Phil Fisher and Kane Ardiri with Monday’s mako shark.
Offshore
Fishing in 30 metres of water off the old Black Rock outfall site, Kane Ardiri and Phil Fisher were hopeful of catching a gummy shark, or perhaps a good size snapper.
There were plenty of yellowtail scad (yakkas) coming in on their lighter tackle; excellent bait it turned out, they had every right to expect a bit of action from down below, but all was quiet in that department.
What did get their attention though was a pocket size mako shark swimming around their boat, initially being of only passing interest, but with the bottom fish still very slow they presented it with a bait, the result being flako mako.
Fishing offshore from Barwon Heads in 30 metres of water on Friday evening, and using eel for bait that they’d caught from Wurdiboluc Reservoir, Chris and Daniel Stamalos were plagued by seven-gilled sharks, but Daniel caught a 5 kg snapper just before dark.
Shortly after that, Chris hooked something a lot livelier than a seven-gilled, shark. And, after playing it for an hour or so, they were surprised to see that it was a fair size bronze whaler; unusual because of the current water temperature of about 14 degrees Celsius. Unfortunately though, it escaped through being wrapped in the line, which parted.
They did keep one of the smaller seven-gilled sharks though, and that should keep them in flake for some time.
Despite the rain on Saturday morning, Murray and Darcy Scott headed out off Barwon Heads, but – despite the calm weather forecast – the wind was gusting to 15 knots.
After putting the anchor down in 50 metres of water off Torquay, they were relieved to find the wind and rain backing off, but they had rather a long wait before picking their first gummy shark on the high tide change. As it turned out, it was the first of four – the biggest around 14 kg – that they caught during the afternoon, along with a snapper of possibly 5 kg.
Darcy Scott with the snapper he caught on Saturday (Picture: Murray Scott).
Darcy Scott with a gummy shark he caught on Saturday (Picture: Murray Scott).
Corio Bay/Bellarine Peninsula
On Thursday, Murray and Darcy, along with Jock Richmond, and John’s son Jack, went looking for snapper on the Corio Bay outer harbour, and – finding some really promising marks between the Mountain View Quarries and the Nine Foot Bank – they put out what would usually be irresistible baits.
And, as is often the case at this time of year when the water temperature is dropping rapidly, they couldn’t raise any interest. So, after an hour or so, they headed across to Clifton Springs where they caught 42 whiting.
On Friday, Andrew Johnson and Dennis O’Brien tried for whiting off Leopold, initially in just under 7 metres of water, but there was nothing doing there. Making a couple of moves, each a little closer to shore, they picked up a couple of fish in 5.5 metres.
That was around 1.30 pm, and from then until high slack water, they caught 38 good size fish before the bite shut down. However, with one fish each shy of their respective bag limits, they stayed, picking those up when the ebb tide kicked in.
Justin Burns and Simon Williams found a good patch of whiting just east of Point Henry, and they too picked up bag limit catches from 3.30 till 5.30 pm also on the outgoing tide.
Whiting have been on the go at Queenscliff as well, as Steve O’Keefe found last week while fishing the beginning of the flood tide with Anna McLean in front of the Cottage by the Sea. They picked up 31 altogether with several over the 40 cm mark.
Zander Ribcak with a chinook salmon from the bank of Lake Bullen Merri (Picture: Matt Ribcak).
Daniel Stamalos with the snapper he caught on Friday evening.
Freshwater
Kevin Wild of the Maryborough Angling Club reports that Tullaroop Reservoir is still producing redfin, and on Thursday he caught 15 to 1.6 kg fishing a gudgeon pattern soft plastic just off the bottom.
John Clements of the Lake Purrumbete Holiday Park reports that nearby Lake Bullen Merri is fishing particularly well at present with chinook salmon and rainbow trout to 1.5 kg being taken, both by anglers fishing from boats and from the bank with the latter picking up most fish on Berkley Powerbait.
Matt Ribcak, along with wife and kids, Zander and Maddison, fished from the north bank of Lake Bullen Merri on Sunday evening using Berkley Powerbait (orange). The kids caught three chinook salmon, not the bigger ones mind you, but they still had a great time.
While Lake Purrumbete has been quiet, good size brown trout are still on offer with Luke Jerkovic picking up a nice one of 3 kg on an OSP Bent minnow.
Jesse Zammit is with Steven Puopolo and David Puopolo with Jesse’s 100.5 kg tuna (Picture: Bob McPherson).
Portland
Down Portland way, Bob McPherson reports that in excess of 200 boats have been on the water each day of the long weekend, most seeking tuna, and – as far as he could tell – there were only about seven of the larger fish, to 135 kg, taken. These were caught in 40 to 60 metres of water from just south of Lawrence Rock to Cape Bridgewater.
However, smaller tuna, mostly around the 10 kg mark, were in sufficient numbers to keep most anglers in business.