Sykes

I took this sunrise photo this morning and added a bit of trickery. I light painted the tree while taking a 30 second exposure. Didn't turn out too bad.
Cheers Dazz.
 

Ventured out this morning, with no plan at all, which was evident by the results at Noon. Packed light, just some Zman soft plastics and a light rod, very handy when moving constantly. After having a flick around West Lakes, Outer Harbour, North Haven, and Snowdens, I found myself in the middle of Port Adelaide. Plenty of fish at each spot, just not interested in my fake bait.    Finally found a huge school of small  ST's, managed about 5 in quick succession and then called it a day.
 
One fish however, had this huge gut on it, very abnormal relevant to the size of the fish, so thought I would share a pic.  

 
Small fish are always better than no fish!
Cheers.

A few catties from the Torrens in the last month.
1 from another stretch, completely different colour to the ones closer to home!!
All on bait, while fishing for carp.... Bread, earthworms... And a couple on yabbie tail.
They're good sport on the 1lb gear!
But do seem to burn themselves out after the first big run.
There's definately no shortage of them around the city!! Think my best this month was 5 in an hour.
Might have to try a lure or two some time for them!

Coorong 70cm Mully, 6lb line, on plastic 😊

Ventured out this morning, with no plan at all, which was evident by the results at Noon. Packed light, just some Zman soft plastics and a light rod, very handy when moving constantly. After having a flick around West Lakes, Outer Harbour, North Haven, and Snowdens, I found myself in the middle of Port Adelaide. Plenty of fish at each spot, just not interested in my fake bait.    Finally found a huge school of small  ST's, managed about 5 in quick succession and then called it a day.
 
One fish however, had this huge gut on it, very abnormal relevant to the size of the fish, so thought I would share a pic.  

 
Small fish are always better than no fish!
Cheers.

Ventured out this morning, with no plan at all, which was evident by the results at Noon. Packed light, just some Zman soft plastics and a light rod, very handy when moving constantly. After having a flick around West Lakes, Outer Harbour, North Haven, and Snowdens, I found myself in the middle of Port Adelaide. Plenty of fish at each spot, just not interested in my fake bait.    Finally found a huge school of small  ST's, managed about 5 in quick succession and then called it a day.
 
One fish however, had this huge gut on it, very abnormal relevant to the size of the fish, so thought I would share a pic.  

 
Small fish are always better than no fish!
Cheers.

Love your work mate! Inspiration for me to get off my ass 

Hey all,
 
Been a while since I have posted on here so I thought I'd post up a couple of pics of fish I have caught in the last couple months. This warmer weather has brought out the bugs and this makes for some fun dry fly action. Had a seven fish session, all in about an hour and a half, a few weeks back which was crazy as the fish were just smashing stuff off the surface
 

More East than North East ......Gotcha are still around, moved from Stepney to St Morris a while back. Still on Magill Rd, still good friendly service.

I thought I'd make a little post coz I havnt in a while! I havnt fished nearly as much as I'd like to lately because of work and everything else etc! Been down the onk a few times which resulted in a few flattys one small n one decent size! Got on the snapper once and got to go to salt creek once through winter that seen 100s of salmon and one half decent schoolie in the mix! Here's a few pics

Hi all,  
With uni and working two jobs, fishing time has been very limited but I managed to get out for a quick fish after work today. Took the fly rod down to the Torrens along with a light spin rod and a bag of bread for backup. I drove for a while along the river and just picked a random spot for a look. Well I found a really shallow bit stacked with lots of good sized carp! Perfect fly casting territory. In the 90 minutes I fished, I landed three good carp, two on fly and one on bread. Sizes ranged from 3.62 to 4.85kg. Heaviest fish was taken on bread on the bottom but the ones on fly were way more satisfying.
 

 

 

Headed out today with James for a northern flats session! A massive thanks goes to Underpants and Sbarnden for hinting us in the right direction. We started off the day at 6am and arrived on the flats at 6:45am. 

The tide was running out which was good but the wind was blowing pretty hard. We set up our stuff and headed straight out. Once we got close to the gutter, James hooks up to a fat whiting on the GULP worms. At first we thought it was a good salmon with the first run but once it came up to the surface, we were stoked. After a quick photo, it went straight into the homemade livewell! 


 
We kept persisting to see if we could get a few more whiting but the toadies kept on chomping out soft plastics. We decided to fish the channel/gutter and that's when the action was hot!  We started bagging some average sized tommies and salmon trout but we wanted to find bigger ones.


We made our way out to deeper water where we spotted a few black rays, but everywhere we went there were only tommies, salmon trout and toadies. We decided to go back shallower to see if we could get a few more whiting, but that's when we spooked a couple of big flathead! (around 45-55cm). I managed to hook one whist flicking for tommies/salmon trout but this one was only a baby. 

 
On the way back in, we stepped on a crab and James was quick enough to snatch it up into the livewell. Just over legal! It was a beautiful day to be out wading (would've been better without the wind  ). Here's just a few more photos! 

Hey mate, we lost a very respected and admired tackle shop when they retired, but I might be able to help.
Go and see Steve at Spot On Salisbury Plain, on Main North Rd.
Very good bait supplies, and good old fashioned friendly service.
Probably the closest store I can think of for you.
And a quick shout out for St Kilda Tackle and Tucker, Robyn and Cookie would easily be the most up to date folks I would know on the local fishing news.
There is also Tackle World Salisbury Highway, another store worth checking out.

Morning Gents. On the hunt for a new tackle store in my local area. Just out of Tea Tree Gully, I was a regular at 'Spot On' in Holden Hill, unfortunately they have since shut down only a few months ago. My closest is now BCF Gepps X. 
 
Any others in the area? Was good helping out the smaller business. Bit of a pain as I usually conduct spare of the moment spontaneous fishing trips.
 
Cheers in advance.
Stay classy,
- Sykes. 

DAY 1

In the first week of school holidays, a Kangaroo Island trip was a great way to settle us in thanks to one of my best mates (John) and his family, who are one of the biggest deaf families in Australia! We arrived on a beautiful day with nothing but blue skies and crystal clear water. As soon as we got off the ferry, we were straight into the fishing! I spotted a few good schools of tommies so I chucked on a small hard body to see if I could tempt a few.. After landing a couple, a tiny squid appeared to be attacking the lure! Hooked up to it but dropped it. The next cast the same thing happened but this time I landed it. It was only small but there were quite a few hanging around it so I quickly chucked on a jig. First cast with jig, it was smacked by a nice squid on the drop. Same with the second, third and forth cast!   I realised how many there were but we were only keeping a few for bait and the rest were released. For the next 1 and a half hours we caught close to 30 squid, sharing around a single rod!    John, his two brothers and mum all landed their first squids which they were stoked about!   




 
It was time to head over to our shack, which was in Hanson Bay. We unpacked and set off for a stroll to the second beach, carrying a couple of rods. We found a very nice gutter and whist John chucked a bait out, I was flicking metals and soon hooked up within the first few casts! After a couple of solid runs, it spat the hook but another one took it closer in! Once again it spat the hook but again, a school chased it into the wave breaks and I saw the hookup through the wave! This one was one of the larger models which took me for a huge run and spat the  hooks again!!!! It was one of the biggest salmon I've hooked and I was spewing!! I even saw it in the wave with another 4 fish following it and clearly, this one was the biggest.   

For the next couple of casts, I had no interest in the lure but once the sun started to go down, plenty of big tommies and small salmon trout were hitting the lure. I landed quite a few big tommies while John only had bites on the baits. It got dark and cold so we decided to call it quits. Fortunately, the alarm was set for an early start the next morning!   
 
DAY 2
 
6am, we got up and had a quick breakfast. Walked to the river in Hanson Bay which I believe is the South-west River? The scenery was beautiful with the early morning fog creating a blanket over the top of the river. At the first accessible spot, I had a practice cast which resulted in a hookup on the Ecogear SX40! It was only a small bream but a good sign!

 
We made our way up the river flicking at every spot we could access. Before it warmed up, I landed another 3 fish with my mate getting donuts, it was his first time using lures which was understandable but I showed him quite a few tricks! 


 We made our way up to the very top of the river where I had plenty of casts in a small pool, on the 10-15th cast, I had a solid hookup! This one felt bigger and almost got me into a snag. After a good fight, I lifted it up to the ledge and boy was this bream healthy!   It measured 30cm and after a few pics it was quickly released. 

 
 
We went back to the second bay after lunch where we landed plenty more tommies, salmon trout and loads of pesky wrass! 

 
We got bored and went back to the shack to get the kayaks ready for a relaxing paddle in the river. But knowing me, I had to bring a rod along.    I followed behind John with the SX40 being trolled behind me. It wasn't long before I got hits, and lots of them! At the first bend in the river, I managed to land around 3 small bream. We made our way all the way up the river where I had no hits at all so we decided to go back down. As soon as we hit the same bend, I had a heap of hits. I hooked up to a few fish which spat the hook. This time I only landed one before sundown which was just legal. A quick photo and release.

 
DAY 3
 
The next day, we went to Kingscote jetty. It was pretty windy and cold. We had plenty of tiny bites on the baits but no hookups, it was really slow. After an hour, John hooked up to something huge on my rod! It took a rather large squid tentacle and screamed off straight under the jetty. After a quick 20 seconds, it busted him off on the pylon..    We reckon it was a big salmon, small kingy or possibly a snapper. I tied on another rig which had no interest other than the odd small nibbles. In the last few minutes, I decided to try for squid. It was hard casting with the wind but I managed to land 2 small squid before we left. 

 
Just after dark, we made our way to Vivonne Bay jetty. it looked very promising with tommies swarming the lights. First couple of casts, we landed a couple of tommies on plastics! They were solid tommies going 28-30cm. After landing around 20, I hooked onto something that peeled line!  After a decent fight, I lifted it up and to my surprise, it was a nice Silver Trevally! A couple more tommies were caught and then I hooked up to another slightly bigger Silver Trevally! We were getting loads of tommies and before we were about to leave, I hooked another Silver Trevally which looked a lot bigger! It fought extremely hard and spat the hook before it broke the surface. Oh well, we landed a nice feed all up! 


 
DAY 4
 
After a long night, we woke up tired but we didn't want to leave the place without landing a big salmon, so we walked all the way to the third beach, both casting metals into the surf along the way. We both managed to land a few salmon trout each, nothing big and were released. We made it to the third beach which didn't look as good as I thought, the gutters were really shallow and we didn't get a single hit. On the way back, we flicked metals at the end of the second bay, next to the rocks. First cast we both had hits. We hooked up to some good fighting salmon trout but we both persisted through the smaller ones. After I had a talk with John about why persistence is crucial in fishing, we both hooked up to a big salmon each, at the same time!!!   Mine was doing plenty of heart stopping jumps but they both stayed on! We were so excited and shared an amazing experience together. Both salmon were our personal bests with mine going 55cm and John's going 51cm. 


 
We threw them onto the sand and our lures went straight back in, hoping for another 'real' salmon. This school moved way to quickly and we didn't hookup to anymore solid fish.. After another couple of hours flicking lures and catching salmon trout after salmon trout, we called it a day and what a day it was!!! 

 
After hard work scaling and filleting the fish, they made a lovely meal! This was when I realised how good they tasted fresh from the surf! 

 
DAY 5
 
It was an early start for me as I had to leave. Lots of hand shakes and hugs went around as I left. I arrived at Penneshaw jetty a few hours early which gave me time to fish! It was windier than the first day but it didn't stop the squid from biting! First cast I hooked up to a nice squid, followed by more.

 
I ended up catching and releasing around 20 and decided to try catch something else. I chucked on a Zman 2.5" grub to see what was hungry. Casting into the reefy shallows, I had a solid hit, quickly retrieving the lure in, it was followed in by a wrass which smashed it! They actually fight hard which was a surprise.  After a pic it was released. 

 
And of course! Here's the video!! My longest video yet, please enjoy  

 
What an amazing experience I had! MASSIVE thanks goes to John and his family for the awesome time. 
I would also like to thank a few Strike and Hook members that helped me get familiar with Hanson Bay! 
 
Cheers guys. 
Alex. 

The Plan: Start at 10am at Southport and hit most southern beaches through to Sellicks and return finishing aback at Southport.
 
Did it succeed: Nope.
 
OK, so decided to hit Southport at 10am leading to the low tide at 11.30am and to lure for Salmon all day.
Was not expecting to catch anything at Southport, as have not yet done so, plus the low tide was not going to help any.
 
The only thing happening or moving at Southport were the walkers along the beach.
(now I'm not talking walkers from "The Walking Dead" from the series for those who have watched it).
 

 

 

 
So after about an hour luring it was off to Maslins and still only half expecting anything to take a lure at this stage of the day.
 
But, some excitement for me....a green floating ball.
 

 

 
But that was enough excitement for me, and as not takers for my lure it was off to Pt Willunga.
 
Arrived at the carpark and had a bite to eat whilst surveying the area - looked good.
 
Then.....something caught my eye......another bloody ball.  Thought for a moment it got here from Maslins before I did, but a different colour, but at least it smiled
 

 
So back to luring at yet again something took my eye....
 

 
Then it all appeared.....a shark?
 

 
Nope....a friendly.
 

 

 
There was probably about a dozen dolphins swimming around about only 50m out and with some chasing something out there. 
 
So I replaced my Halco 40g lure to a Halco 55g lure for a little extra distance thinking they might be scaring some Salmon closer to shore.
 
Just purchased these Halco's so was hoping for results.
 
Third cast and twang, the Halco 55g travelled very well and sunk to the ocean floor
​
So here is a tip for all: Always make sure your reel latch is open before casting
 
The dolphins headed North - the way I was going anyway and then one dolphin leaped out of the water with wave - looked fantastic - I gave it a 10
 
They were then gone.
 
Maybe they scared some Salmon in close as this was the result near the Northern end.
 

 
So I was happy that, to get something was a relief, but then.........it happens again
 
Yep, another   ball.
 

 
What is it with balls today I have no idea, but they are following me
 
The few Salmon were then also gone and was thinking now to go to Sellicks, but this was in the distance
​

 
Now I was thinking I was not prepared for that much rain and seeing I had hooked a few at PW, why not stick to a good thing.
 
Got a little bored with no takers so I etched this into the sand.
 

 
If you can't make it out, it says 'Strike Hook.com'
 
So ended up staying at PW without going back to Maslins or Southport due to time (about 4pm now).
 
But a great day of weather and entertainment plus a bonus Salmon and ST.
 
 
 
 

I was in my boat in the coorong and Alexsfishin came along in a yak. As he was leaving he decided to be funny and grab my line, well karma got him quickly as he capsized! Ended up losing 2 quality combos, his catch and a heap of other gear. As well as being freezing cold! 
 
Or it could be fishing port willunga and having a rogue wave come along, knock my stradic ci4+ and daiwa generation black combo out of the holder and wash it out to sea. Couple hours swimming to no avail. Packed up to leave, decided what the hell one more look! 50M down the beach, i couldnt believe my eyes... it washed up right in front of me!!!

With a early morning flick down the Onk with no results I came home still thinking fishing and after catching up on a bit of work and doing a few things around the house I thought I'd get stuck into making a few DIY soft plastics, I'd rediscovered the moulds in my shed recently.
 
Paddle tail and curled tail grub in a few colours. The green one glows in the dark, takes a bit to charge up but does glow pretty well. I'm pretty messy when pouring but just trimmed them up with scissors afterwards and they look ok. Also have a few jig head moulds, the jig heads came out pretty well, I'll be trying those with the paddle tails. I can't wait to have a flick and see how they go 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I gave the winners a number in order that the logos were found.

 

1 Moggy23

2 Poppa Snake

3 AlexsFishin1

4 Kelvin

 

I used a random number generator to pick a number between 1 and 4. The number that came up was...

 

1. Congratulations Moggy!!!

 

Moggy please send me a PM with a postal address and I will send off the prize pack.

 

The prize pack consists of:

Swivel's Original SA Fish Measure
Swivel's Original Sun Glasses Strap
Swivel's Original Mozzie Off Repellent Strap
Halco Sliced 30g Chrome
Halco Twisty 20g Chrome and Blue
Strike & Hook Cap
Strike & Hook Beanie
 

A huge thank you to Swivel's Original check out their site at www.swivelsoriginal.com.au and head over to Facebook and like the Swivel's Original Facebook page https://www.facebook...swivelsoriginal

 

Thanks to Fishing Wholesalers also for always giving us great prices on gear for our prizes www.fishingwholesalers.com.au and Facebook page https://www.facebook...salersAustralia

So I’ve heard many stories of people finding rat kings within a couple of hours from metro in the last six months and never had any thought of chasing them due to not owning the correct gear. However, one close fisho friend of mine gave me some sound info a fortnight ago and gave me motivation to have a go at a landbased king. Not having ever seen one in the wild (plenty in aquaculture) and never having caught one, I went out chasing.
 
Day began at 5am, left home early and drove up to an area that had frequent sightings of rat sized kings. Armed with a few combos and a couple of not-so-fresh baits, I was hopeful. I began by sending out a freezer squid under a float and let it drift way out off where I was fishing. Whilst that was out the back, I began tossing a squidgy flickbait around on my 1-3kg Samaki Zing and my newly acquired Daiwa Caldia 2004 hoping to nab a few salmon or maybe a snook. After a long while and no hits on plastic, I swapped to a simple paternoster rig hoping to at least catch a fish. Managed to catch typical reef/rock fish such as sweep, zebrafish, wrasse and heaps of leatherjackets in the small size range. I kept periodically checking my whole squid throughout the day but it remained untouched. I swapped out the squid and put on half a garfish just to see how it went. After midday I swapped back to plastics and was rewarded with a solid hookup and strong run. The Caldia was singing loudly and I was losing heaps of line fast. The fish hadn’t jumped so I knew this was no salmon, the Kingies were finally here!! I fought this legal sized fish for five to ten minutes but without a crab net to lift and having completely the wrong gear it was hopeless. The king went for a short run and busted me off on the last pylon. I couldn’t entice another strike from anything until around 4pm when I began to bring in my last half a garfish bait under the float. As I retrieved the float, it began to bloop and pop the garfish across the surface. To my surprise two/three kings came from nowhere and smashed the gar on the surface and things came tight. Against strong drag from the Stradic 5000, it still managed to take line and felt like the harder I pulled, the harder it tried to run away. Eventually I got it close and was able to deadlift it on 40lb leader. Success!!!
 

 

 

 
My first ever kingie at 70cm. Great fight to it and to do it by myself was awesome. Now I just have to wait until late spring to hopefully go and find some more. Would love to land one on plastics as well, so that’s my first summer goal for next season.
 

From a pleasant morning on the mudsuckers......"me bashem good"
                                        cheers b

When youre  coming  back from fishing in your boat, slow right down and throw your anchor rope over the side of the boat.  The wave action will take any kinks out of the anchor rope and soften it. The old guys in their putt putts would do this religiously.
If you have a couple of long  necks that you want to cool down to drinking temperature wrap them in a wet sack and tie them onto your roof racks. after 20 kms. they are cold enough to drink.I
If you dont have roof racks wrap then in a wet sack and stand them in the shade. This is known as Bookabie temp.The second one will taste better than the first   

Hey all, just thought I would share a few recent captures on fly. All caught using home tied flies, the trout on size 14 or 16 dries with 3wt rod, and the carp on size 8 bread fly on 5wt rod (bloody bent the 5wt I'll tell ya!!!)
 
Enjoy:
 
This carp was 91cm+ and prob close to 25lb, VERY fat with huge guts
 



 









 
Cheers!

Well i went out Fishing Yesterday, The fishing wasn't the greatest but the views and scenery were certainly awesome!

Would love to wake up to this every morning! 

Would you agree?
 

Went squidding in my uncles boat on the weekend and made a quick clip hope you enjoy!