Corio Bay/Bellarine Peninsula
On Thursday afternoon, Ivan Bereza and I arrived at Limeburners boat ramp to meet Ivan’s friend Dave from Lara for an evening’s fishing, but there was no sign of him.
A quick exchange on the mobile phone revealed that Dave had taken a run down to Curlewis to catch some squid for bait, and by then, was knocking on the door of his bag limit, which he achieved before eventually picking us up to try for a snapper or two.
We caught three as it happened, the biggest at 6 kg and left them biting at 7.30 pm, all being caught on Dave’s freshly caught squid within short run from the boat ramp.
Andrew Phillips and Keith Fry tried their luck off Point Wilson on Saturday night where they dropped a couple of snapper over the snaggy bottom. Their bad luck continued when a school shark bit them off beside the boat. However, they did catch a 3.5 kg elephant fish and several nice flathead.
Mike Windsor of Clifton Springs Boat Hire reports that snapper have been taken off The Springs and among those to catch them were Noel and Kart Behan with fish to 6.9 kg. They caught those out toward the channel, while Aaron Habgood, Rob Hargreaves and Anthony Sari picked up another six snapper to 6 kg nearby on Friday evening.
With at least nine good size snapper being caught from the St Leonards Pier on Wednesday, following the northerly blow early last week, Jeff Richards and Ken Shea anchored up nearby on Thursday, hoping to pick of one or two more while the water remained discoloured.
First up they caught two nice flathead to 40 cm, but for most of the time, their snapper baits were stripped by pickers: So, out came the light tackle baited with pipi, and by dark they’d caught nine large whiting, the biggest measuring 44 cm.
During the northerly blow last week, Aaron Habgood fished in the shelter of the Queenscliff bight where they hit a patch of the very large squid that are often about at this time of year and took a respectable catch on baited jigs while fishing on the drift.
Offshore
On Friday, Kevin McLoughlin, brother Jeremy and Ben Malouf, picked a break in the weather and took a run out to 30 metres of water off Barwon Heads. As it turned out they didn’t have long to wait before rods were bending to the tune of several large gummy sharks – of which they caught five, releasing all but one – and two good size snapper.
Portland
Anglers fishing for large tuna off Portland had more than rough and windy weather to contend with last week, with a pod of killer whales taking advantage of hooked fish for an easy meal in 35 metres of water off Cape Bridgewater.
Among those to lose at least some of their catch, was Geelong angler Jason Bliss who took several photos of the marauding Orcas as they zeroed in on his fish. However, Jason did manage to boat one tuna weighing 125 kg.
Ollie asks:
What’s happened to the beach at the Geelong Grammar School? It used to be a great place to fish, now you just sink into the mud.
Ollie, as someone who has fished this formerly excellent beach at various times since 1958, first as a teenager on a pushbike, and as recently as a few weeks ago, I have never seen the beach – or what remains of it – in such a parlous state. In fact I suffered an injury while walking from my vehicle to the jetty one occasion recently when I sank in the mud, fell over, and damaged my knee.
I don’t know if there is anything to be done about it: Those with whom I’ve discussed the situation are of the opinion that recent flooding in Hovells Creek has caused both the beach, and what had remained of the sand spit, to be virtually washed away. I can only say that there is a good deal of anecdotal and photographic evidence that this beach and the sand spit had survived intact from early settlement until comparatively recent times.