Georges River - 23/11/08 & Botany Bay - 26/11/08

Squidgie Bream Challenge

25-30 knot winds with gusts up to 40 knots. Sensational breamin' weather...NOT! These conditions completely stuffed any ideas that Gary and I had of venturing up to the Cooks River. Instead we stuck it out in the Georges which was a battle enough in the wind.

Things started off slowly until we hit some weedbeds that we figured would fish ok with the falling tide. Gary eventually rigged up with a Gulp 2" Banana Prawn and bang!, was on straight away. A few minutes later, he added number two to the well. After about 3 hours I finally get a hit and it's a small flattie. Not long after that I get another take and this one is much better..but it's still a flattie. Very nice size at 65 cms but useless in a bream comp.

As the day wore on, we slowly added bream until we had our 5 bag and even added a couple of upgrades. When I say we, I actually mean that Gary hooked them, I netted them and then put them into the well. I couldn't catch a bream for love nor money. Talk about being a spectator! And with 10 minutes to go I finally hook up to another decent fish but this time it's a whiting that stretches out to 44 cms. Sheesh...

Our (ie Gary's) bag ended up weighing 2.16 kgs which saw us nab 16th place out 41 boats, so not too bad considering the conditions. And to top it all off, two out of the top five boats caught their bream in the Cooks! Aaaarrgghhh.... Sorry Gary, next time I'll do better, I promise. : )

Botany Bay Kingie Madness

I'd heard that there were a few kingies around in Botany Bay so I ventured out for a midweek early morning session. Perfect conditions saw me flicking out an East Coast Popper bang on 5:30 am. Six or seven cranks of the handle and 'BOOF-O', I'm on! At first I thought it was a tailor but a strong run had me thinking that maybe it's a king. I had to go fairly easy with the 6lb braid and eventually I netted a feisty king that was about 60 cms. And first cast too, how sweet is that?

Just in case there were a few more bigger guys about, I upped the tackle to my 15lb outfit and threw out a 6" Mojo SP. Another surface smash knocks the lure flying and I can hardly control myself to fire off the next cast. I let it sink for a fews econds, then get two winds away when I'm on solid. Ooh, this feels like a good 'un. The line zings through the guides and I'm being towed back to the beach. Lot's of surging runs and I keep sideways pressure on him to tire him out. When I eventually see him through the slightly murky water I think, "Yowser, this could be close to a meter!". I make sure he's totally knackered before I tail grab him and haul him into the yak. Woo Hoo! He's a new PB for sure but on closer inspection, I don't think he'll go a meter. In fact, he came in at 89 cms and 5.82 kgs, so I wasn't too far off my estimate.

As I'm re-rigging, a school of kings busts up in front of me, so I throw on an olive green Sluggo this time, seeing if the colour change will make a difference. Another instant hook up, so no, it doesn't make a difference! This one goes about 55 cms and the next one I land is probably about 70 cms. I've already kept the big one which is enough for me, so anything I catch now goes back to grow bigger and wiser.

I change lures again, this time to a Squidgie Slick Rig and it's nailed as well. I continue changing lures and it doesn't matter what I use, they are getting hit. Another angler in a hornet (Brad) had turned up and had landed a few on poppers but they'd stopped hitting them and all he had were 3" plastics which he wasn't having any luck on. I gave him a couple of the Mojo's and he was back into them straight away.

At about 7:45 am they switched off which was my cue to go home. What a session! I'd say I landed about 12 kings between 50-65 cms and 5 between 65-89 cms. Plus I was reefed three times as well by some bigger guys, so I may have to take out some heavier tackle next time. Next time? When will that be? Two parties to go to this weekend sees an early session on saturday or sunday unlikely.. Cough, cough...Ooh, I hope I'm not sick during the work next week... ; ) Happy yakkin', everyone.

cheers,

Cid

Cooks River - 9/11/08

Still working too much and about to go up to Coffs Harbour for a week (but without the yak). Ripped off! I've just finished loading the car so thought I'd better throw this quick report up.

Nice conditions and a good tide last week but STILL the fishing is sloooooow. Plus the water was down a couple of degrees from last week. All up I only managed two decent bream, one falling to a blade over the flats, the other from a bridge pylon on a Gulp Sandworm in camo.

As I was heading back I flicked one of my rigged blades towards a channel marker and it was crunched immediately and I thought I had the bream from hell on the other end. But 10 seconds into the fight I felt the 'thump, thump, thump' up the line and knew it was a good trevally instead. Not a bad size at 46cm's and I was wondering what he was doing all the way up here.

Next week Gary and I will be fishing our first bream comp for the season. It'll be the 1st round of the Squidgies Bream Challenge which will be run on Botany Bay. Man, I hope the fishing improves! So stay tuned next week for the report in which hopefully, I'll have photos of Gary and I grinning from ear to ear because we took it out. : ) Happy yakkin', everyone.

cheers,
Cid

Cooks River & Botany Bay - 2/11/08

3 weeks without fishing is crapola! To make up for it, we were hoping the fish would turn it on for us and come out chewing their heads off. The sky was overcast, the tide had just started to run in and the water was up to 20.5 degrees. All signs looked promising. We started off by fishing the Airport Bridge and Terry dropped one right at the start. This was obviously a big mistake as we're sure the little bugga swam around telling all the other fish to be on the lookout.

Bites were few and far between until I finally managed to land my first bream of the day that went 32cm to the fork. But that was it from there so we moved out into the bay to start fishing some of the sand flats.


The action was a little better out here (though not by much) and I managed to get a mixed bag of bream, trevally and a tailor. All the bites were fairly tentative and we couldn't figure it out. Maybe there was still a bit too much fresh in the system and in hindsight, fishing deeper may have been the way to go.

Terry had landed a flathead and I left him to continue along the drop off as I had to head for home. Apparently, just after I'd gone, a small school of tailor busted up but Terry said they were only choppers and there were no legals among them.

To finish off, Terry ended up with 3 nice flatties, all caught on a TN60. And, he also managed an unusual by-catch on the TN60: a squid. The unlucky guy was hooked by one of the trebles in just one of his tentacles. He was soooooo close to getting away. That's life, eh?

I must say that the fishing hasn't been all that great in the Bay lately and I'm starting to wonder if all the dredging that's going on is having an adverse effect on the fish. I'm hoping it's just a slow start to summer and that things will come good any day now. I hope... Happy yakkin, everyone!

cheers,
Cid