Ash Rawlings with a sample of the brown trout he’s recently caught, and released, on the Merri River at Warrnambool.
Freshwater
Ash Rawlings has been fishing the Merri River at Warrnambool, and on his three most recent trips has caught and released some beautiful brown trout to approximately 1.5 kg, of which he’s sent in photos.
Using an assortment of lures including the hard-bodied, bibbed, minnow-types, like the Daiwa Double Clutch and Rapalas, and soft plastics like the Z-Man Slim Swims that he’s rigged with 1/12th of an ounce jig heads, he’s usually had something to take their fancy despite the extreme clarity of the water.
Despite Friday morning’s cold, wet and windy conditions, Victorian Inland Charters clients Steve and Corey were only too willing to jump onboard before heading out on Lake Purrumbete with skipper Ken Carmen.
They began bait fishing for trout, something which paid off almost immediately with the capture of a beautiful hen brown trout measuring 57 cm.
Unfortunately, they missed a few others. So, with time marching on, rather than persist with the trout they settled in over a good patch of redfin, taking home enough keepers for a feed.
Three-year-old Logan Hunt with one of the silver trevally he and his father Taylor caught in the Queenscliff harbour (Picture Taylor Hunt).
Queenscliff
Garfish have been abundant this year and once you get a berley trail going, they are not usually hard to attract.
They can be skittish though, as Paul Raduka witnessed early last week when he had a good bite going from the Swan Bay jetty.
He caught eleven good size gars, prior to a pod of bottlenosed dolphins showing up, and – although not actively chasing the gars – their cavorting around the jetty put them off the bite.
Launching at Queenscliff in gusty conditions on Thursday of last week, Andrew Phillips and Mark Sesar headed out off the entrance of Swan Bay at around 12.30 pm to catch the outgoing tide in the hope of getting onto the whiting.
Unsurprisingly, they were the only boat out there in conditions that many would find unfishable, especially with the tide running off into the teeth a strong south westerly wind.
Nevertheless, they persisted, taking a respectable tally of whiting, the biggest measuring 44 cm before conditions worsened to the point that they were persuaded to make the trip back to Queenscliff, but were by no means done for the day.
Anchoring up in the Queenscliff harbour, partially sheltered by the bridge to Swan Island, they were kept busy with an abundance of salmon that appeared in their berley trail. The largest of these were around the kilogram mark and kept them busy until they were ready to call it a day.
Also, fishing in the harbour on Sunday were Taylor Hunt and his three-year-old-son, Logan.
Initially, with an improvement in the weather, they were keen to get out after some calamari, but with the usually productive areas discoloured from recent rain the tasty cephalopods were a no-show.
So, after returning to Queenscliff for lunch, they decided to try in the boat harbour where they soon had a good berley trail going.
A good move as it turned out, for the salmon encountered previously by Andrew and Mark were still on offer, along with some good-sized silver trevally that were destined to finish up as sashimi.
Victorian Inland Charters client Corey, with a 57 cm brown trout from Lake Purrumbete (Picture: Victorian Inland Charters).
Paul asks:
Geoff, you said last week, low slack water at Barwon Heads is later than low water at Port Phillip Heads. However, my experience at the Point Lonsdale pier has shown the tide to be still running out strongly, long after the supposed time of low water: How come?
Paul, given that the tidal range inside Port Phillip Bay is about half that of Bass Strait, slack water simply cannot occur at, what is a general expectation to be the top and bottom of the tide. It occurs about mid tide when the levels outside Port Phillip Heads and inside Port Phillip Bay are in equilibrium.
This situation occurs because the narrow passage through Port Phillip Heads does not allow the water to empty or fill at anything like the rate that would be required to have parity with Bass Strait. Just as well, or all of the low lying land around Port Phillip Bay would be flooded at high tide.
Please send your reports to occytrapper@gmail.com or by phone to 03 5248 1307.