Jamie Coates
REASONABLE weather over the weekend saw plenty of anglers take advantage and hit the water.
If you were heading offshore, off the sand, up the river or anywhere in between, there was action a-plenty.
Kicking off with our offshore news, it has been busy.
Big tuna is on the minds of plenty of anglers and its not hard to see why.
Fish from 50kg through to 115kg have been boated, predominately from Portland, but there have been a couple that I have heard a little closer to home.
Jamie from Extreme Marine Charters boated plenty of school tuna over the weekend and unfortunately lost a big fish after a 20-minute fight.
The guys boating the fish are making no secrets of what they are using – a selection of colours from a broad range of lure manufacturers are doing the damage – but the one tip is running the lure behind a spreader bar or a teaser of some sort.
Bangers or Bonze teasers, flippy floppys, daisy chains etc, it does not seem to matter, just something to give the lure a bit more spice in the water is what is needed.
On the other hand, you have anglers using baits to get the fish, so either using sabiki bait jigs once you have sounded up your bait schools, or straight dabbing them if they are pushed up on the surface, that is another red-hot way to get a nib.
If baiting for tuna, make sure you have a hook that can handle these brutes.
Big and solid is the key because you are going to pile on a whole lot of pressure.
You would hate to straighten or snap a hook at crunch time.
If big tuna are not your thing and school sized fish are what you are chasing, there are no shortage in numbers of those either.
They have been happily eating smaller 3” to 6” inch skirts in a mixture of colours, or deep diving minnows, such as Samaki pacemakers or Halco laser pros.
Bottom fishing-wise we have seen some great fish coming in from the charter operators over the weekend.
Wilbur and the Southerly Fishing Charters crew had a couple of excellent days out there over the weekend finding a good mix of fish for their clients.
That included blue eye trevalla and gemfish over the shelf, then a nice mix of gummy and school sharks, snapper, terakhi and other reefies to round off the trip.
It sounds like a good weekend out to me.
Off the sand this weekend we have seen some more cracking fish coming through.
Ron Fox fished Nene Valley over the weekend and picked himself up a thumping school shark, pulling the scales down to a touch over 27kg, which is not only an absolute beast off the beach, but a beast anywhere.
While we are in that area, local young gun Nathan Kilsby landed a ripper 70cm snapper from the beach and after a quick happy snap, the big fish was released to fight another day.
Andy Barton has been into the fish again this week.
This time he managed to tick the one off the list he has been chasing for a long time.
Andy not only landed his first legal mulloway off our local beaches, but managed to land a couple of them.
Persistence has definitely paid off and now he has his eyes on that magic metre fish.
There have been a few anglers into the salmon off the beach this week and it seems like there are reasonable numbers starting to come through already from the Lighthouse Bay and Canunda areas.
There is always a possibility of a shark or mulloway not too far behind them, so keeping a bait in the water after the sun goes down is definitely worth doing.
The whiting fishing sounds like it is starting to slow down a little, but fishos are still taking home a nice feed and they are spread out, which is good.
Anglers in the Port MacDonnell breakwater are having to move around a bit, but they are almost always finding some decent fish.
Even the landbased fishos down that way are still getting a feed.
You might just have to work a little harder for them.
The beach fishos are still getting their feed of whiting at Nene Valley, Blackfellows Caves and Cape Douglas.
Much the same as previously mentioned, if you find the fishing a bit slow in one area, a move, even as little as 20 or 30 metres can mean the difference between feast and famine.
Gar anglers have found some more nice fish this weekend, with most of our usual haunts producing fish.
Cape Douglas, Livingstons Bay, Hutt Bay and the Petrified Forrest have all been handy little areas for both boaties and waders.
As per usual, there is no change in method.
A steady and consistent burley trail matched with a bunch of live gents under a float will almost always see you take home a feed.
There are still plenty of mullet, trevally and tommy ruff cruising around in the same areas, so expect a few of those on the plate too.
There have been a few anglers targeting the mullet this week in the corner of Red Rock Bay.
Much like the gar, throw out a burley mix and catching big mullet there is good fun.
A selection of baits are useful, but it is hard to go past either peeled prawn, cockles or live maggots.
A lot of people see mullet only as bait for something bigger, but bleed them, ice them down and then cook in your favourite crumb mix and they are sensational on the table.
The Glenelg River has been patchy over the last week or so, but those who are putting the time and effort into it are getting rewarded.
Mulloway news from the last week or two has been very light on, with a couple caught up around the Sandy Waterholes/Princess Margaret Rose Caves area, but that is all the news we have heard.
Bream on the other hand have been fairly good for most.
Young Nelson guru Joe Unwin has been in the thick of it, landing some rippers right through the township.
There has still been a lot of big mullet caught in the river this week and the only secret is to keep the burley up to them and they will come.
They are right through the whole river, so give it a crack wherever you may be fishing.
The forecast for the coming weekend looks to be fishable, but I would keep a close eye on the sea,
It is not worth risking it for a fish.
There will be plenty more fishable weekends coming soon.
Until next week, safe fishing.
