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HAND CAUGHT YELLOW FIN WHITING


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I put this post up in a Facebook group last Autumn ...

 

HAND CAUGHT YELLOW FIN WHITING

As the YFW lure fishing season is starting to wane when Autumn progresses.

I resort to catching them by hand!

At this time of the year YFW are more active in the evening tide and into the night.

They have shifted from their major meal of the day being Breakfast to now being Dinner.

It is not so much water temperatures. But rather it is all to do with the tide cycles.

The YFW behaviour is as strongly driven by the tide cycles as much as it is driven by the water temperatures.

Autumn water temperatures are still holding above 20C and their metabolism and appetites have not yet slowed down.

The evening tide is now the larger more dominant tide. YFW use the largest tide on the day to access many otherwise inaccessible feeding areas.

Their daily feeding cycle and movements have now changed to feeding more in the evenings using the larger evening tides of Autumn.

Morning runoff tides and mid day lure sessions are far less productive now. The better lure fishing sessions now occur during the evening run in tide.

Particularly an evening after a warm day with a strengthening evening breeze and a large tide pushing through the mangroves.

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However there is only a limited opportunity for lure fishing, before night falls. Whiting Lures don’t work in the dark, and so bait fishing for YFW in the night run off tide is very productive this time of the year  …  Or alternatively for a challenge catching them by hand.

 

In a previous post on YFW Habitats and the food source they held,  I covered a favourite YFW food item. Haswell’s crabs.  ….

It is their love of these little critters that gives you the opportunity to Hand Catch a few YFW at this time of the year.

Under the cover of darkness in the evening tide, the YFW will hang back in the very shallow waters of the littoral zone, as the tide drops. In the narrow channels that run between the Samphire beds.

They wait for the Haswells mud crabs to emerge from their mud holes, that are under and around the samphire beds.  They YFW will linger a long time amongst the samphire beds. A long time after the high tide has dropped, and in very shallow water.

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If you are equipped with a bright headlight you can momentarily hold a stunned YFW (not Mullet!) in the shallows long enough to try and grab him.

 

I missed a few by hand tonight. A very still evening meant the tide did not push in as high and not as many fish came in. But nonetheless I managed to catch a dozen on bait in the couple of hours after dark.

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Try hand catching. A good fun alternative to lure fishing them.

 

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Cheers, Des

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 3/3/2023 at 9:58 PM, Plectropomus said:

Amazing! I never knew the whiting ate crabs, and had wondered how they accessed them. They used to be named "Helograpsis haswellianus" ( think?). I love your posts with the gut contents and sharp observations. What else do you see at night on the samphire flats?

 

The usual array of shallow water species are seen. A lot of Garfish, many skipping Juvenile prawns on the surface. Quite a number of Squid on occasions come in very shallow.

But they also can in the daytime as well when the will take a Sugapen ! :10_wink:

Depending on the area, Flounder and Flathead.

And on some lucky nights, the awesome sight of Mulloway herding mullet into the shallows and smashing the panicking school. Creating bedlam and a great commotion. Never been able to hook one on these occasions. I usually ill equipped for them. But have had them hooked in the quieter nights on YFW gear!

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