Did my first trip out to the islands a couple of weeks back, awesome trip with some good fish caught over 4 days, weather was pretty good bar one night when it pissed down, was ok tucked up in the cab but the poor deckies got wet, will be back for sure.

 After a last minute decision to head out yesterday arvo. I ended up having a great little session, my deckie not so good. Set off with my kids onboard just outside mindarie marina to cach some live bait, since their only good for about an hour we dropped em off to mum at the ramp then headed out to back of 3 mile. Found a lump, anchored up began the burley trail. Used some tips I have got from this site with cat food tins ( works a treat!) then set our lines and waited.

Didnt take too long before f@$^#kn NW blowies turned up, but only seemed to trouble my mate Glen onboard. He lost I think 3 rigs in about 5 mins. While he was mucking about with that, I landed my 1st pinkie on a glow soft placcie. Got pretty crazy after that at one time Glen was dealing with a large port jackson while his other rod went off with a brozie on the end (he lost) while I got a pike tangled in the burley bucket all at once!

It was about then, I got hit with my 2nd Pinky on the glow placcie, this one was a bit of fun on my spellbinder 9kg and Daiwa Sol 3000. So Glen was fair cracking it by then having only able to land a port jackson, myself I was ready to go had my bag limit so was happy. We hung around for a bit so Glen could get a decent hook up so while I was waiting for him, I landed a nice fat KG, followed by this monster pinky (photo below) he measured in at 94cm but unfortunately didn't have scales on board so coud only guess the weight. After a couple of photos he released fine. Glen did manage one after that which was also released.

Went down to Hillary's for s relaxing flick yesterday. Was just chasing herring/whitting and ended up with about a dozen fish. But the most surprising part was when I hooked a little tarwhine it got nailed upfront of my eyes by a large aggressive tailor. Did the classic "chop" and was coming back to finish the job before I pulled my fish out of the water. Was very cool to watch!

Quick little soft plastic sess last night with Tim VB after work, resulted in 2 keeper dhuies and a nice pan sized pinkie.

Had half the pinkie and half the dhuie on the barbie tonite.......and the winner is......................dead heat!!!!! Very surprised how good the pinkie was.

Cant wait for tomorrow nights dinner!

For easy sharing purpose, I've posted the report on my blog. You can click on the links below to read all three parts of the trip. Enjoy!

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2013/05/illinois-exploration-2013-day-1.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2013/05/illinois-exploration-2013-day-2.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2013/05/illinois-exploration-2013-day-3.html

Fisherking, Voodoo and I spent the weekend at Wilbinga and had a blast.

Friday we were letting skinny Tailor at 40cm + go, Friday night I got my first legal Mulloway.

Sarurday mornng was chaos, numerous schools of Tailor coming through, once we got our bag limit we swapped from baits to lures and nailed them on everything - I honestly don't know how many we threw back, but it was a lot. Saturday Arvo and they were back again and we were relaeasing them.

Saturday night/Sunday morn around 2 in the morn, Voodoo got another Mulloway.

Sunday morning was quiet after the rain, but we still all got at least one good sized fish.

Awesome weekend fishing.

This photo is some of my Sat morning catch.

Went for a fish after work today chasing some pinkies.

Started off catching a couple of skippy then the pike moved in and were smashing any baits put down.

About eight we got one small pink and two undersize dhuies then caught a couple of nice tailor at 45 and 50cm.

Whilst bleeding my tailor my other rod had a hit with this being the result.

 Got a nice gummy and small harlie plus let go baby gummies fingers crossed one mite survive. All babies swam off fine. Some photos

Gday all - went out of Mindarie at 3pm sunday arvo just to kill a couple of hours, had half a box of squid and a bit of fuel to use. Drifted around the 23m mark west of Marina - no bites at all. Came in to 14m fed a million wrasse and caught two breaksea cod just size then ran out of bait. Saw birds working in 18m north of us so headed over with lures out. Baitfish breaking the surface all around a big area could see big fish on the sounder in small schools directly under the baitfish but they werent interested in the lures, Kept going over the baitfish balls but nothing. Anyway coming back reel screams and I look behind to see the rod buckled right over - you beautie! the mrs had never caught a game fish before so I said "your up" Fish just kept running she's holding on squeeling after only about 5 mins up comes a nice Sambo that totally swallowed the bib lure and measured 88cm. Started trolling again on the way home then bang another strike this one ran and ran then 0- silence - spat the friggin lure -    anyway not a bad way to kill a couple of hours.    

 G'day everyone,

With the weather looking good for Saturday 18th called up the brother in law to see if he was keen for a fish. Haha when isn't he! So on the water at sun up out from Dawesville. We've been fishing the 30m line for ages but has been a bit hit and miss lately so we planned to go a bit wider out to the 40's. With no spots in the GPS it was a bit of a recon mission aswell. 

Well it turned out to be a good idea. I started off with a nice little shark that put up a good fight on my new Stradic 6000. Then Doug hooked up just as a heavy shower came through and got soaked, all for a nice skippy. The rain lasted for about 10 minutes but resulted in the sea smoothing off and the wind dropping. I have been reading up in the search function about driftbaiting and had made up a couple of rigs. So with the wind dropping I grabbed my Calcutta and tied one on. In the mean time Doug had hooked up and pulled in a ripper Harlequin that went 51cm. Thought the water had heated up enough for a Coral Trout for a second!! A bit later after getting a couple of good runs on the driftbait but not converting, I finally got a solid hook up. After a good tussle I was pretty sure I had a good Dhu, been few and far between lately for me. So when this fella popped up I was stoked. He went 6.5kg. Doug followed up not long after with another nice one to round it off nicely. Also caught 3 pinkies to 45cm just couldn't get a legal to finish our bag. So had to make do with a Scorpion fish.

All in all a very successful day on the water considering we didn't have any marks out there (do now though). We'll be out there again for sure, it's a long run but well worth it.

Cheers

Chris

Here's a few photos from our recent trip to Northern Territory.

This poor girl was floundering in the shallows.  We went and grabbed her to find a gold bomber hooked into her pharyngial teeth.  After a quick bit of surgery and over half an hour reviving her she swam away.......105cm........    5 mins later a bloody shark was shredding her

That evening I scored this one on a Halco Roosta Popper.  Was 98 or 99cm if I recall correctly.

When the tides were right, we caught a lot of fish pushing the metre mark

I was happy to get this one using a lure which was hand carved from wood by one of my mates in SA

Another nice bessie

Most of our fish were caught on RMG scorpions

We called into Telegraph Pool on the way home and struggled to find fish, this by far our biggest here

This little fella was lucky.  We let him go unharmed.  It was interesting to see a large bungarra digging up a croc nest and eating the babies.  we could hear them calling their mum for help, but she did not show up!

 Back to work now    

Headed out early on Saturday for a jigging session off Two Rocks to some ground i hadn't been to for months.

I took three mates out to give them a day out on the water and hopefully find some fish. Most have not been fishing for years.

Got out to the spot to find it littered with cray pots which made it very hard to set a good drift. While setting some of the boys up with bait rigs one of the boys (Jeff) dropped down a jig which resulted in a nice hookup.

First drift and a 58cm pinkie. Nice start.

After that I got smoked on jigs a couple of times by something that was massive. I had my Catalina locked and it taking line like no tomorrow. The boys hooked up with probably 10+ Skippy with one being a stonker!!

Then Brett landed a nice sized Yellowtail Kingy. Not bad for his first fish of the day.

Then i hooked up on something that went really hard for its size. Not sure what it is exactly but has to be from the trevally family i am guessing. Weighed in at 4kg. ID would be great???

The call was made to head out wider to try for some dhuies but with no luck. A nice baldie and black bum were landed but thats it.

Someone upstairs wispered to me to go back to our original spot and give it another go. So off we went. Turned out to be a great decision. With the wind dying right down and it glassing off we decided to drop anchor and chum up with cubed mulies. Within 15 minutes there was 10-15 kingies coming up the burley trail. I threw jigs and plastics at them for 10 minutes with no luck so i decided to "match the hatch" and just put on a unweighted hook and mulie cube. it didnt last 10 seconds. Very cool watching your bait get slammed by a 7kg kingy.

By this stage everyone else was re-rigging their setups to single circle hooks and a mulie cube.  Jeff was next on the fish with a 6kg kingy. At this stage we also had two whales circling the boat and continued to for over an hour.

We landed four in total which was more than enough fish but lost some unstopable fish which were in the 15-20kg range. They were that close to the boat you could see how broad their shoulders were. Big powerful fish. last cast was called and Brett decided to throw out a whole mulie in hope for a larger fish and within 30 seconds wham. 10 minutes later and this miracle appeared at the surface. Typical you lend you rod to someone who doenst own a rod and he catches a metro mackie!!! 9kg and tasted beautiful on the BBQ Sat night.

With plenty of fish in the esky and glassy conditions still present we decided to head for home.  Always nice to finish the day with a smooth and quick ride home. Spent the next 2 hours filleting fish. Thanks for reading.

Well the old's came up for a visit again and I took Dad out for a fish, over the years I have tried everything to get him onto a Dhuie.
But he caught everything else but the elusive Dhuie, well that was until Saturday, we headed out early to the second bank only to have it blow up which made it pretty crap.
We persevered and I had Dad sitting on the Ice box (So he wouldn't take a fall) while I baited he's hooks and got him set. We fished for a few hours catching a couple of Baldies and I also got a Dhuie.
We had shifted around a few spots and was starting to think about heading home when Dad gives a grunt and the rod bends.
The end result was a nice eating size Dhuie and He couldn't be happier to cross that one off the Bucket List...

I just got back from two weeks in Coral Bay, it was my first time up there with the boat so I think we done pretty well. The weather was horrible for the first week so we spent our time drinking and fishing from the shore and drinking. After much anticipation we managed to get the boat out a few times in the second week when the wind died down. I managed to catch my first cobia, red emperor and ruby and there was a lot of firsts for the other boys aswell. The only disappointing part was when the pub ran out of Captain Morgan.  Anyway im a man of few words so here's the photos.

 Went out for a quick fish with the old man in the exmouth gulf today, got some 5 nice sized squid and 1 small one. not bad for an hour of fishing !

Cheers Joel

Hi

Hit the 'hale road reef system' today (for the first time). Got busted off by something big on the snapper gear, so must have been something decent, maybe a big sambo. Usual wrasse and junk.

Managed this KGW, and also a PB at 58cm.

KGW is waiting patiently wrapped in foil at the moment!

Cheers,

Alex

 18 macs in three hours vid and report soon .And no not at the Abrolhos

Love love love squidding. Caught several small to medium ones in the Sound today. Using some new Daiwa jigs and they are amazing!  Also came across a few cuttlefish which was imteresting. You really can't beat a day squidding. 

 heres my first lb snapper from a few weeks back, you can tell from the photo were it was taken 

Another crack at the deep drop, another fail, but I feel like we are creeping up on them, albeit very slowly. Man, this deep drop is hard, and huge kudos to the blokes who have nailed it, I now understand the effort that goes into this extreme form of fishing.

THE GOOD

My sounder is now working more than adequatley, plenty good enough to find fish. Thanks to all the blokes on this forum for their advice, the TVG settings made a huge difference and I am now runnng betweeen 2.5 and 4 gain in depths of 250 to 400. This is a quick shot of a bit shallower show where we got a good fish show. See the ugly as to why we were at these depths......

TimVB drops down, bang bang.....hookup, the big electric groans, a few short and determined runs......then heaps of weight and a few head shakes.......this has gotta be the holy grail.......WRONG!

Very dissapointed when this amberjack surfaced.......still, better than greeneye!

THE UGLY

1. Current - wow!!!! It was pulling us against a plus 12 knot wind at over 2.5 knots!!! Almost impossible to hold bottom even with a 350 chev engine block as a sinker.

2. Weather forecast - bloody Nora! It was shite out wide. A few little squalls meant local winds above 15 knots, whipping up little white horses and this pushed up against the very fast current to make very uncomfortable conditions that meant out sister boat out there had a very green skipper and deckie.......our boats crew utilised quells to subdue to carrot chunks.

3. The fuel bill - 177 km, 181 litres of fuel. Not bad given we were pushing into rough conditions on the way out and then pushed hard at plus 26 knots most of the way home. Not bad fuel consumption for a reasonably heavy boat but a big bill when the fish boxes are empty!!!!

Moral of the story : Dont think your ganna head out to do dep drop and it is easy.....it aint! Should make success that much sweeter........

Duges66 and myself .. thought we'd give the snapper another crack yesterday and took my tub out , hit the water about 5am and headed out in the dark from woodies past the islands . Decided to anchor on some new ground that looked interesting . Dropped a half filled  scaling bag with old fish heads and frames that had been marinated in thai fish sauce and also threw in a can of tuna for good measure ( we like to spoil our potential fish ) . Kicked back for a hour or so , pretty well on change of light we started getting hits .. a few small models to start with , then a few keepers . I was commenting to Duges "great no sharks for a change" .. then the rod goes off small bronzy only the one though should've kept my mouth shut lol , plus a largish docile Port Jackson . The water was great sat on 30+ knots on the way in ... We've put in a good effort of late and finally a good return .  

So I tried out Trigg for the first time this evening, after reading about it and from the advice of a passer by down at North Beach. Had a rare afternoon to myself so after stocking up on gear I hit North Beach but that was futile, both the platform and the beach to the right, getting snagged and weeded out. Was a bees dick away from cracking it and going home but decided to drive down to Trigg. Wasn't sure really where to fish and nearly bypassed it but doubled back and parked down at Clarko park and checked it out.  Not a lot of room to the left of the island and seeing as I still suffer from the odd erratic cast I decided that the right side would be infinitley better (and safer for the surfers and other fishos )

Bombed out a few unweighted yellow tails on 3/0 gangs and all was quiet save the churning of the water and it smashing against the rocks until just as the last slivers of  dusk disappeared behind the clouds, wammo! No preamble from the fish, it took the lot and proceeded to scream off to the left and try and brick me. Seeing as it didn't want to fight fair, neither did I so I leaned hard to the right and dragged it back around.  Soon this beautiful green back was swinging through the air and onto the rocks. This was my first tailor for a few months, having seen just one in the proceeding months and that was a cheeky bugger performing acrobatics at the end of the Busso Jetty and giving my stickbait the old heave ho.

Went quiet and just before 6.30 as the bait had washed further in on the breakers, I got a couple of enquiries before it stopped pissing around and swallowed it. This one was a bit feistier than the first and there were a couple of hairy moments as it skirted around a rocky outcrop just in front. For some reason I had eased the drag off so when it hit it took off like a rocket. That was it and I was out of there at 7 with a satisfactory haul in my books.

 Got into a few decent tailor at a NoR Beach.  Came on the chew right on the predictions at 730 this morning

Was using the first batch of salted mulies I've done and boy are they good you get so many casts out of them compared to fresh ones

Finally decided to join up and share some of my fishing photos with you.  This pinky was 2 weeks ago and the dolphin fish about 4 weeks ago.

Might be heading up this arvo is it weedy up there ATM? Cheers

I went for a dab in Rocky Bay on Sunday with a huge catch of 2 whole prawns. Not deterred, I hit it again on Monday night with a renewed vigor but alas, not a one. Chit chat at the ramp reviled catches no greater than a dozen prawns.

I'm not expert but from what I was told, I though Sunday would have been a great night for it with a good flush out and good rains on the days preceeding it. Any thoughts

Cheers

Adam

fished about 20m to 22m deep just south of the sisters off rocky today the tide was ripping throu but the jumbo sandys are still there as are the occasional size flatty

 Hiya all..Im hoping to head to Yeagurp for a days fishing, be my first trip there..Any reports of fish, tracks lately?? Whats the best way/tracks to get down on the beach??  thanks barty

Headed out with Duges around 5am behind GI and rottnest trying a few spots .. plenty of dhu and snapper not one in the esky though , one dhu went 49.5cm that hurts . Bit of a mixed bag including small sambos , leather jacket , skippy , bbums , we were cursed with small sharks on a few spots . Moved on and then we were pulling up what I think were sea sweep they were like blowies everywhere all released , but thought we should've kept one for a taste test but weren't 100% on ID . 3 other types of fish not sure on ID .. all in all , a good day catching fish and got a feed .. would've been nice if we had a snapper or dhu in the fridge but thats fishing . Seen heaps of birds and bait fish in the sound on the way back to woodies .. with quite a few boats heading out around 5pm snapper hunting I presume , the water was like glass at that stage.