Cooks River - 8/3/08

After such a good session last week, we had to hit the Cooks again. I was under really tight time constraints (and I mean REALLY tight), so we only fished for an hour. The tide was running in this time which funnily enough, has never fished as well as the run out. Well, for me anyway.

We started off slowly with Terry landing a few undersize bream and it wasn't until we neared one of the bridges with some nice eddies swirling about that Terry landed a keeper on his faithful SX40. I was casting a 3" minnow in pumpkinseed towards the base of the pylons when I also landed a bream, this guy going 30cm's.

Terry then hit a purple patch and landed 3 bream for almost as many casts. Lucky swine! I was still landing them but they were definately a lot smaller than last weeks bruisers. Unfortunately, the 60 minutes flew by (they only seemed to last an hour or so) and we had to head home. As we scooted back, I kept flicking a minnow in front of me towards the shore. On one of the casts, the SP landed and promptly the line shot back out towards the middle of the canal. 'Hmmm, that's not normal,' I thought, so I lifted the rod which set the hook into something that felt fairly decent.

There were a few solid thumps that came up the line and I thought, 'Oh, sweet, it's a jewfish!' but these thumps turned into a rythmical thump, thump, thump and I knew straight away that it was a trevally. But at least he was a beauty! I took my time as they have fairly soft mouths and he stretched out to 52cm's which is a new PB for me. A few quick photo's and back he goes to grow even bigger.

This weekend Gary Brown and I are fishing at Lake Macquarie for the penultimate round of the Squidgy Bream Challenges. Fingers crossed we'll do ok and cement our position for the final in April. No yaks involved unfortunately but I'll definately be keeping my eyes open for potential fishing spots for future trips up there with the Hobie. Happy yakkin', everyone!

cheers,
Cid

Cooks River - 2/3/08

I was really itchin' to get in a good bream session so I planned a trip to the Cooks River which at times has been simply superb for great breamin' action. Terry and I launched from the small ramp on Holbeach Ave and shook our fists at the unexpected rain. Straight to the road bridge and undercover for the next 15 minutes until it stopped. Terry was flicking around a large SP in hopes of a Jewfish and for about 5 seconds, he was connected to something that had considerable weight behind it. As he threw his head back and let our a long "Nooooooooooooo", I reminded him it was CATCH and release, not just release...


With the rain stopping we set of for some rocky shorelines that we felt would produce in the overcast weather combined with a runout tide. I was first on the board with a just legal fella (25cm's) taking a swipe at my Halco Scorpion. About 8 casts later, the lure is crunched again and this guy peels off some drag so I know he'll be a bit bigger. When I net him he proves me right and he stretches out to 36cm and by the looks of him, he's a Black Bream.

We take one side of the river each and over the next 3 hours, we have a ball landing a heap of bream. Nearly all of my 8 legals were landed on the Scorpion and Terry landed all nine of his on an SX40. My next best fish of 35cm's was taken on a Gulp Shrimp in molting colour rigged on a 1/20th oz jighead.

With the water still being a bit murky from the recent rain, we were working the lures v-e-r-y slowly with lots of pauses and twitches from the rod tips. During the pause you'd often feel a nudge at which point I'd give a slight twitch which more often than not tempted the bream into jumping on the lure.

The battle-scarred lure I was using is one of my favourites and this colour has been thumped by bigger bream than all my other HB's. Todays bountiful session was also (I'm sure) due to me replacing the trebles with some new Owner Stingers. The original hooks had been used for a few months and they just didn't feel as sharp as I'd like. These stingers are super sharp buggas which I can vouch for as I managed to get one of the hook points stuck in my palm. Gritted teeth and a quick yank surprisingly saw it come out without too much trouble. Twice before I've had barbs go in and each of those times I'd had to push the hooks right through before I could flatten the barbs.

If you haven't tried HB's for bream, then definately give them a go. The initial strike can be so hard and ferocious, completely different to the majority of hook ups that you'd get from an SP. When you have a session like Terry and I had, the adrenaline is pumping all morning. My 5 bag for the day was 2.52kg's which isn't too bad and considering I dropped two nice ones right at the side of the yak, I could easily have been nudging 3kg's. I'm sure if we'd spent a few more hours out there we'd have definately upgraded a few times and scored a corker of a bag.

Ah, the good ol' Cooks River. Not the cleanest of waterways but she can certainly turn on some rod-bending, drag-screaming fishing days when she wants to. It almost tempts me to stop chasing kingies...almost. : ) Happy yakkin', everyone!

cheers,
Cid

Botany Bay - 20/2/08

Wow! Three weeks between reports and in that time I've only been out in the yak twice. But I'll make up for it with this report now and another one on wednesday night. This one covers a session I and 5 mates had with Scotty Lyons from Southern Sydney Fishing Tours (http://www.fishingsydney.com.au/). Scott taught me the finer points of Kingie catching a few years ago and it was time to pass on the skills to a few other fishos.

We started off by catching a few trevally around the Drums and then it was off to the live bait grounds where we quickly loaded up with Yellowtail. From here it was a short blast out to Cape Banks where we promptly put two livies down. We'd just had time to finish a coffee when one of the rods starts to bounce around a bit. Scott no sooner says 'That livey is a bit nervous,' when the rod slams down and we're on! Justin drops the two closest guys with a quick left-right and then snatches the rod. A few determined runs has us Ooh'ing and Aah'ing but Justin handles it like a pro and our first legal (67cm's) hits the deck.

While all this is going on, I'm flicking about a Mojo rigged on a 1oz jighead. I let it sink before working it back from the bottom when I get a savage strike. The drag squeals briefly (very briefly) then it all goes slack. I can still feel that the lure is there though, so I give three more jigs and whack!, I'm on again. The light Pflueger 3-4kg Supreme Rod loads right up but it has heaps of power in reserve and the next legal (66cm's) is in the boat, too.

Over the next few hours we hook a total of 18 kingfish and land 12. Of the ones we lost, 4 threw the hooks but two of them were absolute screamers that took off and just kept on going until they reefed us. Man, they can pull like a freight train! The action was simply superb and twice we had a triple hook-up with rods and anglers hooting and hollering all over the boat. Matt (pictured above) had never landed a kingie before and was absolutely stoked to get into a few. Although there were almost tears when his first king (that looked about 70cm's) came up tangled with one of mine and my braid sliced straight through his leader. Oooh, he wasn't a happy chappy at all. : (

I thoroughly recommend a day on the bay with Scotty. Get a few mates together and let someone else do all the hard work. Scott provides all the tackle and bait and you'll definately learn a few tricks of the trade and if nothing more, you'll at least learn some of the top spots that Botany Bay (and Scott) have up their sleeve.

Of course, after getting into these kings, I had to give the Hotwater Outlet a crack a few days later. And what did I get? NOTHING! Not even a hit. On the way back in a decided to have a quick flick around the groynes off Silver Beach. 15 minutes later I had these 4 in the well. I couldn't believe it. All caught on a 1/16th jighead rigged with a Gulp 3" Minnow in Mouldy Cheese colour. The 40cm model was a big fat bugga, too.

Ok, the next report will cover a bream session I had on the Cooks River last sunday with Terry. And it was a ripper, too. So until then... Happy yakkin', everyone!

cheers,
Cid