G’day lads and lassies (thanks, Kate!)

 

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Ben Knaggs from Fish NSW magazine keeps sending  GREAT PICS. This was like a shot of rum on Saturday’s cold windy morning:

 

Exmouth water temperature is still right up near 30 degrees from inshore to way out beyond the 1500m line so the small black marlin are spread out all over the place. Hooked and lost just the one yesterday, but were entertained by regular strikes from dolphinfish which are about in good numbers.

 

Remember when Mad Max hit the supercharger, on his XB? Same acceleration when a longtail feels the treble sting. Here’s Glenn:

 

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And Kevin with his beautiful Hervey Bay longtail, taken on a popper. Let's face it - now that the Thai/Filipino canning plant is online in PNG, these will have to take the place of yellowfin, for east coast anglers:

 

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Recently went up to Hervey Bay for a Charter with Andrew Chorley of Hervey Bay Sports Fishing and man what a day and what a great guide. Nothing but the highest praise for him and the effort (and time) he went to, getting us onto some great fish.

 

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The day started with some shallow light jigging with raiders for school Mackerel and ended with having to use the heavy GT gear and 60g stickbaits to get the longtails away from the sharks, some we won and some we lost but all were great fun.

 

What a magic day that must have been. UK carp expert Roy is back from a hugely successful trip to France:

 

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Hi Andrew I managed to bank fifteen fish on my trip to France in difficult situations, flooded swims & the fish started spawning on the Thursday,  three fish where over fifty pounds the largest at fifty six pounds & eleven fish over forty pounds, one small fish at 39lb 14 oz! they certainly gave the carbontex a work out!

 

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Incroyable! Well done, Roy. Bob Greenhill sent in some What The Hell pics, knowing I love them. Check out this character:

 

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And this bloke’s keeping an eye on the boat, while his mate finds the bungs:

 

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Rickey pleased with our carbontex and reel knobs, now he needs some hooks:

 

The new carbontex washers I cut to fit my Fin Nor OF9500 and it now has unbelievable stopping power!! I’m very happy with it and the knob on my Rarenium 4000 feels and works a treat! I am very interested in the hooks that you sent me, what are these worth and how do you packet them i.e. ( 5,10,100) per pack?

 

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Glad you’re pleased and thanks for this feedback. Those 7/0 hook freebies we sent you are only $20 for 30 hooks including delivery so, a real steal. Especially compared with the competition product, at $2.20 each:

 

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Roger P, over the moon with holiday success:

 

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How's this one Andy caught by Les Ritter on our trip up at Red Rock and safely returned to the sea.

 

That one is magnificent Rog, they’re turning up everywhere now. Definitely time to remove them from the endangered list. Graeme Henderson’s mate Rod got one too:

 

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Hi Andrew, a couple of pics from a really hot session Monday off Bribie Island. My mate Rod with the grin and the cod, Me with the snapper!

 

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Kevin Abbott scored his PB in Whyalla, this magnificent 30 pounder:

 

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  Scott, pleased as punch with his nice red. Imagine how good this would taste after a bake in Alfoil:

 

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Gatesy, with his big Lake Macquarie salmon:

 

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Hey Andy, thanks for the line it is great.  I have loaded it onto 3 spools and something became apparent to me.  Colored line is amazing for trolling.  Dad and I have been trolling a bit in Lake Macquarie in the past 2 days and running 2 lures, 1 deep and 1 shallow.  The coloured braid allowed me to see how far back the lures really were.  With dad always taking really sharp turns this was very helpful to avoiding tangles.  We have nailed some good tailor to 1.5kg and today I managed a stonking 61cm salmon on a walk the dog style lure on my bream gear.

 

Glad you’re pleased, Mike! Colour change braid just so handy, I even use it to tell how far I’m casting now:

 

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Click here to order.

 

Les writes to thank our readers for their outboard recommendations:

 

Hi Andrew, I appreciated and considered the feedback from your readers a few months ago regarding the re-powering my 6mtr 'Trailcraft'. I ended up going with a brand new 'F150 AET Yamaha 4/Stroke' spinning a 14.3/4 x 17 inch stainless prop. It jumps out of the water faster than a 'Radical Greenie Diver' being hunted by a rec-fisherman.

 It cruises comfortably at 82 Km P/H at 5,200 rpm and you have to listen hard to hear if the engine is still running. Hey, Who's in a hurry anyway?

 

Lotsa blokes, Les! Check this out, Bayview boat ramp on Monday afternoon:

 

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And here’s the tow car, it’s a beast too:

 

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The sound of this rocket going up Pittwater had to be heard to be believed. At the other end of the spectrum, a 5HP Mercury just went on my new folding boat, replacing the 8HP Yamaha. Meaning no boat license will be required, for operation:

 

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David has a request for advice, too:

 

As per our call earlier tonight on me going to lake Awoonga and lake Proserpine we are heading up on the 1st of June and hope to be there by the 2nd of June would just like to know what we need to do up there to get the big ones barra as we will be there for 5 days then heading to Proserpine for 5 day would love some great tips on where to go and what to do thanks for any tips.

 

If you have any recommendations, send me an email? I’ll put you in touch with David. Sydney’s keenest fisho Ben Squire jigged the close in marks on Monday:

 

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G'day Andrew, attached are some pics of the days fishing off South Head. We caught about 20 legal fish (biggest about 75cm), with a quite a few falling to jigs. We also jigged about a couple of thumper Tailor. On the bait side they weren't fussy, squid, yakkas or shiny steel were all on the menu.

 

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Glad to hear you had a good one, Ben! Simon Milne was out there too:

 

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Hi Andy.  Your Saltiga and jigs got a workout today.....thanks again for delivering

 

Anytime cobber, glad they delivered for you. Kingie hunter extraordinaire Nathan Love sends news of success:

 

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Justin Brogan with another bruiser from the shallows.

Fish this size were feeding in less than 6m of water, plenty hooked on poppers, none landed.

 

Very nice indeed, Nath. Hoping for some of that action myself, over the Anzac Day weekend. I was out there on Thursday with ladies aboard, a nice change. Jenny and Rebecca are super keen anglers, with Rebecca regularly competing in the Bream Tournaments. I had to take some photos and write a little how-to on Squid Frames, a great little product from Victoria that makes a dead squid troll straight and true:

 

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So we started out downrigging with those along South Head:

 

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Despite light winds there was a solid swell rolling in, creating a lot of backwash. So I was glad to see a call from Matt Reid showing on the screen. Completely out of the blue and unasked for, but so typical of this top bloke. He told me to head out deeper and break out the jigs, so that’s exactly what we did. Rebecca hooked up:

 

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And soon after, boated her first kingfish:

 

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Weekly report readers will know that, last Tuesday, I had to suffer through a presentation on rec fishing in NSW marine parks given by the new Marine Estate Management Authority, at the Institute of Marine Science. The PC jargon flowed like the mighty Tweed, with buzzwords like ‘stakeholders’, ‘accountability’, ‘data acquisition’ and ‘risk management’ being used in a numbing procession of meaningless claptrap. So I had to laugh when a voice called out from the only other boat there, asking if I was taking a ‘holistic approach to kingie jigging.

’  You’re a funny bloke, Peter:

 

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Unfortunately Jenny was suffering from seasickness so straight back in to Watsons Bay wharf, where I put her ashore for ten minutes, a remedy that has worked well in the past. Meantime Bec broke out the bream gear and started working a blade around the pilings. At one point she hooked up on a lost brag mat:

 

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Jen returned and was back to her bubbly self but I decided it was best to stay inside. Intrigued with Bec’s bream techniques we headed for North Harbour, where Carolyn and I had seen some nice bream under moored boats recently. I was interested to note that she puts her lures in a sealed tray of fresh water, after use. Pretty good idea because the tiny trebles on these expensive ($20+) lures would be a hassle to replace if rusted:

 

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Bec started scoring a steady procession of bream on her Jackall lure. This is a small version, she got some better ones:

 

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This sour old lemon told us with hands on hips to get away from her marina, because fishing was banned there. When I asked what authority had banned fishing, she said, ‘’Maritime.’’ What nonsense, but I didn’t want to make a big deal of it on such a beautiful morning:

 

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A few more bream:

 

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And our time was up. I enjoyed fishing with the girls and learnt a lot. Jen is a real trouper and suffered in silence with her mal de mer for way too long. Looking forward to getting Jen her first king, next time she’s promised to pack some Kwells. At the other end of the country, Nick from Mareeba has an inquiry about Head Starts:

 

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Has anyone had any problems with spanish mackerel hitting the rigs and damaging the head? It looks like the larger part of the head just clips into the smaller part?.... I get a lot of macks up here in NQ, so keen to try these rigs out as wogheads don't get the same level of action as these rigs do.

 

All good Nick, they’re made from Lexan polycarbonate. Here’s what happens when you fire a Lexan projectile at a cast aluminium block – at seven thousand metres per second:

 

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They’re pretty tough. My dear departed step father gave me Wal Hardy’s The Saltwater Angler for my birthday in April 1969, and inscribed the flyleaf. Just checking it and found that, for some reason, I’d taped an ancient Fishing News kingie report from The Peak inside. This gives an idea of the size and number of kingies we used to catch on the inshore reefs, back in the day:

 

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An incredible photo from The Saltwater Angler, the jetty at Geelong in the 1960s. Does anyone know what they might have been targeting?

 

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And not one of them had a license. To politics, and lots of feedback from last week’s report on the Marine Estate Assessment. Some readers think it should be all sweetness and light, with our greenie tormentors:

 

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Others reckon it’s time for tough negotiation, with green bureaucrats:

 

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I’m tending towards the latter view, especially considering feedback after last weeks’ meeting. While there I met Dan from the anglers lobby group in Byron Bay. He checked the submissions made by the public on the NSW Commonwealth marine parks process. He found that a submission had been lodged by Jackie Corlass, the Senior Compliance Office at Byron Bay Marine Park.

 

 

Corlass had lodged a submission without declaring her office.  That’s an abuse of capacity. Intrigued, I did a little Googling on Ms Corlass. The first red flag – or should I say green flag – was the email exchange below:

 

 

 

 

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The organisers of Byron Bays’ New Year Eve festivities wanted to put lights on the local beach. Jackie wasn’t happy because the lights might affect fish offshore. I posted this on our Facebook page, and the reply column lit up like a New Year’s Eve lightshow. 600+ views and 10+ responses in the first eight hours:

 

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Next stop was Jackie’s Facebook page. There, I discovered she’s a fan of every hard core green group going:

 

 

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March Against Plastic, indeed. I wonder what her keyboard and mouse are made from? From her employer’s code of conduct:

 

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She’s also friends with Tropical Fruits:

 

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I’m a big guava and mango fan so, thinking we might have a common interest, clicked on the link. That was a mistake:

 

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Got a greenie gab fest happening? Count Jackie in:

 

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Yep, a 25 minute panel discussion on burrowing clams. Sometimes the jokes just write themselves. J Jackie is a Marine Parks Compliance Officer, meaning she’s in charge of enforcement. If you’re wondering what a compliance officer is, it’s someone who writes down the details of your fishing license, then passes it back to you with a reassuring note in her voice and a smile on her face. She tells you everything’s okay and you probably won’t hear anything more about it. Two days later, you receive a $250 fine in the mail.

 

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Jackie and Co are very good at issuing fines. Check these statistics out, 175 fines and 146 cautions in six years. They let off one in twenty, most of those in the first year:

 

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Not one fine or spoiled holiday benefits marine conservation, in any way shape or form. Regular readers will know of the unhealthy arrangement between north coast marine parks admin and South West Rocks Dive Centre. It’s wrong to favour one stake holder over another. But under Labor the arrogance of marine parks staff went stratospheric, and the new government hasn’t done one thing to address that. Would you believe that anglers’ nemesis Bill Talbot has been appointed Director of Aquaculture, in New South Wales? That’s like putting Lindsay Lohan in charge of a beer truck. I invite anyone to imagine how impossible it would be to get an aquaculture project approved by a deep green fanatic like Talbot.

 

Anyway, back to Byron Bay. For those unfamiliar with the place, the single best fishing spot is the Julian Rocks. Just like Fish Rock, Julian Rocks have been closed to angling on fraudulent environmental grounds, but its open slather for dive companies. Check this out:

 

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And what do we find on Jackie’s Facebook page:

 

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That’s right, she’s a friend of Sun Dive, the biggest dive company in Byron Bay. It’s quite interesting, the way these people are so unconcerned about having the rules applicable to their job enforced. That’s why you see parkies attending Green rallies, in full uniform:

 

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That’s why you see parkies putting Green political stickers on their government vehicles:

 

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and that’s why we anglers suffer under parkies  so arrogant they think they own the ocean.

Until next week! Keep the good stuff coming my friends, it’s all fascinating and very gratefully received. Cheers,

 

Andrew Hestelow

Managing Director

 

 

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