It’s funny how a few weeks can change the pattern in fishing. After suffering through wild weather for nearly a month I’m glad to say everything has cleared up and we’re on track for a great time on the waterways.

Flathead are starting to show up in the river, and with the start of the prawn season they should fire up as well. Bream and whiting will also become good targets if you are inside the estuary.

The harbour mouth has been fishing well with tailor, salmon and the odd big mulloway visiting both Stockton and Nobbys walls. I watched a guy flick large soft plastics into the shipping channel recently; he let them sink before using a stop-and-sink approach to great effect. He got great hook-ups on big flathead and school mulloway. Admittedly the jewfish were on the small side but some of the flathead that were moving in to feed on the abundant whitebait were a very keep-able size. To my surprise though he let them all go. It’s good to see that sportfishing, as opposed to ‘grab fishing’, is still alive and well!

Outside in the big blue yonder the water is warming quite well, picking up since September. It has brought with it mahi mahi, marlin, tuna and a load of other ready-to-grab-a-lure fish such as kingfish and even cobia.

There have been a lot of shark sightings on our local beaches throughout the Hunter Coast lately, mainly great whites but also some sizeable whalers and hammerheads. This has been due to the rains we had a while back pushing all the bait from the estuaries out to sea. It’s not an unusual effect, and with the warm currents pushing bait down to us this can be expected, so if you are into tangling with these monsters now is a great time. Remember that the whites have to go back unharmed. Remember also that big sharks are full of mercury; 4-6ft fish are best when it comes to eating quality.

The beaches are picking up with loads of gutters and holes forming from the wild weather. I drove along Redhead Beach and was surprised to see the close gutters that were there. If it hadn’t been blowing a gale I’m sure it would have fished very well. I saw a few trying but the sandblasting got too much for some. Whiting, bream, and night mulloway as well as sharks should be plentiful if you pick the right day.

Off the rocks the game fishing boys will be swimming yakkas and slimies under balloons hoping for a big chomp from the kingfish that lurk along the deepwater ledges. Remember all the berley you use to entice your livebait will also bring a lot of other species in close – morwong, drummer, tailor, bonito, bream and squid. A live squid is deadly on mulloway and kingfish if you can keep it out from the rocks.

The reefs will be firing as you read this. Reports of good size mulloway, kingfish, snapper and teraglin have been getting around. Squid the shallow weedy areas and use these as strip baits over places such as the Marbles Reef, the Dumping Ground and North Reef. Along with strips of slimies, yakkas should all work very well.

If you want to get into some huge blue and red morwong, grab some crabs and cunjevoi and try deploying them over the reefs. Swim lures up and down and I think you should hit on some great fishing.