The park never lies as long as you are asking a fair question
 

Heres some stuff Ive heard or tried for long casting with bream gear

Lightest line you can possibly get away with

FG Knots

Filling spool dangerously close to the lip

Smooth casting action, so lures dont tumble in the air or just use lures that arent prone to tumbling and are slightly heavier.

Having a rod correctly matched to the lures you throw most often

Ive been told long rods are the go -but Ive never gone much longer than 7 foot.

Long casting surf and carp spinning reels tend to have long, fat spools and I remember the super fat alveys being a great distance casting reel.

I also use 2500 for the fatter spool - but Ive never actually gone down to the park with different out fits to see which one casts the best. That would be the only way to be sure which outfit was your gun long caster

Nice one SurfcaztR.

I remember going to a salt water fish farm in Ballina and thinking - this is going to be like shooting fish in a barrel - it definitely wasnt.

The owner asked me what lb leader i planned to use - I said 8lb - he said - you wont get a touch on lures unless you use 4lb. These fish have seen every lure and presentation imaginable.

Of course I had to test the theory - only took 45mins to realise 4lb leaders might be the best choice - it made a big difference.

That visit was a bit of an eye opener - at a fish farm where they arent fed live food - their food doesnt look like fish - it looks like pellets - they werent the lure slaying maniacs I expected them to be

The owner came up toward the end of my session and threw in a hand full of pellets to show me what was in the pond. The joint exploded with jewies. They were tracking the pellets through the air before they even landed.

The only lure Id have complete confidence in, is something that looked like a pellet

32 minutes ago, SurfcaztR said:

YD1..Yes i did see that B4 in one of your posts and considered that self made spear.But i had this $50 BCF gift voucher burning a hole in my pocket and $40 later walked one out the shop instead.And I did remove the barbs.

Ahh good work

Nice one Love the set up

I was convinced by an old flounder guru to make a 2 pronged, heavy spear with long spear shafts and no barbs.

Its a serious weapon that worked much better than I though it would.

He reckoned barbs on the shaft, just slow you down when removing fish and I found that to be true aswell - and the extra weight really helps drive the spear home on those "One inch Punch" style jabs. Especially on boney headed flathead

Your set up looks great - just putting up another option for the diy spear.

3 hours ago, doobie said:

Yep agree, those caramelized bits of the sweet chilli sauce are a nice bonus  

I did buffalo wings not long ago - first time ever - and now hooked on the Sriracha Hot Chilli sauce & Franks Redhot sauce  

Yeah Chicken wings are phenomenal - its just hard to know when you have had enough

17 minutes ago, doobie said:

Honey 

I went through a sweet chilli phase that lasted many years - Id put it on anything including fish - when it caramelizes on the edge of a shallow fried whiting fillet - its a taste sensation. You do need salt to even it out though

Just spotted this spice mix - could be interesting

Yeah both great sauce options

sriracha sauce batter flatty nuggets

10 hours ago, Rybak said:

I presume you mean a Dabbing Light. 

Water proof LED torches work really well under water on calm nights or with a slight ripple. Just tape to an electrical PVC pipe to the torch...

Yeah torches and batteries have come so far over recent years - if I looked at the specs on my 6 year old flounder light, theres no way I would buy it again today.

While its still effective, its only 250 lumens, which isnt a bright light. But i imagine the low lumens, is what gives it its 5 hour run time and you have to keep that in mind for a flounder light

As long as you can find a dive light with enough flood in it - and one that could maintain peak performance for a few hours on one set of batteries - a dive or waterproof torch would be a very solid option.

With the $75 I paid for my yellow flounder light - I could buy a much more powerful dive torch and just strap that to a broom handle or bit of pvc pipe

Sofirn is a brand at the lower end of the price bracket, that has a grudging respect of guys who buy torches for 5 to ten times the price. And the guys Ive spoken to say the water proof seals are excellent.

Mine sofirns have survived dunk tests with no issues and mine arent rated for diving - so Imagine their dive torches are even better

For $50 you get a rechargeable torch and battery - that will run 8.5 hours on 320 lumens - with the option flick a switch and get 1000 lumens for 2.5 hours or 3000 lumens for 1.5 hours.

originally I just bent some pvc pipe and strapped a cheap dive torch to it - but things got out of hand pretty quick after that - I put a bend in the shaft so I could hook it over my shoulder when I needed 2 hands to removed fish from my spear

Light weight and hydrodynamic is much more important than I thought it would be when putting this monstrosity together

I ended up buying the one these skinny yellow battery operated ones the guys use in the video but lost interest in it and never used it -

I just turned it on then and the batteries still worked so it has very little drain over the years
 

On 20/08/2022 at 1:08 AM, Des said:

You always go that extra yard !  

When you're built like me - Breathability is a big factor



 

May aswell round out the collection with a 50mm pvc pipe unit.

Saved myself 3 bucks with a fiddly bits spray can lid and gaffer tape "end cap" - if it proves itself, I might splurge on a real one

45 minutes ago, SurfcaztR said:

40 years ago when starting  a lawn mowing service we only had the choice of wearing a shirt,polo shirt or T shirt,20 years on the polyester shirts came out as pictured above and they made a huge difference.Working at 8-10 homes a day in 30+ deg heat and walking an average of 10ks a day during summer anything that made a difference was a benefit and todays franchise mowing contractors wear those micro vented shirts in there daily jobs because it's cooler.

Yeah you cant get a better endorsement than that -

There really is some magic going on with those shirts

I was a bit Skeptical when Buying my new fishing shirt - It didnt make sense these new shirts could be cooler than cotton.

I wouldnt have even bought it if I didnt have a voucher, I didnt know what to buy with.

I was always told cotton was the best  - and for a long time it probably was - but the breathability claims of cotton now have some serious competition. The newer polyester shirts are well worth checking out. 

I just went outside and blew air through the 2 sorts of shirt - Forcing air through the Polyester was about 3 times easier than cotton

 

Dont forget the bottom half either.

These are great for sunburnt legs and take up very little room in a tackle bag
 

heres a shot of a variety of different hats in the same conditions.

Im wearing the White Greg Chappell cricket hat - (similar to the Grey Nichols in the middle of wide brim hat picture below)

As you can see - my new Ali express is much wider and offers even more protection

My hats have also evolved - I used to wear baseball caps but they basically just shade your eyes - and often thats all you need.

But if you are out in real sun - super wide brims are where its at.

It amazing how much cooler you stay when direct sun isnt blasting your shoulders aswell.

This huge brim from ali express is very well made and collapsable - so you can pack it easily in a suitcase.

 

This is the whitest I could find at the time - plus I figured if a squid inked it, it wouldnt look too out of place.



 

Ive moved away from the $2 cotton op-shop business shirt.

Mainly because I had a BCF voucher burning a hole in my pocket and I was intrigued by the claims of the new materials

Theres definitely some truth to those new polyester shirts keeping you cool - it doesnt make sense that they could be cooler than cotton but there is some weird science going on once you start to sweat.

If its super hot and Ive got no shade for hours out on the boat - I go with the new tech polyester and huge brim hats - in white

14 minutes ago, Soobz said:

SA can dream they'll wake up here and do the same one day.

Yeah my reply was a little tongue in cheek, but also a bit real.

Recruitment is strong.

 

"JULY 26, 2022

This year is proving to be a fantastic year for Victoria’s snapper stocks with high recruitment found in Port Phillip Bay. The latest snapper survey by the Victorian Fisheries Authority has found the third highest abundance of baby snapper since monitoring began almost 30 years ago."

JULY 26, 2022

This year is proving to be a fantastic year for Victoria’s snapper stocks with high recruitment found in Port Phillip Bay. The latest snapper survey by the Victorian Fisheries Authority has found the third highest abundance of baby snapper since monitoring began almost 30 years ago.

11 minutes ago, Wert said:

SA size limits, flatties 30cm, KGs 32cm, snapper 38cm.

I never realised there was such a huge difference, I realise different conditions etc are at play but this much gap in sizes seems crazy.

Yeah we need to thin out the herd a little in Port Phillip Bay - since they stopped netting, scallop dredging and alot of commercial fishing - the joint is carpeted in fish.

We caught about 30 undersized flatties in as many minutes before getting a legal, last session. Ended up giving up because the reward wasnt there

Pinkies are the same - absolutely thousands of the little buggers hammering your baits - it gets to a point where you have to go looking for single big arches on the sounder, to try to get away from the piranhas.

No matter how many rec boats are out there plundering the resource - the spawning just keeps getting stronger.

I think the scientists reckon about half the juveniles reach sexual maturity at around 27cm to 28cm - but with pinkies you've got to wait till about 42cm before nearly all the fish are sexually mature - dont quote me - but its something like that.

If they notice a decline, Im sure they'll raise the limits. But so far, it almost looks like our limits are a form of population control

They did raise limits a while back - but it was only by 1cm - thats not going to do much when it comes to percentage of fish that are sexually mature - but they reckon they know what they are doing - and recruitment of tiny, time wasting, bait thieves doesnt seem to be an issue at the moment

In my local Bay - Legal Flatties and Whiting are 27cm.

I had to snip the lip off the container with tough little snips - then sand it down for a smooth finish. Removing the lip would make it easier to scoop fish off the floor.

Bit its got a thin side for whiting and a fatter side for other fish - A legal pinkie is 28cm - so if you can estimate what a centimetre looks like - it could be of some use there aswell