The stories (you really gotta read it!):

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2014/05/2014-virginia-day-1.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2014/05/2014-virginia-day-2.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2014/05/2014-virginia-day-3.html

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2014/05/2014-virginia-day-4.html

The pics:



#387 for Elijah...tying my #387 for a short while...then completely surpassing my lifer count after. Super happy for Elijah and his accomplishments on this trip!



Swamp monster...



Finally a lifer for me...my only lifer of the trip...and my first lifer of 2014...yes, it was a difficult trip...



We caught more species...but Northern Snakeheads are just too cool not to highlight. Lia's lifer Northern Snakehead was impressive! It was about 8-9lbs, but the photographer did a pretty good job to make it look massive :wink:



The snakehead whisperer



Yes, we did have a blast!!!

Nobody really does deep dropping here in Quepos, so i thought we'd be the first ones to try and man we had some pristine fishing.  Every drop was something, if we sent down three hooks, we had three fish, amazing day out here deep drop fishing!  These were all caught at around 400 ft (I know this isn't super deep dropping) but there are just a ton of rocks I always marked and knew there were fish down there.  We are going to ramp up the bait size on the next couple of deep drop trips and i bet soon we'll start seeing the 100+ pound groupers.  Right now we are fishing a simple 3 drop chicken rig with dead squid, these guys said they just wanted action.  We filled the cooler getting a couple of grouper from each spot of the 50sh spots that I have marked while I was billfishing!  These were all done on my 28 foot panga at around 18 miles out (that trip runs 600 a day).  Great deep drop fishing, I WISH MORE PEOLE ASKED FOR IT, lots of fun nailing the big ones here in Quepos Costa Rica!!!

Fished Mindarie marina wall from 4pm till about 8.30 last night along with heaps of other blokes along the wall nobody got a snapper. Most guys using whole bony herring and scalie mackeral i was using big squid baits. The swell was still real big coming in so we were hoping that would keep the snapper in close seems they've gone back out deep. The weed is a pain in the arse. Looking forward to getting down there after the next big blow. Any other rock fishers got a snapper? How about the north and south moles are the snapper still hanging around?

With all the talk around town of Mulloway and Pinkies moving into the bay a couple of mates and I decided to give it a crack last night.

After 2 or 3 hours of nothing nothing nothing Fiddler Ray nothing Fiddle Ray nothing all hell broke loose when Rhys' rod bucked under a screaming run.

He was pretty nervous being his first BIG landbased fish but after some pointers/bagging and a mad dash to find the gaff this appeared in the wash

Not a bad way to open your Mulloway account with plenty off 'yews' and high fives going round.

Looked every bit of 15kg+ possibly 17kg (128cm).

Thinking 'lets get another' baits went flying back out.

About an hour later my rod bucked big time in the holder and after a mad dash to the rod (and a broken chair) it was hooked up solid. This guy was ANGRY!

After what was a close fought head banging affair this appeared

Screams of PINKY!!! filled the night.

Being my first Landbased Pinky I was pumped to say the least!

Came in at 86cm and looked around 6-7kg

Happy days!
 

I whipped this up quickly last night. It needs more editing so I'll take it down soon. I need to get rid of the swearing....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1Fh-nwl4F0&feature=youtu.be

 Any fish being taken currently at Tims  thicket? I am heading down next Saturday with a 13ft spinning surf rod for live baits, and a 7 and 8 foot spinning rods for lure fishing. I will mostly be going for salmon. Are the schools still hanging around here? Or will it be stray salmon there?

would port beach or north mole be better? Sorry for all the questions

lachie

 had a crack at these north mole pinkies this morning.got 1each

hey FW finally got around to posting this years shark bay trip. dont have any of the photos as of yet except this of the pirate vessel (below if it works).

left perth thursday night and stayed at a mates half built farmhouse in gero, complete with redbacks including 1 eating a baby tiger snake, awesome... stayed there that night and left nice and early the next day (rained both days...) didnt look like rain was going to clear untill we hit useless loop road where some blue finally shone through. the road in was rough as always and the boat trailer and water supply suffered to it. water tank we towed in broke and lost 800lts of water and the boat trailer lost numerous fittings wheel archs and buffers. finally made it to camp and the set up but the bung had fallen out of the boat on the way up sigh... oh well set up camp and waited for the other group/boat. just hung out and had a few drinks that day and launched the still ok boat on the beach. next morning the damaged boat trailer was taken to the loop for repairs and a new bung and we managed to get both boats in. weather was bad so went for some 4wd exploring instead, had to do some serious water crossings on the way back due to some big tides and heavy rains. still a bit of fun.

next day finally had both boats in the water and head out for a days fishing, was a fairly slow start to the day with alot of undersized bluebone. first decent fish managed was when i left my baitrunner in the rod holder when nature called, barely started off the back of the boat when the drag buzzed and i had to call out for someone to grab the rod, 8000d and shimano terez with 30lb braid (a little overkill i found) made short work of it and before id finished business my mate had landed the first decent fish, a 410 bluebone (tuskfish) on my new gear, which he happily pointed out...  not much else happened before the same mate scored a 570 pinky out of nowhere. we caught up with the other boat who had bugger all at that point and rafted up for lunch. during which casting out the back at a shallow reef we we got about 12 sized black snapper ranging from 340 tp 450mm 3 of which belonged to me and i got my first pinky of the trip only barely over at 510. we kept the 2 pinks and a handful of blackies for dinner.

weather turned bad after that with 30 - 40kph winds almost all the time. we tried what we could to get some more fishing in and went for a beach fish at a few spots that looked ok. best manged was 2 30cm pinkys and i scored a 60cm shovel nose on my 2500 sedona on 8pb braid, but have to say it didnt put up much of a fight. tried another spot but that was it. we got desperate mid week and pulled the boats out and cut across to a different inlet in hopes of avoiding the wind or at least reducing it. worked to a degree and we got an ok day on the water but the fishing was slow. had a little fun with some snook at a drop off, i personally landed 6 in and hr and kept 4 to try smoking,which i found to be delicous and will happily do it again. otherwise there was a longtom, more undersized pinkys and then some norwest blowest started wrecking the rigs so we pulled the boats out and explored more.

got up early 1 morning to a fairly flat sea and we skipped breaky to have on the boat and got out there before it turned bad, hit some more spots from last year and cooked a bbq on the boats. 2 of the guys caught some more shovel noses 1 just over a meter on his stradic Ci4 4000 which he rated highly. both went back and we saw some small sharks about but none wanted to play. weather stayed ok and we head off to explore new, deeper water, caught a few more blackies and baby bluebone in  few spots and nothing in others. started heading out for a spot right out deep in the gulf but got turned around by the weather and had a slow trip back to base. hr and a half over heavy chop for about 12nm was less fun, but not too bad in the end and we made it back safe and sound.

last day we spent most of exploring, visit the blowholes and played on the 4wd tracks and just messed about in general, we got back to camp at nearly 5pm and the wind had just dropped off, we had a last little window. no time to waste we rigged up as fast as we could and jumped on the bigger boat that was still in the water leaving the less keen behind. we nailed it out to a nice little rock wed had luck at before and got to it, wasnt long before a few small snapper were landed and thrown back when a mulie i had slowly winding in got smashed and i got my first decent fight of the trip, the terez bent over and a few meters of line lost (more worrying in 2ms of water in very rocky ground) but after a short fight landed a 60cm pinky biggest of the trip right on sunset and i was stoked! we kept at it and i and a mate got another 3 blackies between us before it was too dark and we head back.

the fishing was alot slower than last year and no personal records broken but a few new (to me anyways) fish landed/tasted and a few fillets to take home. in the end theres alot of good memories and thats what matter most so all in all a good week camping with the boys and looking forward to it again next year.

Ryan Thipthorp and staff member Dave went to North Mole late last night/this morning targeting land base pink snapper. The boys did well with Ryan getting a pinky on the first cast, Dave got one 30 minutes later and the boys hung around for another fish which Ryan landed. Congrats fellas, Ryan left his DSLR camera at home so shitty iphone pics were supplied.

Gotta love the storms for land base fishing!!

Took my boy out the other day in Safety Bay to get a quick feed of Herring and squid.

We trolled 10gm Halco twisties most of the time and came across a few big schools while squidding, so it was just a matter of casting out and we were on.

I have always wanted to try a single hook on a little twisty for Herring but for the life of me can't work out how to get the treble off the split ring when the hole in the body of the lure is so small. You just can't feed the eye of the hook around the split ring to get it off.

So while rummaging through the tackle box I came across an old 10 grammer with a busted up & rusted treble, so I cut the split ring off with the pliers and managed to get another split ring on that I pulled of some other old hard body lure and managed to get it through the hole and get a small wide gap hook on it. It wasn't perfect and the hook wasn't swinging perfectly but it was enough to give it a burl.

First few runs I used a twisty with a treble to make the comparison and as usual about a 50% loss rate per hook up.

Changed to the one with the single wide gap and sure enough 'my get the fish to into the boat' rate went up to more like 90%.

Also noticed a distinct change in the way the fish fought - harder (by Herring standards anyway). I guess the single hook 'swings' a bit easier. 

The single hook also made for a far easier release for small fish and caused considerably less damage.

I know hezzas are only small fry but I would be keen to hear other's experiences with single hooks on lures for bigger fish and if anyone else has worked out how to change to singles on the smaller twisties without damaging it.

Here's a quick vid, part of my attempt to cram a mornings fun into one minute. All GoPro edited in GoPro Studio.

A couple of hours fun, a nice feed and just a couple of bucks in fuel.

As always, best in HD.

http://youtu.be/QLJy-MV9dtk

 Hi all, any king george around at all?.

 got a feed of squid(13) on tuesday the 6th. but no kg's only trumpeters. 

 went out about 4 yesterday aiming at getting a feed of squid then anchoring up for a the sundown bite.

After about 30 minutes we only had 3 small squid(dhui bait) so we headed up the sound and got on anchor.

Pinks were going off for a good hour and we landed 8 keeping 4.

 Have been fishing the north mol non stop the past week or so. Nothing seems to be too large in numbers, with the most important influencing factor being time and tides. All the usuals around herring skippy etc. Tailor fisho's in their numbers though there havnt been any noticeable runs. Mainly casting metals along I got stuck into an unidentified tuna late afternoon. Fairly large fish and was the only hook up for the day, and unfortunately spat the trebles on a jump. Switched all my trebles for singles in the hope for a noticeable difference.

Does this count?

 few pinks around. released a fair few. good couple hours

 G'day all. I headed down south over the Anzac Day long weekend. Embarked on a huge trek to find some lightly fished ledges. Didn't really find the deep water I was looking for but made it to a likely looking ledge. A school of big, fat salmon were there all day, and all too willing to fight over surface offerings. This kept me very amused inbetween chasing blues. After chumming up with some salmon, what I initially thought was a small bronzy chasing my salmon, turned out to be a big Samson, who had some smaller mates. I picked one up on a stickbait and another larger model on a plastic, but the latter straightened the hook as I was trying to drag him up the rocks. Was one hell of a fight though. Also managed a little bluey for my troubles

Last minute decision to head out in the boat lastnight after my brother inlaw said he was keen for a fish... night started pretty bad after forgetting my phone and having to turn around to get it :/ half an hour latter we arive at the boatramp realising I needed fuses for the nav lights....  well we first left my place at 8.30 and eventually had the boat in the water by 10pm...

 Just thought I would give a bit of a update of the Coral Bay conditions and use to chance to show off a couple of our better nad more unusual recent captures.

School holidays where good with some good weather for once, but since then it has been a bit up and down. With weather forcasts not helping too much lately and the second decent bit of rain for the year tonight after about 100mm the other week. But we have still been able to get out most days. Fishing has been made a bit harder lately with some strong currents in close and out wide that have been sticking around for a few months now. But I'm happy to say the fish have been bitting hard, we have had to look around a bit some days but have allways been able to find a hundgy school of fish, bagging out or close enougth to all trips this season so far. The fish have been good to with the Goldband and Rosey Jobfish regularly firing.

We have just finished our first group for the year and they did well. After running out of room in the eskys the first day with big goldband the plan for the second was just to head out and have some fun with the small stuff in a little closer then troll for some makkies. But it didnt go to plan with the boys getting onto some of the biggest reds we have seen for a while. The best two in the photos went 11 and 13kg. 

We have found some fish a bit far from hole lately too. Early in the year we got onto a few smaller mullaway out wide, and a during the school holidays we got the 8 bar cod in the photo much shallower that it should be in about 100m. But the most odd one was a 7kg Green Jobfish in 120m of water on the first day of the group.

First time out for ages as busy at work, we got a dhu, baldie, a few B/B's and this YFT after having a quick troll to break up the jigging.

Tim landed the tuna on 10 kg mono, the thing went very hard and he did well to land it. It went 19.6 kg on the scales.

 Found plenty of gummy sharks in close today, not really what we had set out to target but the bigger ones gave a good account of themselves. All returned much to the shock of an old guy we we're telling on the ramp after . We catch these back in Ireland but they are a lot smaller and they are called smoothound but generally don't keep them there either. 

Are they easy to fillet? Might keep a couple next time...

 Headed out from 2 Rocks at 9:20am Lines in the water for 10:00,and fish were on the bite. Baldies, dhuies and heaps of shit fish ,Picked up 5 baldies all kept and 6 dhuies all released on the first spot, So we only need one more and it was time for home. We were looking for the big dhu but he didn't want to play today so we setteled for a 6kg model. Ended the day with around 20 -30 fish for the few hour we fished . Good fishing and good company.[[URL=http://s291.photobucket.com/user/pen850/media/P5040116.jpg.html]

 Went out tonight and got our limit, beautiful  night no wind.

 Bugger me I was out the back of FFB TRYING to catch a feed this arvo when I spotted what I thought was possibly some sambos smacking up a school of baitfish. Due to the poor response from the whiting I was chasing, I up anchored and went after the splashes with a troll past the surface work. Saw the fish on the sounder and whack ....got one. Good size salmon. So I had another go and bang again another. They were like small horses!!

So anyway I do have a photo but cant work out how to get it off the iphone. Dont care if you all say "no photo it doesnt exist" but I just wanted to let everyone know that BIG salmon are about and bloody good fun on the troll.

Quick-ish report of our pre-easter trip to Exmouth with the first time taking up the "big" boat. Spent most of my time up there in a 4.5-5m boat so having the much bigger 6.4m boat we had to change the usual tactics a bit.

Day 1 started with a trip out to murions to show a couple of Exmouth first timers the islands, trolled out to northwest reef on the way out there the hope to open the account with a mack but to no avail. Fishing was pretty quiet so majority of the day was spent snorkelling the shallows out there.

Day 2 launched at tanta's and started trolling south in a bid to crack the first spanaird of the trip. Only got a shark and couta on the troll, so that was quickly given up and headed to an shallowish area where I usually get some good coronation trout and emperors on plastics. The spots were quiet although we still boated a few coronation trout and some emps. I was changing spots and came across a whaleshark cruising just behind the reef in less than 10m. Quickly jumped in and swam with it for a good 20mins or so, it was an awesome experience and with the added bonus of having the whale shark to ourselves rather than with 20 other people. It was something I have always wanted to do but could never justify paying $400ea to go out on the tour boat. So I’m glad I finally got that chance. After the whaleshark we trolled back in and had a triple hook up of macks but lost all three.

Day 3 weather forecast was strong northeasters so it was decided to troll out first thing then head back inside the reef to fish for shallow water spango’s. Only longtails around and with the wind, well and truly howling we came in to fish the 1m mark for some shallow water spanglies. One of the guys got bricked a few times but I managed to land a good 60cm spango’s in a metre of water. Awesome fun and a great alternative (even in a big boat) when the wind is up.

Day 4 started with a troll to find these now elusive macks which we’ve been struggling to find or land. Didn’t take long to get our first and was quickly followed by another. Finally with 2 in the bag pressure was off and we headed back to the shallows targeting shallow water spanglies. No Spango’s landed this time just a few small but tasty yellow tail emperors.

Day 5/6 was a trip back out to Murions and peak. With a couple of the guys on board trying to catch their first GT’s we started the morning popping/stickbaiting around the reefs. Found some good white water with gulls working above and sure enough the G’s were there. Only landed a few pups but some big black gt’s were cruising around. Did find a metre long queenie amoungst them tho. Went for a spear around peak chasing some trout or bluebone but only managed the one bluebone and no trout to be seen. Tried some bottom bashing around peak only to find sharks everywhere! It was getting on in the day so decided to head back to have some more fun on the G’s. Landed some good sized goldspot’s and a 12-15kg GT. At one point we had a feeding frenzy with trev’s, queenies, couta’s and shark's everywhere under the boat. Also trolled up some YFT for the day.

Last day was only a half day as we were planning on leaving that night. Decided the freezer needed some topping up, trolled up a decent mack and had a nice hoo get sharked, Bugger!. Hit up a lump in the 40’s and boated a bluebone, spanglies and a small red etc. PeteVb also managed a good sized robbo! Ventured out to the 110m mark and got a couple of saddle tail and a goldband. Lost a few good fish out there too.

All in all a good trip, sharks were a problem but no where near as bad as my last trip there, had a few magic days in the weather along with a couple of howlers but all part of fishing I guess. Can’t wait to get back out there again with next trip a bit more emphasis on the islands and out deep.

I just got back from a short but enjoyable trip. The weather severely curtailed our plans but we managed to sneak out to a few inshore spots for some good fish.
We managed some big Herring in the cast net and as soon as my Livie touched down I was on. The end results was a Fishwrecked upgrade to beat Nicko's Large Mouth Nannygai. At 91cm and 11.5 kilos it's a big one but I'm sure Nikko will upgrade it in time!!

We went back along the headlands then to hide from the Northerly and got stuck into some cracking Fingermark.

They took both live herring and squid. The Squid were good quality and the Fingermark thought so too.

My biggest went 84cm which is also a FW record so it was a good night. All 7 Fingermark boated were sizeable fish with the largest at 85cm and 8 kilos. The smallest would have been just under 70cm. It included a couple of double hook-ups.

Headed out from Point Peron ramp about 6.00 out to the 40's. bottom bashed for a few hours picked up a 70cm Sambo and a few undersize pinkie's. Swell was pretty big so came back into FFB and caught a few wrasse and a Fox Fish. day was getting on so we decided to head through the causeway and try some squid in the sound. 8 in 20 minutes not a bad day out on the water.

Well another trip to Exmouth has been and gone, and another great trip it was.

Again we hired a house on the marina, makes life a lot easier when loading and unloading, a couple pictures of the boat at the jetty at sunset.

A Little different to the past years, this time the wives and kids joined us for a few days prior, then departed and the rest of the boys arrived. We had 2 main bucket list items for the trip, Yellow fin Tuna and Ruby's on the deep drop!

My partner and I decided to give the whale shark thing a go this year, and booked in for a day out on a charter swimming with the sharks.

Must say, well worth the money at least once in your life. Amazing majestic creatures with little to no care in the world, not even with 20 people in wetsuits getting in their way!

Whilst it was family time for the first few days, we did manage a couple days out on the water when the weather looked red hot. And the fishing was just that, red hot. We managed one solid day chasing bottom fish and another chasing pelagics.

Day one

Not a bad start to day 1, bagged 6 reds, a few rankins and Spangles!! and couldn't believe no sharks!

2nd day was a trolling day. Decided shallow water chasing tuna, mackies, anything that would take a lure really. 5 minutes into trolling we managed to get 1 of the bucket list fish!!! and a nice one at that!

Not 5 minutes later another rod went screaming! A nice solid mack

Even my missus was getting in on the action!! I think we had 2 go off at the same time.

This guy hit a lure after we had stopped whilst landing another fish and one lure still floating out the back!

We had hooked 8 or 10 fish in lass than 2 hours. hot little session. Spent the rest of the day throwing plastics, getting a few more spangles and other bits and pieces. As well as a nice cobia

The weather on the way back in

Easter Monday came pretty quick, and the rest of the boys had arrived for 8 days of fishing with just the boys.

First day out on Tuesday was a nice day out, where we managed to jump in for a spear as well as get out into the deep chasing a few more bottom fish. The ride out up around peak was average, taking over an hour and half to get out, but I had promised the boys the weather was going to be mint. we pulled up in behind peak sheltering from the SE wind for a swim and managed 2 trout on the spear, and the first fish on spear for me!

An hour later the wind had dropped right out to almost glass, so we pushed out to some ground I found the previous year. We were about 2 hours before high tide.

First drift resulted in Den's first red! not a bad way to open your account that for sure! Den was using some old Penn overhead thing that was about 100 years old. It was spooled with braid, but very very slow on the retrieve. To our amazement he barely got sharked. his combo was quickly named 'the datto'. Estimated 9kg

2nd drift the datto is on again!

This was the sounder at anchor. Mind the high gain, I was playing about at the time someone took the photo

We ended up anchoring for the high tide, with our other boat anchoring only 10 metres away. The end result was 3 reds, 3 rankins, some big cod, plenty of spango's. Biggest red went 10+kg but I don't have a picture of it yet.

We moved out deeper after the high about 3 mile or so away to another mark I had which in the past, didn't seem to be so reliant on the right tides. First drop!

Red and Gold band!!

Another Red for Scano. Think he had had a few by this time!!

By the end of the day we ended up with 26 or 28 fish between the 2 boats. 5 reds, 2 trout, a few rankin, Gold band and Spango's!

Thursday was a bit of shallow water fun again, firstly with another swim, but couldn't find any trout. There were a few very very curious sharks about which liked coming within a foot of your fins. None the less, no harm done so we kept an eye on them and kept swimming about. One of the other blokes did manage to get hold of a nice painted cray which ended up on the BBQ and tasted pretty dam good!

After a swim I pushed up further around flat island for some shallow water plastics action on some more ground I found the previous year. Now its taken me quite a few years to get the boys into plastics fishing. In the past, they struggled to get many fish, and generally only hooking Charlie cout (Plastics sitting too long on the bottom) I would end up catching the majority of fish while the boys just got pissed off. Well I think I've now convinced them plastics is the way to go!

Carl with a nice 54cm trout on 12lB on plastic!

Nick with a nice rankin on 15lb on plastic!

A Few hook ups on plastics too. Some never to be seen! got plagued by Large mackerel which seemed to love the plastics

We pushed a bit deeper again looking for fish before we went in.. I managed a nice Rankin and also a few spango's

sunset coming back into the Marina

Friday was deep drop day, with only a 3 tide day and absolute glass, was a good decision. Being the first attempt at it, I was determined to find fish. All on manual gear!

After playing with the sounder a bit, this was the first lump I found!! and didn't need to look any further!! Must say I was bloody impressed with the glarity of the Furuno in those depths! first time out there with this sounder!

this was the 2nd drop!

3rd Drop

4th Drop

We ended up with 4 ruby's all around the 4-5 kilo mark, so nothing huge but success for our first attempt!

We trolled up out around the rigs a bit chasing billies, with little success only managing a few small tuna. The other boat managed a nice Dollie about 10 kilo.

Along came Saturday, and with it the rain!!! it started raining Friday night, but simply poured down Saturday morning. The floods was a first for all of us (Except one who was from the NT) a pretty insane sight. the main drag flooded 3 times.

Trying to ride a pushy through the flood :)

Standing in the middle of the road in front of the Marina!

the floods

We did have 2 Roo's try cross the flood right in front of us, one made it, one was in trouble, so one of our mates waded out to try usher him across, to our amazement he actually grabbed the Kangaroo and lifted him across the flood to safety. The Roo didn't kick or try get away, was just grateful to be out of the water! some of the locals couldn't believe that, that just happened.

We managed to get out on the Sunday, the Gulf was filthy, this is some crap we found on the way back from the Murians

The house, water almost made it

All in all, a bloody great trip, I think we went through 35 cartons of beer in 7 days between 8 blokes.. work that one out!

Some great laughs, some great storeys, a beer or 10 with some great mates and a few fish to boot. What more could anyone want!

Bodie

It's about that time of year when the prawns should be running, so I may give it a go this weekend.
Has anyone tried dabbing from the boat lately? any luck?

Couldn't get enough of fishing this weekend...after the steelhead marathon, I took a marathon 16 hours nap...only to wake up and arranged another afternoon of fishing.

This time we were fishing at Pickering Nuclear Power Plant.

We caught about a dozen Smallmouth Bass in 3 hours. Most were about this size.



These smallies paled in comparison to the action from other fish. I broke my PB Freshwater Drum thrice today. This Freshwater Drum was my PB for a very short while...



...but you ain't seen nothing yet!



...and still...that wasn't my PB....

Check out the blog for the full story and the real PB. ;)

http://muskiebaitadventures.blogspot.ca/2014/04/fishing-so-hot-it-was-nuclear-meltdown.html