Julie/Graeme, Anglers Warehouse Tweed Heads (07) 5536 3822
anglerswarehouse@shopsafe.com.au
Wayne, Kingscliff Bait and Tackle
Matthew/Charlie, Deep Sea Fishing Charters

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Offshore: Plenty of good size Snapper around the local reefs and Cod Grounds. Trag and tailor around the Plonk Hole and Wooyung.
Rock and beach: Big tailor and bream can be found around the north wall, south wall and all local beaches.
Estuary: Big bream around the co-op walls and the Spur Wall. Bream and Trevally around the highway bridge. Flathead around the island past the Ferry Reserve caravan park. Good size mud crabs in the river.

Joe
BP Discount Fishing Tackle Brunswick Heads (02) 66851268
brunswick-fishing@netspace.net.au

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Heaps of fish everywhere, tailor, big dart, bream, big whiting, absolutely everywhere with more fish weighed in the past few days than over the last month. Swell up a tad. Seven Mile Reef has some nice snapper. Rocks and beaches are firing.

David Keevers, Coastal Fishing Tackle (02) 6685 7133

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Mandy from Dave’s Bait Shop says there are plenty of tailor from the beaches and headlands. Nice bream at South Ballina Beach, plenty of jewfish from the walls, headlands and in the river. Some decent flathead still around in the lower river. Snapper and pearl perch outside.
At Evans Head there have been good tailor and bream from the rocks with the odd school jew as well. Mack tuna and the odd bluefin busting up regularly in the bay the last few days and mid-week the spotties went mad on livies down south. Plenty of weed and sand in the river with the odd good bream on the night tide. The beaches have turned up tailor, bream, dart and whiting. Pretty good, really.

Dave’s Bait Shop (02) 6686 2481
&
Tony Zann

t.zann@fishingmonthly.com.au

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Paul Kneller
Big River Bait and Tackle, Maclean (02) 6645 1834

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Offshore: A few mackerel in the north with maybe a chance of a spotty on the southern reefs this weekend. Plenty of good snapper to 8kg this week with the odd good samson fish.
Beach gutters still have good whiting and bream with some big tailor. Tailor also around the rocks with a good run of blackfish.
Lower estuaries fishing well for bream, whiting and the odd flathead.

Peter Russell, Fish Tackle Australia 6652 4611
motackle@midcoast.com.au

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Mark and Denise Bird and Paul and Michelle Martin
Rocks Marine Bait and Tackle 6566 6726
rocksmarine@dodo.com.au

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Jason and Virginia Isaac, Ned Kelly’s Bait and Tackle 6583 8318
jasned@ozemail.com.au

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Offshore: Mahi mahi remain on the fisheries FAD but reports of marlin and cobia have dropped off. In close mack tuna, bonito and tailor are on offer around close in reefs and headlands. Reef fishing last weekend was disappointing with the captures of quality pearl perch and snapper during the mid-week period not repeated. Leatherjackets remain a pest.
Beaches: An unseasonably good run of big whiting has been reported but not noticed by those chasing tailor. Some excellent captures of mulloway have come from Blueys and Celito beaches. Plenty of bream coming up the coast.
Rocks: A few late northern bluefin tuna came off Flat Rock last weekend. Bream, tailor and drummer are on the chew. A few mulloway were reported on rocks around Seal Rocks.
Estuary: Mulloway action from the breakwalls is slow with only a few captures reported. The bream fishing is great on lures and bait. Blackfish are more plentiful off ocean rocks than they are in the lake system. Plenty of small tailor and around the bridge.

Lloyd Campbell, Great Lakes Tackle 02 6554 9541

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Estuary: Bream to 1.5kg on the co-op wall with a few jew. Bob Urukallo’s 7.23kg jew and a 1.35kg bream not a bad morning’s work, Colleen Pearce a 1.49kg bream. Stacks of luderick in front of the hospital and on both breakwalls. Plenty of baitfish in the bay getting worked over by bluefin tuna, Danny McKay’s 15kg bluefin on the Salamander wreck on live bait, for example. A few flathead on Baggies and Corlette groynes. Blue swimmers Taylors Beach.
Rocks: Stacks of blackfish at Boulder Bay, bream on Rocky, good snapper Boat Harbour, Fishermans. Tailor at dusk on One Mile and Sunny Corner. Plenty of pigs around Boulder, Hole in the Wall, Honeysuckle.
Beaches: Bream on Stockton with George Felix catching 17 to 1.4kg on Wednesday night. Stack of salmon and tailor. One Mile and Fingal the same.
Offshore: Jew in the shallows off Big Tommy at Fingal, Speed Tool caught one 17kg on 6kg fishing for squire. Jew on The Tank and The Vs. Good run of squire in the shallows at Broughton with Steve Kiss getting a 5.8kg one on The Sisters. Plenty of pelagics, bonito Cabbage Tree and East Head, stacks of tailor at dusk around the three islands; a few bluefin off the Gibbers.

Graham Duffy, Salamander Bait and Tackle 02 4982 0711

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Peter Sanderson, Fisherman's Warehouse (02) 4945 8922
enquiries@fishermanswarehouse.com.au

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The old codgers who flogged Wamberal Lagoon over the last few years are whingeing. When the lagoon opened this time there were only handfuls of bream coming out of it with 10 a big catch. Those old blokes are probably wondering why there are none left but they took their bag limits every day when the going was good last year. It’s a small waterway so it can’t stand such fishing effort. A lot of seasoned locals have noticed the steady decline.
Apart from that, bottom fishing offshore is firing up after the bad weather with some patches of snapper and good blue morwong to 2kg, heaps of nannygai and silver trevally. Action on kingies is fluctuating day-to-day.
Estuaries have gone pretty quiet but bream and a few jewies are kicking around. Also some estuary perch with a stray flathead.

Aaron / Joel
Freddys Fishing World (02) 4367 5555
Shop 1/ 229 The Entrance Rd Erina

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Wind, waves and wild weather last weekend wouldn’t be what most of us wished for, especially after reports of yellowfin tuna filtering in. Thankfully now that the winds have calmed and the seas have flattened out, getting offshore is a little more comfortable again. If we’re lucky the yellows will still be there, though Fish Outta Water customer Andrew Manser went out early in the week and had trouble locating them. He did, however, find more striped tuna than you can poke a stick at, including some fish around 6-8kg, south of the Harbour mouth and from 10 miles out to as far as 30 miles out.
Not only are offshore waters much more fishable without southerlies, but rock fishers can venture back onto their platforms without fear for their well-being. Thankfully the fish have stayed around on the rocks at least. Drummer are coming on pretty strongly this time of year. Fish around couple of kilos have come in from Curly, Dee Why and Manly headlands, though not just on abalone gut but on a whole range of different baits, including pudding, cunje, bread, and even cabbage weed. The clear water has made it a little harder than usual and often the whole range of baits will need to be tried, but they are biting hard when you get it right.
There are still a few Kingies around off the stones taking livies from North Head to Long Reef and more, but they are a little lethargic in this cooler stuff and less frequently making to journey up to investigate your surface lures. A few of the bonnies that are still about might take more of a liking to them, though, as they are certainly getting stuck into high-speed metal slices in blue and silver. Tailor are also schooling about around dusk and dawn and to a lesser extent after dark, and will crash into the same lures as the bonito.
Pittwater has a few nice bonito this week, most notably around the Basin and on the south side of West Head. These are your regular run-of-the-mill street hoodlum variety bonito rather than the champagne-living double-barrelled Watson’s leaping type that had been about. Mornings and evenings have seen them on the surface smashing baitfish. Tailor are schooling in the same areas, often in mixed schools. Big bream have been another bonus in Pitty lately and continue to feed on whitebait, nippers and pilchards. They will respond to a good berley trail. Pete Le Blang of Harbour and Estuary Charters also reports he is still catching kingies at the rate of three or four per session.
The Harbour is a bit slow as winter weather rolls in, but water temperatures are still as high as 20° in many areas and the occasional king has come in from off the yellow marker buoy and other places – just don’t put your house on it. Better are your chances for a dory, especially around Dobroyd and Fairlight reefs, which have provided fish of late. The major trouble has been getting enough yakkas of the right size to make the trip worthwhile.

Darren Thomas
Fish Outta Water 9949 9488
fishon@uunet.com.au

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Mitch, Mac's Bait Bar
428 Princes Hwy Blakehurst
ph 02 9546 1341, mobile 0411 661 911.

Lake: Nice blackfish on the southern side of Windang bridge. Bream in the channel between the islands on peeled prawns. Also bream on Mt Warrigal side on brown soft plastics. Nice bream in Berkley boat harbour using peeled prawns early of a morning.
Beaches: Good salmon on mullet strips on Windang beach, Warilla for bream close to the island on pipis. Small jewfish in Port Kembla harbour on live bait. Hill 60 has trevally, pigs and blackfish on peeled royal reds in a bread berley. Slimy mackerel on Bass Point on small metals. Small kings there, too, on squid strips. Good bream and pigs off Bombo on royal reds.
Offshore: Pesky leatherjackets everywhere but some up to 2.5kg, so don’t forget the wire trace. In close around the Shellharbour gravel loader for nice bream on prawns and pillies, also around Rabbit Island. Snapper off Bandit Reef but they’re not big.

Garth, Deans Bait and Tackle, Windang 4295 1615

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Estuary: River has gone quiet but still black bream and EPs along the back, yellowfin bream thinning out. Flatties have also gone off the chew though they’re still there.
Beaches: Worth trying for flathead in the rocky corners, plenty of bream around and the odd salmon around but there is a lot of weed in places. Tomakin has bream but the weed is a problem. A few good reds to 6.5kg off the beaches so it’s worth getting out. Also the odd jew to 14kg from the sand.
Rocks: Plenty of squire, salmon, tailor and some big drummer. Bream also working around the rocks with the snapper.
Offshore: Not too many reports but the yellowfin tournament is on this weekend and rough seas should make it a comp for the diehards.

Rodney Stockman,
Harry’s Bait and Tackle
ph 02 4472 4393, fax 02 4472 3405

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Offshore: Heaps of yellowfin to 79kg and a few around 70kg but most around 6-10kg, Still marlin around and mowies and reds for the bottom bashers. Jackets are starting to ease up and the flathead are there.
Estuary: Jewie haven at the moment with 18 caught in the last fortnight on live or fresh baits and lures, biggest fish 9kg. Plenty of bait with tailor on the baitfish and jew under them. Really nice bream to 1.5kg around the racks. Still a few flathead around.
Beaches, rocks: Tailor and salmon going well from the beaches; some nice jew to 7kg up towards Tuross on worms. Still bream, drummer, tailor and salmon from the rocks.

Darryl, The Ocean Hut (02) 4476 2278

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Darren Redman and Mark Rose,
Bermagui Ocean Hut and Charter Booking Service, (02) 6493 4688

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