Few rubys from a recent trip. Managed to get the little quinine out to the 300s and get a few on the jigs. 

 G'day everyone, been a long time between posts, don't get out as much as I use to. Anyway here's a few fish pics from the last year or so. 

 Managed a nice metro 71cm baldie today, new boat record for me.

Oldest boy and I pushed out again today and he was finally on the board first drift. Dropped the pick today and burleyed up and we got our bag very quickly through heaps of 45-49 pinkies... some of which are now in a shark's belly. Also nailed my first pinkie on a placcie.

It was a long 10 mile pushing back into the 10kn SE on a 45 degree angle and ended up doing and extra 2 miles to take it front on.

Arrived last night and the weather turned it on after a week of hell according to my cousin who left this morning.

Woke up to beautiful condition and decided a late start was on the cards on account of the Mrs sleeping in till 9.

No idea where to start so I decided to push straight out to the channels and found some ground and my 2nd pulled in a ripper Rankin. After 5 NWers we shoved off to the Barr Flats and caught a heap of Black Snapper keeping the ones 380+ with Missy Moo landing the pick of the bunch. My oldest caught SFA and is putrid so we're pushing out again tomoz for retribution.

 Took Wednesday off to make the most of the perfect weather.

Quietish day, but the fish that we're brought on board we're good! PB baldy (570), 470 black bum, and another bluebone.

As usual, few undersized snapper and dhu's also caught and released.

Moking was having work stress in retirement. So what does a good friend do??? He takes him fishing. And this is the result. Now he can go back to retirement work with a smile on his face. Haha

Took an RDO Monday just gone as the forecast of light winds and some rough weather the week before, I figured if I could find some stirred up water I'd be in with a chance for my first snapper for the season. Anchored up on sunrise on some inshore reefs not far out of Woodies and I let out a sigh of relief as the current carried the first handful of cubed mulies in the same direction as the wind. I fished with 3 rods to cover all bases, an unweighted bait for the rod holder, a lightly weighted plastic for another rod holder intended to fall/dance extremely slowly through the water column and a slightly heavier plastic that I would jig back through the burley trail. Didnt take long for the burley to do its thing with a couple of just undersized pinks coming in on the bait rod. I was fairly run off my feet fishing the 3 rods as my game-plan for anchoring and burleying for snapper is to always have your rigs slowly falling through the water column, so once my rigs hit the bottom after a long cast out the back I give the reel quite a few winds and get the rigs at least halfway up then let them slowly drift back down again and repeat until you're under the boat and then start all over again. Throw in chopping burley and jigging back the third rod and all of a sudden fishing isn"t so relaxing any more!

Working up a sweat paid off when the jigging plastic got clunked by a solid fish. With all the reports of 500-600mm sized snapper around I had opted to throw around a smaller 4in plastic and jighead, so I was stoked to land a solid pink on the 15lb outfit that ended up going 890mm.

I was well into the rhythm of cast, jig, cast, chop, throw, wind, jig jig jig, wind, chop, throw, cast, jig, wind when the slow sinking plastic outfit buckled over in the rod holder. This fish went 800mm. It coughed up a heap of my burley cubes and one of my whole fish baits that had flung off on a cast earlier in the morning when I got the fish to the side of the boat, burley is key!

I ended up with 2 sized snapper, missed a few big runs on the slow sinking plastic, and a dozen undersized snapper on the bait rod. Always worth mixing it up having bait and plastic offerings, some days they'll only eat one! I came in closer to try for skippy but couldn't get away from the rat yellowtail kings.

Friday evening I headed out with the brother and got stuck into some mulloway. Mixed it up again with plastics and livebait. Livebait was king claiming 3 fish but it was a blast to nail a few on plastic on a baitcaster outfit aswell. The first fish was on the first cast after anchoring, it smashed a plastic that I was slow hopping back to the boat, took me well by surprise!

Hope you enjoy the read guys, tightlines.

 Hi Guys

Thought I would post up a few pics of our montes trip from April.

Spent a good week over there camped up on the islands. As usual fishing was fairly good, with some excellent days and some fairly average. And as always sharks were ever present.

Shallow water fishing was awesome, and also cleaned up with some squid one day.

Really love the place!! Can't wait to go back.

Got some crackers

Been almost 2 years since I have seen him. Finished his quarantine last night . Squid on menu this morn. Plenty of good ones around .

I took a couple of young blokes from the UK for a fish on Saturday and it is fair to say that they both are very novice fishermen. We spent the first hour in the shallows so they could get in some practice before heading out wider.

Fished a few marks without any joy before moving to another spot and whilst lining up the drift, one of the young blokes pulls out a banana and starts eating it! After delivering a barrage of expletives to him and him nearly choking in his haste to consume the banana, the three of us dropped down. 

Baits hit the bottom and almost instantaneously their rods load-up and they are into what appears to be reasonable fish. The first Dhu comes up and after sorting out tangled lines, the 2nd Dhu hits the surface. 

What is almost as good as catching fish, is seeing others, and in particular, novices catch fish on your boat. 

Was a ripper day.

Shot out Easter Monday got Moking onto a nice Dhuie. Pulled a bit string. Actually he cleaned us up, got most of the catch. 

We bled last time out a couple of weeks ago. No north tide this time and the pickers were out. 

Hey guys, long time no post by me, have been trying to upload reports regularly but seems my phone and its photo resolution is not compatible with the forum and the pictures come out all skew-whiff, so have had to upload to a third party photo sharing website first.

Finally ticked off the metro mack for this season, didnt think it was going to happen after a run of bad luck with 2 fish going full airborne on the strike and missing the hooks and getting snipped off by another while targeting sambos in the shallows. New PB for me at 1.44m

Took dad out a little while ago to chase some fillets. Halfway across the sound I realised I had forgotten the sounder and only had the GPS. All the fish come off the one spot, and after only ever catching 1 baldie off Perth before, we ended up with 3 in one session.

Have been taking advantage of the very little swell off Perth lately and sneaking into some gnarly ground hoping for some tailor out of the whitewash, some sessions better than others but I think if I het them at sunrise or sunset I would be in for a hot session. Havent had any luck on poppers yet, all the fish have been caught on stickbaits or plastics.

Last year I won a $1400 reel through Recfishwests FADs photo comp and was honoured to find out they were going to run the photo on the front cover of their 90 page Annual Report. You can check out the online version here https://recfishwest.org.au/news/recfishwest-2020-annual-general-meeting-reflecting-on-a-year-of-great-gains-despite-big-challenges/

I also feature in the current Western Angler, where I answer some questions about how I got into fishing and some of my favourite styles and share some techniques on how I target YTK.

On Good Friday I took the young fella out for a quick session around the inshore reefs for some fun on herring and we come across a little school of big snook which was a lot of fun on the plastics. We had a good laugh as he got to experience first hand at how smelly and slimey they can be.

I snuck out yesterday arvo for a quick anchor and burley session in the shallows hoping for some big autumn skippy but with the lack of swell recently I might have to wait a bit longer before I see any around the reefs. Had a red hot session just flicking back mulie cubes on the 12lb gear, landing a handful of 50cm kings and a bunch of 40cm pinkies and skippy. As I was packing up so I could be home before dark the big rod went off and after a decent tug of war I boated one of the best kingies Ive caught in a long while, going just under 1.1m and with very fat sides, this fish had been gorging on the abundance of bait out there at the moment!

Still some nice ones around and they're all nice and heavy. Did 5 runs on 7 nets for our 8 with Dad and my eldest boy

 Hasn't been many posts on here lately. Maybe everyone is put off by all the recent posts about metro marlin, and let's face it, this ain't anything like that, but anyway.,.

Went out early Sunday for some bottom bashing. Went to one of my usual spots and there was not a single show on the sounder. Thought I'd have a go anyway and after a while got mauled by skippy. I think they are great bait so wasn't too upset. After that it slowed down so put the rod in the rod holder and went to fillet up a skippy. Before I could start the rod was getting bites so picked it up and hooked up solid to a nice fish. After the characteristic dhuie surges up came a nice 12.5kg dhuie. Not a bad start for 6:07 am.  Not long after the floating line went off and after a bit of a tussle I got bitten off by what I am pretty sure was a mackie. Bugger! I don't like using wire trace for them because I don't think they eat the bait as often, but interested to know other peoples thoughts?

Anyway, not long after up came a sized baldie. It wasn't in a good way so no release for him and into the bag for a bag out by 6:30.   Didn't want to head in so decided to troll to find some new ground. After a while I was reasonable close to one of the fads so headed over and to my surprise there was no one else there. Dropped a bait back and before I could turn around it was on. Over the next hour and a half it was about a fish every 5 minutes, sometimes two at once which was chaos on my own, especially when a bird flew into the line and got tangled up with a fish on the other end! They weren't big fish, but they'd have to be one of my favorite fish to catch. Kept a couple of them and then cruised back in with perfect conditions.

Stopped off for a bit closer to shore to clean the boat and - first time ever - got boarded by fisheries to check my catch. Before they came on board I asked them if they wanted to come on board to measure my fish. Once they got onboard and I opened the bag they decided they didn't need to bother  measuring

With the warm current still cranking and weather forecast looking do-able, me, Daz (DazSamFishing), Bodie (Bodie) and Troy (Baron) headed out on the big girl for a day of burning fuel, drinking beer and hoping for another metro marlin.

Run out was good, hit one of the FADS for a quick dolly, plenty there but they were pretty shy, but Daz showed us a little trick and we got one on stick bait. Then headed out to the warm water. 

Spread out on the Regulator.

After 6 hrs of nothing including heading half way to Madagascer, we were all feeling a bit sleepy after several beers and too much rocky road, then boom, short rigger gets pulled from the clip.

After a few moments of imitating Fraggles with arms waving on the air, we looked out the back to see if we should clear the spread as not much line was getting pulled, and then saw a big blue dog hairing across the surface outrunning the boat, this thing was big and angry, jumping out of the water and getting in front of the boat with a big lure hanging out of its gob. 

Had to speed up the boat to get in front of it, then the boys cleared the spread and Troy locked in for a monumental fight. 

It was more than 30 minutes before we saw the leader for the first time, Daz just touched it and it took off again, and this cycle was repeated another 6 times.  This thing was not playing nice, it ran under the boat several times and the inexperienced Marlin skipper (me) was not helping things.....

Just when we thoughts we had it beat, it bashed its bill on the side of the boat (another scar for the Reg) and dove under the boat and wrapped the line through the ladder bracket and around one of the props....In Bodies words "This is a disaster!".....

Daz pulled his shirt off (normally he does not have a good reason except when "Im too Sexy" comes on the radio) but in a blink Daz was in the water and screaming for the motors to get shut off....Troy backed the drag off, Daz wrangled the line from around the prop then the ladder and the Blue ripped another 50 m of line while we dragged "Fabio" back on deck out of 1000m of water.....the shirt never went back on...... 

Another 10 minutes and we had it to the boat. One epic battle, we managed a few quick photos but this thing was not done, it rag dolled Bodie and Daz who were both hanging on to its bill, spat the hook and took off into the cobalt blue water....no need to swim this bad boy. 

Brilliant job guys, it took all 4 of us to land this fish, for Troy, a fish of a lifetime, for all of us, more tall stories to be told at the MAAC for years to come!

 Caught on a 105 sinking stickbait by Nomad in the fusilier colour

 After pulling the pin on Friday, I was desperate to get out so convinced the decoy to be up at stupid o clock and bashed out to the fads. Was a bit bumpy but not bad. First fad luckily got there first, managed 1 drift before the spear is turned up. Got 2 fat skipjack tuna. Mate was keen to try them, figured if no good would at least make excellent bait! We're bloody good fun on the light gear!! Reels screaming. Then left once the spear fishers were ready. Went to the next fad and someone was there being a bit of a muppet. Was using engines to back up onto the fad, diver in the water with no flag or float, then would just keep dropping them right on the fad regardless if it meant u were going to drift right over them. If anyone was trolling that could have been downright dangerous as could barely see the guy. Luckily they buggered off after we asked them what the hell they were doing. Was quite frustrating trying to keep things safe when they were repeatedly putting themselves in risky situations. Did a few passes with stickbaiys for nothing, we're about to leave when chucked in an unweighted mulie cube for giggles. After dodging the birds for a bit reel started screaming as I was hosing the boat, and hooked my first ever dolly!! Epic aerials, didn't disappoint, jumped out the water like 8 times! Was stoked to get it on the boat. Went 85cm. Not huge by any means but I was over the moon. 2 boats saw us hook up so decided to continually motor right over the fad trolling, but didn't seem to get much. We did another pass and mate hooked one (on cube), then back in the water and we had a double hook up! Bloody good fun as neither of us have caught them before. Could see packs of 2-3 patrolling on the surface. We decided to head as had our pelagic bag and weather was due to turn. Stopped at a spot on the way in and I got a cracker baldy at 58cm.

then bashed home. Was horrible combo of swell direction and wind on way home so made for a long trip, but was worth it!!! Cant wait to get out there again!!

Couple of mates and my self headed up to Jurien on Friday looking for a marlin after seeing some favourable looking water on ripcharts and an epic forecast. The weather didn disappoint and we headed out in my mate gregs refurbed 19ft Douglas craft centre console. Got to the shelf after about an hours running and to our fortune found a random float that was surrounded by mahi mahi. Mate Sam ties on a stickbait, lobs it out and gets ravaged by a pack of hungry dollies. Hooks a smaller one which carries on jumping around in typical fashion, gaff, spike, bleed, ice repeat. We all take turns catching a couple small to medium ones for the bin, epic watching them crawl all over a high speed skipping stickbait. Then we’re off again looking for the edge of the warm water we were hunting We put the gear in at about the 800m line and continued west. As we neared the area we thought the edge of the current should be at around the 1000m line we found a line of scum,( algae? Coral spawn?) with birds working in patches and sauries showering out of the water in their hundreds. Weve made the decision that this is where we are going to concentrate our days efforts and begin to mow the grass over a couple of kms of water between the two converging currents. The whole area was littered with patches of bait and bird on the surface and some good size bait balls in the top 40 metres of water. We thought surely there had to be a hungry unicorn around here somewhere but after a few hours of back and forth and nothing to show we started to second guess ourselves and begun heading south loooking for something else. After about 45 mins heading south and seeing nothing we decided we were idiots for leaving that much bait and turned back. I decided a lie down was in order, weve had quite a few bites up north when I have a nanna nap, and as we got back to the area with all the life I came to. As I;m saying to Greg ‘we shouldve had a bite while I was sleeping’ the long rigger gets knocked out of the clip and screams off but drops the lure. We’re all screaming and carrying on at this stage, and as Greg resets the lure the fish erupts on the short corner lure and a chunky blue jumps through the middle of the spread. The long corner reel starts screaming and were all looking at each other dumbfounded whether we’ve got two fish or if its been fouled up on the jump. I was on strike first so I pulled the closest teaser in and.grabbed the first rod, harness on, let’s do this. Sam and Greg clear the rest of the gear, sams in the other harness, game on. We settle in but both lines are going in the same direction and feel like theyre rubbing so off comes my harness and after a little bit of dancing and rod sewing we get them untangled. Straight after sams line goes slack we then figure it mustve been foul hooked on the initial jump. The fight goes on and about 40 minutes later the fish comes up without too much nonsense. First fish south of exmouth for all of us so was bloody satisfying .

Dodged the Valentine’s Day commitments and managed to get out and enjoy the near-perfect conditions yesterday.

Bit of quiet start with plenty of fish seen on the bottom but not a lot on the boat, but things turned around mid-morning and we ended up with a decent mixed bag of 1 bluebone, 3 black arse and a my first dhuie on the new boat (3rd trip out so didn’t have to wait too long!). Not a monster by any means (7.8 @ 80cm) but was a nice end to a good day! Added bonus was that I caught every keeper with the other two instead catching me dhuie bait (wrasse and Srg. Baker ).

All done and back in to OR by 1:00pm which was nice too (the beauty of being able to 32 knots both ways on days like that )

 Headed out early on Friday. Very sloppy conditions, boat handled it great. May be he first time ever I started to feel just a teeny bit crook. Luckily didn't last long. Fished in the 40s. Mate got a 51cm baldy, and a 44 blackass. And I picked up a good snapper and by bigger dhu yet at 71 cm. Dhu was the last fish caught, and sounder was lit up but we left, as hate when people play the upgrade game, and not interested in catching dhu for fun given their poor survival rates. Cooked up the heads, wings and frames for din, and fillets in the freezer for later. 

Had another crack today . All big . Different spot . Bit Deaper . 26 to 32 feet . Used 105 duos .

Moking got us on to them today. They were really aggressive and some of the best overall bag size I have seen. I think I would have done a pb today. I even got a double header on the 1 squid jig. And I nearly did it twice. If anybody can catch squid it’s Moking. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll turn a couple of those little lollipops into Dhuie’s. 

 Quick run in the swan yesterday started slow then picked up caught some stonking crabs, biggest had a carapace of 180mm and wingspan of almost 700mm, only took 11 because they were all so massive we didn't need any more, cheers

 Nice little bully in the swan

Was down in Busselton last week for the annual holiday with the extended family, went out to 20km to 30m of water and looked for some ground. Being the first time out there with a bigger boat, took some time to find some ground, finally dropped on a spot and pulled up some small pinkies , then the wife hooked on to something a bit larger. Pulled it up and its the biggest fish she has ever caught at 75cms. To say she was excited was an understatement. Not much else caught was worht mentioning, but a great time was had.

Cheers Joel

Took my two boys out in the morn and anchored up in the 15kn easterlys and caught a stack of big herring after our berley trail brought in about 4,000 of em.

Once the wind died down we headed out to the 30s but the bite was off and the wind was pushing us on different drifts directions for an undersize blackarse.

Tried dropping the pick and ended up way off my intended spot so back to drifting and bang my oldest had a fight on his hands and got these two up without needing help. Couldn't wipe the smile off his face all day!

He's been learning how to fillet with mixed resuts and joined me with his xmas pressie, a Swibo filleting knife (thanks Mick C for the suggestion) and did an awesome job of filleting, skinning and deboning the herring.

Took the nephews out crabbing in the river this morning. Wind was up a bit initially but a cracker of a day. Got our 10 pretty quick (2 licenses). And was stoked with the size of them! Didn't catch a single female or undersize crab, got 4 on our last run so had to throw 2 of them back.

cooked up tonight for dinner! Full of meat and tasty! Tried steaming them for the first time, as had cleaned them prior to cooking, and reckon will always do it this way from now on. 12 mins was perfect, thanks for the tip jackfrost! 

 After finally manging to align decent weather with a break from work, I managed to take the new bathtub out with a few mates yesterday for her first run. Weather wasn't quite as Hollywood as Tuesday (always the way) but still decent enough for a comfortable day out.

Punched out north west if Rotto in a little under an hour and was straight into a few in the 40's. Managed to land a decent mixed bag of 2 X good size blackarse's and a KG that wouldn't have looked out if place wearing a saddle in the Perth Cup. Mate also got an undersized pink and Dhuey (both released well).

Boat ran sweet as a nut, so all in all a great first venture out on the new rig.