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Hello everyone! I've been having a go at catching some Silver Drummers lately but have found it to be very tough! I know there is some BIIIIIIIIIIG fish swimming around my local spot, was just wondering if anyone else has caught any big Drummer in their time or has any stories or tips?My missus hooked onto one today on bread only to find the drag not set and the fish being lost within seconds :( They seem like they are very cautious, but at times they were splashing and eating the bread off the surface which was something I had never seen before and a very spectacular sight in itself! Veeeery big splash, thought it was a seal or something at first! :woohoo:

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Ive only caught a few drummer off the rocks on the yorke pen'. They took fish peices. Great fish to catch , fight hard even when theyre small and there is always a snag waiting for them to bust you off on. From what ive seen, if they catch a glimpse of your line or the hoook they will leave your bait but quite happily eat all the burley from cms away from your bait. I think youve got to really present the bait well for the most part or just hope for the fat hungry one :lol:

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Had some fun with them off Port Giles Jetty a few times. They love to hang around the pylons in full view eating your burley but get very picky when they see line and hooks. I managed to get bites using unweighted hooks well covered in fresh bread (it tends to open up and hide the hook). Even then, using 10lb mono and a locked drag I was done like a dinner every time. Good fun though. :woohoo: Wahoo

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I once watched a guy hooking them up off Port Noarlunga Jetty with one kilo line and bread which he was pre-soaking in his mouth. Free lined a fine wire bronze hook and expected to lose them every time and was only doing it for the fight he got off the fish :ohmy: He certainly got his sport but I'm not really sure about the ethics of deliberately lodging a hook in a fish and maybe a length of mono too :unsure:

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G'day team- i've landed a few 10 pound drummer from the rocks on Fleuriou (the ledge). A couple i jagged with triple ganged hooks and whole pilchards (during a feeding frenzy with heaps of burley in the water). When they have been there usual cagey selves i have nabbed them on tiny hooks, a tiny morsel of squid, and once, a frozen pea did

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I have hooked a few but never landed one.I used a bread fly after berleying with bread.Had no success till I was given a great tip which was use liquid paper to paint the hooks white and flourocarbon leader.This tip also applies to bait fishing by introducing whit baited hook into the berley .Have been told the same technique can work on jumping mullet at dusk but have not tied it yet.CheersRollcast

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  • 7 months later...

Uh hu.....Silver Drummer....Fox of the sea, cunning and stealth like if you ask me. For boaties, Silver Drummer will be those elusive schools you've seen under your boat from time to time that just won't bite. Schooling close to the surface, around 1.5 to 2kg particulary on real calm hot days in summer. They will linger right under your boat at around 1 to 4 meters below you. They will swim right up to your bait, but never take it. The best you may feel is the slightest weak nibble, but that's it.I was straight out off the end of the Normanville Jetty last summer about 1k out. It was hot and the water very still nearing a dodge. In shallower water I commonly through out a handfull of burley, very bread based with pellets, old pizza and anything else similar that has been in the freezer to long to eat. I blend it all up in an old blender to very fine consistency, add old chopped pillys, old cockles, any crushed up shell fish and fish oil. I threw out my traditional handful scattered and before I could get a bait in the water they were there, right under the boat. The school was that great, I had to turn the fish alarm off on my sounder becasue it was driving me insane. I fished for about an hour trying anything I could to catch one of these things for the first time ever to finally see what they were. I was eating lunch and threw out a piece of bread and they hit the surface fighting over it. I tried the bread and was getting nibbles, but so faint that a strike would miss every time. After testing just about all the baits I had, I finally used chuncks of Pilchard and was getting much more regular attention now, but still only nibbles. I soon learned that you can't strike at the nibbles. You will miss every time. You also can't use any weight at all. These bugga's just come up to your bait for a suck and taste session. To make them take it you have to begin teasing them. With the slighest nibbling just begin to lift your rod slightly and back down again and I do mean slightly. 1 inch up, 1/2 inch down, 1 inch up, 1/2 inch down so that the action is raising up further and further, 1/2 inch at a time. On this day I had been fishing for whitting earlier and remained with the same rig, with long shanked whitting hooks, no sinker at all and the pilchard pieces. Throw out a handfull of burly and follow it down with your baits. Use the raise\lower method from above and just get ready to hang the F*#k on. They go from little girly nibbles to hitting like a freight train. There's no real bite. They just take it and run. Even with this method, don't be surprised if you wind up with no bait left without even feeling a nibble. Like I said, they are the fox of the sea. The whitting hooks are a little flimsy for these fish and bend the shaft of the hook badly. Once you've got one in you can throw that hook away cos it'll be bent like a banana. Stronger hooks would be the go, but I couldn't be bothered changing that day. Only one other warning. They have a habit of Shi*ting as soon as you get them in the boat and I can tell you first hand, it stinks. In fact it's absoulely putrid. They are really only weed eaters. That's why they are so hard to catch on baits. I landed about a dozen of them in quick succession after this once I got the whole method right.Use the method above and you can have some great fun with these puppies on light gear. I'm sure the same method would work around jetty pilons and structure land based. Have a go. Good luck. ;)

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  • 7 months later...

recently ive been targeting silver and black drummer and i can assure you silvers are without doubt the hardest fighting fish pound for pound ive ever encountered, mind you we did raise over a dozen fish that were 10kg + and the best being almost 25lb! cunji and peeled prawns doing the damage on a shimano nexave 701 with a shimano alivio 10000 spooled with 50lb mono ( also suggesting some other posts that say they are cautious feeders being a wild exadgeration ). being schoaling fish, generally if u are lucky enough to raise one of these freight trains u will probably get a few.. we target them from various environments but our fave location is a condemed pier loaded with cunji, weed and kelp but ocean rock platforms with open access to deep water also provide quality fish when the swell is up and rolling. eating qualitys are well below average, to a point where u wouldnt give them to your mother in-law but the black version are quality table fish. im happy to share more info or even take new fisherpeople out to get stretched by these mutant fish, but beware.. your arms will be 12 inches longer after im finished with ya! tight lines guys

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Theres heaps of em near the semi reefWe got them up around the 3kg mark they where like footballsThe ones we used to fish for where reluctant to take anything above 3 kg lineMaximum hook size we used was a number 2No weight no nothing just a hookWe would burley them into a frenzy with mulched up pilly and when they where actively feeding we would lower a small pilly fillet amongst them. 3 kg fish on 3 kg line used to take an honest 10 minutes to land.We lost more to the ledges below than we landed but we landed enough to make it worthwhile.Despite what you hear they taste great too ;)

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Bread is great for teasing as burley to get them worked up but is hard to keep on the hook as they tap is ever so gentle and it falls off.Rub the bread bwteen your hands to reduce it to crumbs. Dry bread for better crumbs and powder and the in a bit of fish oil or cockle juice prefered.3 long shank whitting hooks on a paternoster trace with no sinker at all.Throw out a handfull of the bread mix and drop you trace about 2 to 4 meters below the water line in the burley trail. They go into a fenzy in the burley trail. Pilchard pieces for bait. The heads and tails work best.DO NOT strike like you would with any other fish bite. You will miss every time. Don't be surprised if you come up with bare hooks without feeling anything at all. They don't bite, they just touch it up a little. "IF" you feel the very small nibble just raise and lower your rod about an inch up a down slowly. The nibble "IF" you feel it changes to an absolute grab and run like F*#ck and from there just hang on. They fight hard. I go and search a few out once in a while about 500 to 1000 meters of the Normanville jetty when nothing else is bitting for the day just for a bit of fun.They stink! No good for the table but have heard ok if smoked. Good luck.

Hello everyone! I've been having a go at catching some Silver Drummers lately but have found it to be very tough! I know there is some BIIIIIIIIIIG fish swimming around my local spot' date=' was just wondering if anyone else has caught any big Drummer in their time or has any stories or tips?My missus hooked onto one today on bread only to find the drag not set and the fish being lost within seconds :( They seem like they are very cautious, but at times they were splashing and eating the bread off the surface which was something I had never seen before and a very spectacular sight in itself! Veeeery big splash, thought it was a seal or something at first! :woohoo:[/quote']
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