I've been going out for the last 3 weeks around either dawn or dusk trying to get myself a snapper without any luck yet have caught black ass and a decent flathead but no snapper and after having to come home at dusk a fortnight ago on a flat calm evening becanuse I didn't have any lights I decided to replace all the lights wiring and all so I can stay out in the dark. Knocked off work and got the boat and headed down to woodies shot out behind the islands and got anchored 11m around 5, I knew the full moon was not going to help with the snapper but I thought the light would be handy I had a awesome burley sock I'd made myself and got to cubing up mulies around 7:30 when I was starting to think how long should I hang around for and one of my Rods was getting a little movement so I picked it up and started winding slowly and could feel something so I just pulled it up real gentle thinking it was another flathead then it got to the surface I don't think it knew it was hooked until it saw the dinghy all I saw was a white flash as it took off back for the bottom, I got it back up again and it took off back down again fought it back up and it was done, except I netted it and it just tore a hole in my cheap bcf net so I grabbed a rag and just grabbed him by the mouth and pulled him in. Still no snapper but my boats first dhue for me not too bad either at 68cm. YEWWWWW

look

 Been a bit slack getting this one up. took advanatge of the good weather pre the blow. been out a couple of times on mine and mates boat, getting the sounder to read well finally. both have airmar 1kw transducers but reading significantly better on the furono than my lowrance. always thought transducer made most the difference but clearly not. found some new ground about 1nm in closer to the ground have fished for years. same structure, being a veru steep rise from @ 200m to 220m. interestingly fish held on top of this rise, rather then theo other ground where they are at the bottom. the school is massive, made up of grey band, pinks (XL), a deep water tusky (XL), and nannies (okay size). biggest GB went close to 40kg and the range from 5kg+.

 Went out late Friday arvo off ocean reef for my second crack at catching a snapper. Read up on all of the tips and studied the charts for a likely spot. Anchored in about 8m of water just shy of the 3 mile in a clear patch surrounded by some good looking reef. Let a couple of unweighted snelled 5/0's with 30lb leader out the back and started to burly hard with chook pellets and chopped up mulies.   Was quiet to start with so decided to drop a whiting rig down for a bit or fun. Caught a couple of skippy before one of the rods went off....disappointingly a wrasse.   About 10 minutes  later had my first decent run and landed a 55 cm snapper.   Was stoked!  In the following half hour then caught 6 x 70cm snook which was fun to start with, then pissed me off as they kept destroying my rigs and getting in the way of the snapper I was after.   On sunset the snook went quiet and then I was smashed for the next half hour by some good fish, with both rods going off at the same time. Unfortunately they kept biting through the leader between the two hooks and after losing about 10 rigs I decided to pack it in. Home by 730pm with my first snapper and a half a dozen big snook for cray bait ...and gave a few to the old folks to try.   Have since upgraded my leader to 80lb cause I think it cost me some quality fish. Anyway live and learn and had a ball in the process!  Westy. 

 Been lucky to getout the last couple of Thursday's and finally checked out the fads off o/reef Thursday week ago ,still learning my new boat so a little nervous going so far offshore, not much going on out there as far as mahi mahi  but I was surprised at how many boats were out there so early, i was lucky to have my mate Eric  take his boat as well so I felt pretty safe. After a couple of hours we made the call to at least try to catch something so we came back into the bank for a Dhu hunt, as in the last post the comments the tide on the crazy current were bloody hard to fish, I was working pretty hard to get a bite but if you let the sinker stay on the Bottom  the bait was getting hammered , really hard to hookup; had prepped a couple of new vexed meats the day before and chucked one on and got a great 94 cm beast, pretty happy with that so the world for me was pretty good at that stage, we got another nice one in closer where it had glassed off and no current, nice day out and did  almost 80nm: this Thursday went Dhu hunting again and had an awesome day , had my best rod in a rod holder that I fitted the day before onto the bow rail thinking it was tight enough with a jig on on the line ( Stella  8000) , I was fishing wth my bottom bouncing setup and concentrating on the bite ,I don't know how long it was but after a little while I glanced at my stella and it was gone and the rod holder was on an angle that was pointing to the water, my heart sank so fucken low I could of cried like a baby, I looked at my mate and said Eric I just lost my Stella it's at the bottom of the ocean, very low moment I can tell you going fuck is all this effort worth it, picked up my other rod and started fishing again trying not to think how much money just went down the drain: after a minute or so I felt a light tap tap on the line, felt vague and light, I thought better check my bait anyway ,winding slowly up my line felt a little strange,up came the first hook no bait 2nd hook no bait , the tag on the sinker line had my braid I had just lost hanging there on top of the sinker and attached to that is my Stella and I all  of a sudden I felt a whole lot better, attached to the Stella was a great baldie; faark could not believe it; gets better, loaded up my bait again and put dropped a fresh prepped meat on the rod I just lost and put it in my back rod holder where I knew I wouldn't loose it, all good fishing again; soon as I hit the bottom with my other rod I hooked up and had a great tussle with a 82 cm Dhu; happy days; just happened to look at my Stella and the rod tip was almost touching the water, had so much load on it I thought I hooked the bottom; got it out of the holder and holy fuck it was screaming out line, I thought just maybe it could be the one I been chasing for a while; after a truly epic battle up popped something I dream about at night and it make all the effort worth it, cheers fello fishos; had to tell the story:

Big boy went 107 cm just on 20 kgs

Not much of a report - but I figured I would share my struggles in case it makes anyone else feel better about their fishing ability ! 

Went out today from Rockingham, cruised out 20nm @ 0600, conditions were magic but the current was ripping as hard as I have ever seen it. The sea anchor wasn't working as it seemed to overtake the boat. Tried to anchor but the current was so fast we couldn't hold ground. I'm hardly a veteran at the bottom bouncing game but that was the fastest I have seen the water moving out of rockingham ever. 

Changed spots (several times) and seemed to escape the current only for 1x massive cuttlefish. Hard to complain when the conditions were so good. 

So... that's my 3rd outing in a row where the eski has come back empty ! Wife is starting to question if we really go fishing ! 

I'll admit, the last 3 times I've been out have been labelled as "low fish activity" on a solunar website - so either the spots I have are fished out or there really is something to the solunar theory about fish ! 

Quick trip out today after work. Weather was too good to not go. Was a bit slow but did manage to land this one. Was just under 80cm.

Seems to be a few about at the moment. Caught in 35m off Rotto on an old mark I havent fished for a couple of years.

Happy Days...

Glen had previously invited me to fish the FADs, an opportunity that I had to reluctantly decline.  I was not going to decline a second invite and even though the swell was up, I gladly accepted.

We launched before first light from Mindarie and after navigating a rather tricky Three Mile Reef with white water breaking all over the place, we were on our way to the Recfishwest FADs about 54km offshore.  A short stop at Direction Bank for breakie whilst celebrating another awesome sunrise in a crazy Covid world, and we were on our way again.  We arrived at the FAD and were pleased to see that we had this part of the ocean all to ourselves.  Our target species for the day was the dorado (also called the dolphinfish or mahi-mahi), a species that has been on my bucket list for a long time.

I had visited Luke Ryan from Tackle West the day before and he had given me some great advice on catching this fish (btw, Luke has a well equipped tackle shop with quality gear and is never shy to share his knowledge and experience).  Loaded with the lure that Luke suggested, I hooked and landed my first dorado on the second cast.  What a great fight this fish offers as it delivers a number of breathtaking leaps in-between line stripping runs,  before eventually unwillingly surrendering to the angler.  Next it was Glen’s turn and so we took turns in landing this stunning species until our arms were cramping from fatigue.  

There was a period of about an hour where the bite slowed due to a couple of spearos who arrived on the scene.  They however soon reached their quota and thankfully disappeared over the horizon.  Another two boats made a brief appearance during the morning, but everybody acted like gentlemen and made way for each other.  There were more than enough fish to go around in any case.

After an exhilarating morning of landing about 20 fish between us, we decided to make the run back home.  Back home we cleaned the six fish that we kept and vacuum packed the fillets to enjoy on another day (two of which my daughters already pinched).

What a great part of the world we are privileged to live in. 

YouTube video

https://youtu.be/waBOfS0ExWU 

Headed out to the FADs again yesterday with the bro.

Very early doors start paid off and we had our choice of FAD to ourselves for about 90 minutes. After that a few other boats moved in and it was time to bail.

Bit quieter on the numbers but we still got a bag each, including two nice bulls for Paul.

First five fish came on the 1/4oz Bucktail Banana's again and a small cow for number 6 on a trolled 8" Zuker. Quite a discrepancy there.

The second last fish pictured regurgitated a 12'' fish into its throat when we boated it, the pig still ate the little peanut wafting in front of him.

Loving the new Mercury 175 V6.  

 Hey all, haven't done this in a while so here goes

Went for a quick anchor and burley solo a couple weeks ago, started off trying to get some fresh bait, absolutely no problem finding the herring (12 in 20mins) but finding sandies completely different story only 2 in 30ms of drifting my usual spots.

Once the sun had dropped enough set up anchor and started flicking around some small softies and nailed 3 black ass in 3 casts (all small and realeased one just size) followed by a small pink. Picked up the slightly heavier combo and nailed a just size pink (released). What followed was alot of bust offs and snap off from countless rays and sharks.. finished the night with a mid 600 snapper on the tide change. Called if after another ray happy with the avros efforts. 
 

Simple sessions are sometimes the most fun being close to home waa a bonus 

Thanks for reading

In the mid 30s

The annual 2020 Exxy trip got cut short, we had to leave on Sunday only half way through our trip, due to the impending regional road closures and increasingly restrictive social distancing rules, but we still got some good fish and had a lot of laughs.

67 cartons of beer, 15 blokes, 14 bottles of spirits, 7 boats, 2 houses and 1 mother of all parties prior to the restrictive social distancing rules coming in........what a trip!

I only have a few photos from my phone and I took very few, lots of other fish but here is what I got.....

On way up....a bit apprehensive with the whole Corona thing, but we still went.

Arrived Exxy midday after a stop over on the way up, first fish on jig to Daz by 2.30 pm:

Finally a red on jig after many, many years trying for me, first half day was a good one!

First half day with lots of red stuff, these go hard on jig. 

First night in Exxy......everyone with sad faces looking for Langa, who missed the trip at the last minute due to Corona work issues.....the other crew similarly had a crewmenber missing due to quarantine from overseas travel........we "relunctlantly" drank Langas beer and used his brand new 200 series for the tow up.

Nek day, it was skippers vs deckies......me and Bodie took my boat out, the 4 deckies took Bodies boat......and the winner is.....THE SKIPPERS....easily ! We bagged out on reds, goldband and a stonking jack by 11.30 am, the deckied dicked around all arvo for a few Charlie Court.....

Some of the weather was brilliant.....me and Troy from the other crew fished in pidgeon pair Whalers within a few meters of each other for over half an hour. 

Went out for blues one day, raised one and had a hit, 14 small blacks raised in closer and 4 landed between me and Bodie over two days. 

Heading home early......to Zombieland........

My mate caught a small dhuie on my boat about a month ago, while gutting it he found one of those big eyed gobble guts fish inside it's stomach. 

Just found it quite interesting, I've caught them before on small hooks, but never thought to send them back down as live bait, I will be next time tho! 
 

what surprises have others found in the stomachs of dhuies? 

 So many posts about the virus thought I would break it up with a fish post. Fished Gamex with some mates. First time never caught a marlin before. Broke heaps of gear. Two rods, outrigger but caught three Marlin and all solid fish in what was pretty quiet conditions. Went 4,4,3 

 Bagarius yarrelli, also known as the giant devil catfish or goonch, is a very large species of catfish in the genus Bagarius found in rivers in South Asia.
It is possibly also found in Southeast Asia, but this may involve a separate species.The Kali River goonch attacks were a series of fatal attacks on humans claimed to be perpetrated
by man-eating goonch catfish in three villages on the banks of the Kali River in Nepal and India, between 1998 and 2007.

I have the opportunity to fish this ferocious man eating catfish in Thailand.
While most goonch fishing were caught in India and Nepal by live/ dead fish.
As a avid lure fisherman myself, I tried to catch this magnificent fish by mean of artificial lure.

Youtube channel -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qZX8RKecIo&t=111s

We have had some excellent captures by our juniors at the club lately.  It is great to see the young ones out competing on the water, and all bodes well for the future.  In fact, juniors comprised 15% of the total field in the last club competition.

Pictured are Luke with a quality 10kg Spanish Mackerel, Grace and Scarlett with nice tuna, Darcy, Max and Sarah with Dhufish, and all caught out of Hillarys or Ocean Reef. 

The smiles say it all.

 Got a nice feed of herring, and 6 nice size skippy behind Garden Island.

Headed out Friday afternoon for a sunset/night fish. I was initially a bit worried about the winds as they did not drop off as per the forecast, however bit the bullet at 5pm and headed down the ramp to check it out. Turned out to be quite a nice night on the water. The winds were gentle, no swell and a nice sunset made it a pleasent couple hours on the water.

We trolled the back of the 5 fathom for about 30mins, while we sounded some spots, with no luck on lure. Picked a spot and anchored up just on/before sunset. We probably left it a bit late as soon as I dropped down I was on to a nice 600mm pink, didn't even have time to get any burley out. A few pics and I dropped back down then set to work on the burley pot. Shortly after the reel started screaming again and I was on, what a called for, a much larger pink snapper only to be reefed shortly into the fight.

After the sun went down it all went quiet and we packed up by 9 with the one fish and one unlucky squid that decided to hang around the boat.

 It's been over a year since the last time we went out for a metro pinkie bash and the weather looked too good on Saturday not to give it a crack. Got up early and made it to the ramp by 4.30 with the aim of making it out past rotto before the sunrise which was predicted for 6am. We buggered up and took a little too long to get out and missed that first light. Anchored up but quickly realised the tide was going apposite to the wind which was causing our burley and bait float away from the reef. 2nd attempt sorted that out and we were away. Action was instant and within 30 minutes we had a 65cm, 70, 50 (which went back) and lastly a stonker 90cm come up. All were caught on weighted floating mulies on snelled rigs. After a couple more bites but no hookups it went quiet  and that was us done. Pretty happy to get some fillets in the freezer. Didn't weigh the big boy unfortunately but it was super fat, does anyone have any thoughts on a rough weight?

upload pic

 I went out early yesterday to the 5 fathom to try and catch some skippy so i can take my dad out when he comes back down in a fornight. I got 6 skippy, 2 small snaps a small ray and a just undersize black arse  so hopefully they will be there when dad comes down cheers.c

 My old man came down for my daughters engagement party over the weekend, managed to get him out for a couple of hours on Sunday mornin. I know there only whiting but its his favourite fish. To me it wasn't about the fish, it was spending some quality time out on the water with your dad, memories  that you can remember and cherish especially as his health is deteriorating and i really only get to see him a few time's a year. On the way back in we were flagged down by a fellow boatie who was having fuel issues, so i gave him a tow back to pt kenedy ramp from the sisters, he wanted to pay me for doing it but i said no its not needed, as i was happy to help out a fellow boatie in a little bit of trouble. Darryl

Hit the ramp around 6pm to head out to one of my favourite inshore reefs.  Conditions were good with 5-10kn sw winds, moderate swell and a high tide.  After about 10 minutes we arrived and watched the swells for a while before deciding where to anchor.  The sets were reasonably large and surging so we couldn’t really get as close as I would have liked.  Before we set up there was a quick dash to check out the flocks of birds which were active about 500m away but by the time we got there the action was gone.

I had been dusted by kingfish at this spot before so brought out the reasonably heavy gear and set a heavy drag.  40cm garfish was the bait of choice and after a dozen casts or so it was smashed.  The fish played the game initially and headed away from cover towards the boat.  A moment of concern as it headed for the anchor rope but it swam above it and then saw the boat.  After seeing the yellow flashes there was no doubt what it was and it went pretty hard heading for the bommie that was close to us.  Nice to see it in the net and while it was only a rat, pound for pound they go pretty hard.  A quick photo and released to swim off strongly.

We kept casting and just after the sun set the tailor came on for a short while.  I had quite a few garfish loose their tails and probably need to change my rig to position a hook in the tail section.  It didn’t matter though as my eldest boy, who has never really fished a lot, hooked up to an angry fish using a large mulie on a gang.  It is always good to see “new” fishers tackle the task and we were stoked when it was landed.  Again, a quick photo and a strong release.

As the light failed we packed up to be back at the ramp about 7.45pm.  A quick trip where everything went to plan, other than having to cut the anchor off as the surging conditions wrapped the chain around a rock.

 Managed to get out wide on a mates boat.. slow bite but got there in the end. Some nice Bass and blue eye

 Had a nice day fishing for Herring, and some large skippy in the reefs behind Garden Island.

Funny what turns up some times, 50M from shore on a small piece of fresh herring as bait.

 Trip to the block late jan was going to be a special one because was taking the old boy on in his first lb trip needless to say he loved it!!. We worked hard for the fish we caught as the water colour was of for most of the duration of the trip, didnt bag out but some quality fillets for a feed for the five of us. Photos compiled by all the boys and a special shout out to Rig for passing on some great info after his trip cheers mate ! 

 Hey gents, 

Can anyone give me a walpole mouth report? shallow?

Thsnks in advance

 Hi Crew. Currently caravanning around the country for 12 months with the Mrs and we're camped at Cosy Corner near Albany this week. Wet a line this arvo and caught a couple of Hezzas and Whiting which was a bit of fun. Will try and do some more posts as we travel around the country.

Been trying to get out on the water a bit more lately. 

Had a good time with Terry and Bob pulling pots this season, and although we didn’t do spectacularly it was fairly solid with each cray costing $4.92 (including fuel, bait and ramp fees, but excluding labour).  Terry and Bob’s pots came out on 20 December, but I decided to keep mine out there in the shallows to hunt some reds and scout some likely spots for next season – I’m still a bit of a rookie.  Generally only pulled them when the weather was good, and added another 20 odd crays to the season bag.

Headed out one day when I probably shouldn’t have.  The SW wind was much stronger than forecast, and made for quite an uncomfortable time.  Pulled the pots for a few but made the mistake of just chucking one over on the reef because the sea conditions were so nasty.  Had the rods on board that day so came in a bit closer for a fish on some of my snapper ground (have always caught my best pinkies in nasty conditions) so decided to give it a quick go while I was out there.  What do you know, the floating mullet fillet and burley had barely hit the water when the baitrunner started screaming.  You could tell it was a nice pinkie by the runs and shakes and after a good fight the 78cm model was landed.  Not sure of the weight but probably 6.5-7kg as it was a fat one, and a nice mid-summer fish from the shallows.

The next trip out, that bloody pot that was just chucked over was stuck.  Nothing I could really do as I used the boat and tried to pull it from every angle without success, and in the end had to give up.  No choice but to contact some diver mates and arrange for a trip to get it off.  I was very fortunate that Leigh agreed to come out and free it, and he wanted to have a dive to hunt for some crays at the same time – happy to oblige and provide the boat.

The release went smoothly as Leigh just pulled on the floats when it was free.  It was reported to be wedged between three boulders rope down so couldn’t have been retrieved without the help of a diver, and even though it had been out there a fair while there was still had a size cray in it.  I spent the next 45 minutes watching the bubbles and keeping the boat close which was quite relaxing and I did notice that Leigh spent quite a bit of time on the few marks I had sounded up for the pots.  When he surfaced, the catch bag looked healthy but was dominated by an absolute beast.  3.5kg and one of the biggest crays I have seen.

Leigh is a keen tailor fisherman so we decided to head out again to the inshore reefs and try our luck when conditions allowed again.  At the ramp for 4.30am, and a slow trip out so there was enough light to see the reef structure and get in close to it.  The highlight of the trip out, although I didn’t see it, was a big mackerel leaping high out of the water just outside the marina.  Another highlight was my eldest boy, who has never really fished with me, agreeing to come along and have a go.

The fish were there and we landed half a dozen in about 20 minutes before 5.30am, including one for the young fella.  Then, in an instant, they were gone but you can’t complain about the “mayhem” in the first light period.  We released the fish, other than the two that were too damaged and cooked up that night - the photo is not the biggest one we got, but was still a nice fish.  We spent the next hour or so checking out some more likely ground for future trips. 

I’m still amazed by the quality of inshore fishing on our doorstep.  It’s nice that you don’t have to go very far to land some quality specimens.

Opening night at Harvey Dam

Decided to trek down to Harvey Dam last night after work to a spot we got incredible numbers at last year. Safe to say I will never be going back there on opening day again. First of all it was packed, drove around the whole south side of the dam that was accessible via 4x4 and apart from a few little 50m spots basically the whole dam was pegged out. Talking to a few blokes from Bunbury we knew down there they go there Tuesday night and it there were already quite a few people there then. Apart from that with the large number of people bought in the trash with people cutting up in their 4x4s in the mud right close to the dam.

The dam this year was extremely low. The water level was a good 30-40m below where it was last year and there was a lot more mud around the edges this year than previous, and to make things worse the wind was in a totally different direction as what it was saying on "Windy" The wind eased at around 8:00pm which was good however the moon was that bright when we were walking we were casting pretty big / dark shadows which didn't help.

Anyway went to the spot we have been going to over previous seasons (Not on opening night) and the whole bank was taken, luckily we packed kayaks and as the laws have eased we were able to kayak over the other side of the dam where it is not accessible with a car and we had a pretty big stretch of the bank to our selves. A few other people had the same idea we did. Marron started appearing around 8:30pm but there were about an 8th the amount of marron that we have been seeing over previous seasons and there were no real massive ones around, the ones that we did catch were only just the 90mm. We ended up with 7 marron between the 2 of us and I decided to call it quits at around 10:00pm. Talking to a few others in the area that seem like regulars they were very surprised with the lack of numbers as was I.

All in all was a good night to get out, however I wont be going back on opening night again. I will try head down before the season closes to see if it was just the moon and see how I go.

Cheers

 Report stark bay, west end Rottnest Island