Arrester 630 and many other products can be found at www.adventureangler.net

Cheers for reading,
Dan


landbased kalbarri trip 17/5/14-7/6/14

 What a trip 3 weeks of fishing in kalbarri i fished at least twice every day the options were endless bream and cod fishin spinnin for tailor or macks dermersals and ballooning at the cliffs mulloway hunting crabbing. This was defently my best trip yet, i got my first fingermark bream, first mud crabs, first lb amberjack first lb baldie (even if it was only a baby)

Tailor- were a bit few and far between but still managed enough for some good mulloway baits, mack bait red head and slide swim minnow in silver and orange were the goto lures this time

Mulloway- i lost a horse on one of the first nights i was there and didnt have much luck after (spent more time at the cliffs than chasin mullaz). i was there to see tangles land a donkey20kg+ model though awsome fish very fat.  

Cliffs-got smoked by some big pinks so much fun didnt manage to land one but witnessed tangles land some beauties, got plenty of other fish there lots of wirrah and gold spot mowong which were a bit of a pest but kept ya entertained tailor skippy dart and lots of unstopables. 

River-heaps of fun spinnin for cod small tailor bream and even jagging some rather large mullet on our bream lures which go real hard! This is also were i met Belly88 (the cod master) and his misses jamie a really nice couple and had some great days fishing  with them and some great nights on the beers defently be catchin up with them soon.

A massive thank you to tangles i absaloutly loved fishin with him he has so much knowledge about fish, fishing and kalbarri it was amazing what i lernt off him in the last 3 weeks and all i can say is i'm a better fisho for been able to pick his brain thankyou.

Pics

First fish of the trip and christening the sol (thanks oceanside)

Fishin frustrations love that spot

Nice spot for the misses out of the wind and sun while i fished

Lb amber 6kg gutted

Muddies

Misses pb tailor 55cm

11 kg Lb mack gutted we had some fun getting this bugger up the stones

First Lb baldie see you when your bigger 

Bloody shark on a mulloway rig jeez that bloody thing strechted me

Best tailor of the trip 60cm+ 2 and a half kg

The feed tangles put on before we left bloody awsome mulloway baldie and cray bloody beautiful 

 

 

 


Exmouth - Coral Bay pics

3 weeks in Exmouth and 2 weeks in Coral Bay. Exmouth was mostly rubbish weather and sharks, we got there the day before the flood. Coral Bay was better weather and hardly any sharks.

 

 


Mekong Catfish Fishing in Thailand- BKKGUY

Here a short catch report of my malaysia team fishing with us at BSR.

Many fishes & plenty of fun !!!

Enjoys the short video clip.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muE0qPzM77g

Highlight photo shots of the day.

 

The young & the couple......everyone looking towards to this day....

 


 


 


 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Metro mac on jig & KG's

With Wednesday forecast (just gone) looking sweet Ryan Thipthorp took staff members Josh & Dave to Tworocks for a fish on his boat. The boys have their own boats also but was a great opportunity to catch up outsideof work.

The boys got into demersal on jigs but no standouts however at one spot Josh jigged and landed this 15.5kg metro spanish mackerel on PE2 (if i'm correct) & a Lamble Jig (congrats Josh and Ryan for getting them onto fish)


Staff member Josh with a nice metro spaniard on jig (15.5kg)





Then Thursday (following day) had some great conditions also so Ryan took out good mate Scott (Soupy) to target KG's on his boat. The boys did well with 2 dhufish/1 descent breaksea and 8 plus big KG's kept. Ryan said the smallest KG was around 45cm and the biggest was 53cm. Bait used was Fremantle local ocky from the shop and the esky (in pic) is a 70L Extreme cooler so descent size indeed, well done fellas.

 

Solid KG's from South of Rotto



Abrolhos Anzac Wkend

 I wrote a full report and it disappeared so heres a few photos. Awesome trip as usual!


Some pics frorm the Abrolhos trip


Just a Little taste of Abrolhos

Went over to the islands over the long weekend, the missus and I on our boat and Paul G and Family on theirs..

Started out in Middle group for 2 nights and then 1 night in southern group.. Awesome place and plenty of laughs and good fun had by all..

Didnt take many photos, not really my thing..

But here is a small taste of what we did get up to.. 

 


Tuna off mandurah

 Went for a quick fish this morning we had a quick couple of drifts on the 5 fathom for no results so decided to head out deaper and decided to troll on the way,  caught this little beauty in the 40's was 113cm and 18.5 kg was a total surprise. 

 

cheers

Rod

i have added another pic might make it easier to identify


salmon @ Rockingham on Friday night

An older bloke bulled up a salmon on ultralight gear on Friday night - he said he was only using 2kg line. 
He was only using little a flicky rod and reel so I believe him...

He was cool as a cucumber the whole time, played with it for ages. Gave the fish to some some young kids who made a total mess filleting it....


Friday night pinky mission!

Headed out from Woodies with good mate Dean (Dirt) on Friday arvo on a pinky mission! Our plan was to move outside the square of our usual spots inside GI and out between the Islands. We'd been waiting for the right conditions to fish a particular spot at night that we had only fished early morning prior to this with fairly good success boating some good sized pinks, big sambo's and even some yellow tail kings.

Friday night was set perfect with east to north east winds and a falling tide ideal conditions for this spot, we had the boat all set up on anchor by around 5.30 and Dean had thawed out some scallies on the trip out so two rods were immediately deployed and before I could even get the berley pot into the water Deans rod buckles over and the drag starts screaming after a good little tussle first pinky hits the net and measured 680. This was the start of a hot pinky session we bagged out on pinks averaging from 680 to 700 and the biggest going 870 not my biggest but still a great fish.

We had some great fun releasing a few fish and also dropped a horse or two each being dragged into the rocks or our leaders giving out, these pinks were going hard in the 6 metres of water we were in and they were hungry as most of the fish caught had completely swollowed the baits only a couple of fish came to the boat jaw hooked. After a great and very successful pinky mission we decided enough was enough and snuck back over to carnac and tucked in nice and close behind the island out of the wind and settled in for the night with a couple of black cans and plenty of snapper talk!  We can't wait to get out out on this spot again when the opportunity comes especially when there isn't another boat anywhere insite.

Only down full to the night was we couldn't get Dean's big camera to work for some reason so only got a couple of pics take with his phone the next morning at home.

 

Cheers

Paul

 

 


Shark Bay Long Weekend

Not a full report yet, as I have a heap of pics to go through...

But thought I'd upload this guy I caught.

What a fight on PE2 from heavy heavy structure!

I got a few nice pinks, then got burnt hard twice in a row thinking massive pinks, then it became apparent that we'd hit a huge school of big goldens!! AWESOME TIME! Lost so much gear hahaha.


abrolhos island charter trip

The trip started off with a nice casual drive from and over night stay at our beach shack with some time to waste we took the scenic route thru port Denison and dongra on the way and off corse I wanted to stop at the tackleworld country just for a look at and walked away a bit disappointed then head off to the warf to throw our gear on the boat and have a few drinks until the rest off the boys turned up then off to the pub for a good feed. Back to the boat and we continued talking and drinking to the we hours off Wednesday morning and we decided to get a few zzz before departure
We woke up to a heavy shower off rain and the we set off for the islands And breaky was cooking away with that done I thought I'd have a few more zzz then out off the blue I was down the back throwing up ( few to many drinks nite before) went bak to laying down and was feeling fine bout half hour before first drop so thought better start getting me gear ready out comes me arsenal of rods and reels but main one I used for the trip was me new GAGH crony rod teamed up with a shimano twinpower 5000 running pe2 then out me old faithful blue mackerel pattern flat sider jig on with a hand made squid assist. Things were a bit slow for me on the jigs but the bait boys were pulling up a few red throat emporers and others. It wasn't until bout 2-3 drift in I was finally hoped up and putting the new rod to the test and hamling it well feeling a few head shakes I was calling for a pinky and that wat came up a new personal best for me at 73cm went a bit quiet for me then started feeling sick again so went for a lay down in the eskies for the rest off the day off to the mooring for the night I perked up a bit and were all treated to a nice cheeseboard spread for a late afternoon tea and a good tea

Day 2
Another quiet day for me still persisting with jigs but still kept trying next min I was hooked again a nice big long run Then got some line back in another short run and it had run out off puff and easily pulled it in up pops a nicer pinky and beating the days before pb now upto 80cm went quiet for a while for me then boom hooked up no fight so pulled to the surface and up comes a stinky nor west blowie on jig quick pose for the camera ahahah then went quiet for me again while others were pulling up baldies and smaller sized pinkies headed bak to mooring for another spread off afternoon tea and nice dinners and drinks to go with

Day three proved to be yet another quiet day for me but resulted in the first dhuie for the trip on the boat and yet another pb for me at 80cm That day also proved to be a bit costly nd lost a few jigs

Day 4 the swell was down so were able to go to the shallows so decided to break out the light outfit for a bit off fun but proved to be a bit expensive with hooking up twice with one reefng me and the other given me a good fight until the 10lb braid snapped after a good 100m run and thumbing the spool so decided to go bak to the heavy gear and pulled up a few undersize uSpangos and goat fish then we head a bit deeper and first drop resulted in the boats 2nd dhuie at75cm

The last day. Proved me best day with the most action we hit a few lumps on the way back to port half way back first drop I was on and up pops a 57cm dhuie 3 drift resulted it a big bust off tied on another jig and 4th drifte hooked again Bit off a run gained some line then another run. Gained line a small run then gained the rest off the line up pops about a 15kg sambo next drop was a big busy off and lost me leader and all so thought get me steadic 6000 with pe3. On the GAGH rod tied another jig on next drift resulted in another dhuie. 4 for the trip and another guy got a ano ther on bout day 4 2nd last drop before we headed back to port I was on was screaming off calling it for a sambo and bang line went slack and was bit annoyed but ohwell
Packed me rods nd reels up and headed back
Fish caught by the others on the trip were coral trout spangled emperors baldies even a cobia at night time and a lil shark mackie
In all was a good trip loved using the gagh crony rod and arms didn't get sore at all and was really pleased with the action off it lot about 12 jigs up and tried plenty but the only ones that I hooked fish and lost jigs were the shimano flat sliders. Which I'll have to re stock up on
Thanks for reading me report. Sorry off bit long winded and spelling and grammar not the best
Thanks chris


Cervantes Mulloway

 first ever mulloway at 9am this morning on a mulie

weighed 14kg and estimated 110cm long, conditions were blurry, heaps of weed and got pissed on this morning.

picked up half a dozen tailor and a few herring, oh and got 3 of those pesty rays everyone loves catching.

pretty stoked.


New PB Landbased Pinky

It's happened again. 

This pinky went 93cm.

 

 

 


Went to challenger beach near the boat ramp got a feed

Went down to challenger beach caught 1 big mullet on squid and got half a dozen herring..i put a live bait out the bait was taken not sure what it was though as i did see a small hit but didnt get the hookup..I found i can cast the tld 25 pretty good  still getting use to it a bit still stuff up sometimes  but still learning.Seems to be a few undersize bream around as well a fair few herring which are a good size.Tthe mullet put up a hell of a fight i used a over head penn 320 gti for catching the herring and mullet..


Mixed bag of Metro Lollies

Nice day on the water, fished from 40m to 350m, was a fun day and ended with a mixed bag that should be nice on the BBQ.


fishing

 Hi guys havnt been out in ages and have a friend visiting from USA who wants to go out so is there anything out there and if so were please will be heading out tomorrow (sat)and yes I know its the worst day but only chance I will get thanks 


Lano

 Gday guys currently sitting in the ute hiding from the rain and having a coffee whilst reflecting on the past two days for inspiration ! We decided to make the most of a quiet patch in the work department and have a go up in lancelin. The weather has been fairly rough but wev managed to get out over the last two days. Day one resulted in a skippy and a small black ass. Day two picked up a bit with a snapper that just went 50 and a small yellow fin tuna however apart from that it's been very quiet ! Wev been fishing in between 15-30m and trying to find the ground but can't seem to find the good stuff. Wev been hunting around the lobsta pots but even the ground there doesn't seem to deviate much. Are we fishing two shallow ? I know there's plenty of lumpy looking ground around direction bank but it's a bloody long way out !! Wer guna have a crack at the biscayne but we need the weather to improve a bit. Apart from that if someone could advise an appropriate depth at this time of year that would be great. 

 

Cheers Nik


Back to the Good ole Days.

Like most I started fishing on the bread and butter species, Squid, Herring and whiting..

As the years went by and our boats just got bigger and bigger and the further we went out and the more we travelled up and down the coast chasing bigger fish.

Well of late I have been taking the dingy out just chasing a few herring, whiting and squid which is something I have neglegted to do for a long time and forgot just how much fun it is..

Today was my third trip out over the last couple weeks, this time with my daughter (who is up visiting from Bunbury)

And did we have a ball all on light gear and back home within a couple of hours.. Lunch and Dinner sorted..

Best of all the dingy runs on the smell of an oily rag.. 

 

 

 


steep point

gday anyone been up to steep point lately..headin in on the 7th june got a couple of boats so hopefully we can land a few..cheers


Solo Busso Mulloway

We've had a few quiet evenings since that last successful trip and with no one keen I thought bugger it i'll go anyway.

About half and hour after sunset one of my rods unloaded line at an alarming rate.

After a few nervous moments and a dance around my other rod the silver shine of my first solo Mulloway appeared in the light.

 

She came in at 122cm and was in very good condition.

Stoked to say the least.

 


North Mole Snapper

 Hi Guys,

Caught my first land based pink snapper this morning. Had both rods goin off at same time but only managed to get the one up on the rocks. Had one other run which i think was a shark but the light gear didnt handle it too well. Not the biggest fish but definately made my day. Caught at about 6am