Big Southern Calamari and Bream (15-Apr-13)

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So the Autumn weather had arrived together with the end of daylight savings, which made for some chilly sunsets and early days. But the cold weather also bring in some big squid as well. Knowing this, we concentrated our efforts on some squid jigging. I would normally go the smallest size I can get to target the bait sized squid as well, but I switched to a slightly larger model, a 2.5 in hope of some southern calamari. So after a good hour of fruitless jigging, I felt a familiar pull on my line. It at first feels like you’ve hoooked on to some seaweed as it feels like a dead weight, up until they hit the hooks and try to pull away. I called it a southern as the pull is more intense. After a few hours of jigging we managed a two large specimens at around the 30cm mark.

squidandbream

You may be wondering how to tell the difference between a Southern Calamari Squid and an Arrow Squid. The calamari’s wings go all the way up to the head, whereas the arrow squid’s wings join the body only a part way up, making it look like an arrow, hence the name. The calamari also have beautiful big green eyes.

We also ended up with a keeper bream by dropping some small bait underneath us. A short fight ensued to prevent a dive behind the pylons.

Winter Flathead (23-Mar-13)

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So Autumn was here and the wonderful summer was well and truly over, with the weather dropping off dramatically and with it, the number of fish as well. We also find that there are generally less species available during the colder months as well. The action was a bit slow with just the few live baits available, but we put them out anyway. In the mean time we tried for some squid as they can be caught all year round. The jigs are also easier to handle in colder weather as you’re not touching frozen bait all the time. One of the live baits went off in the meantime and up came this flathead of about 50cm.

flathead

Flathead make great eating, especially dipped in batter for fish and chips. At a price of upwards of $30/kg, they’re a valuable catch as well!

Big Australian Salmon (25-Feb-13)

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So trying to fit in as much fishing before the end of summer, we decided to try live baiting for hopefully yet another flathead like in the two previous posts. We had a few variations going, one with a small sinker and one with a bigger one. The small sinker gives the fish some more slack to swim around the surface, whereas the larger one puts it down towards the bottom. The rod with the smaller sinker was hit by a steam train and took the line in all sorts of directions. This would indicate your usual pelagic species of either a salmon or kingfish. After a short 5 minute fight, we pulled up this beauty which measured around the 55cm mark and weighed about 2kg.

 

salmon

Squid and Flathead (18-Feb-13)

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So the flathead have been around as was the case in the previous post. It is good to know that a particular species is around so that you can target them. Flathead are quite easy to catch, but not quite in abundance. They are bottom feeders and are very well camouflaged with the muddy and sandy bottoms. A standard rig we would use is a bit of lead on a live or fresh bait with about a 50cm trace. You have to be fairly generous with your bait offering as they have large mouths and aren’t shy when the baits are substantial. We put out a small live yellowtail in hope of another flathead and we came up with this beauty. It measured around the 50cm mark.

squidandflathead

The fight was shortlived and predictable, but sometimes we mistaken them for a sting ray. They both take the bait and swimming around without too much of a fight, but rather with a lot of weight, quite to opposite to bream and snapper.

The two squid were caught later in the day, a bit of a rough time squidding. It took the good part of two hours to get the two, but will make great bait for our next trip.

A long time between drinks

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So guys, sincerest apologies for not posting for so long, some things have come up and it has been hectic to say the least. I have still been getting plenty of emails, all of which I have (hopefully) attended to. I have also been out fishing in that time as well so I will add the posts in due time. In the meantime, I had noticed that most of the traffic to my site has come from tablets and mobiles, and so I have decided to pretty it up so that it is a bit more navigatable on all. I have also a few things in the pipeline to improve the site, so watch this space! Tight lines!