Zorgs

Just a small salmon comp...
 
Everyone who writes up a salmon related post from today (22/08/2014) until the end of September (30/09/2014 midnight local Adelaide time ).
 
Will go into a draw to win a Strike & Hook salmon pack.
 
The pack consists of:
 
Kamashark 21g lure Kamashark 40g lure Kamashark 55g lure Pack of two small surf poppers Strike & Hook cap Strike & Hook beanie
 
At the end of September a winner will be chosen by site moderators. A few things we'll be looking for are a great story, detailed instructions, nice photos or video and nice flowing, well written content , so no one liners.
 
Get in there everyone and get up your reports, recipes, how to's or what ever else you can think of that is salmon related.
 
The Kamashark lures and surf poppers are available at Fishing Wholesalers at Lonsdale. Please visit their site to view their range of great fishing gear, everything you need they have! www.fishingwholesalers.com.au 
 
GOOD LUCK!

when in the fishing club years ago, on the rocks i would use spark plugs as sinkers, they open up when caught and 90% of the time you get your hooks back, just hook another spark plug to the loop and go again. You will be surprised how they don't get snagged as much too, must be there shape! i also used to have the hook at least a meter off the bottom to try and keep it out of the weed.
 
But most of the time we float fished, use one of those snapper style floats with the lead on the bottom  tie a bit of wool on the main line to set the depth, check a knot site how to tie it. Let the float sit on a swivel to cast then tie ya leader to the swivel with a hook on it, a foot leader should do and it's then like having an un-weighted bait sitting in the water 
 
best of luck mate
 
cheers chuck

Proper pic of my gear now that I have two rods sorted.
 
TLD30A 2spd, 50lb mono, 80lb top shot, Wilson Live Fibre 15-24kg Land Based Game
 
TLD25, 30lb mono, 50lb top shot, Backbone Elite 15kg Fully rollered
 

That's what I do, either that or tie a very dodgy knot to the sinker that will slip under excessive strain.

I finally got around to making a batch of berley blocks.
 
Ingredients included old bait like cockles, a few weird looking pillies, salmon trout, salmon frames, tommies, fresh prawn shells, squid, some old snapper  and stale bread, I think that was about it.
 

 
Some nice containers ready to use. I saved a few round containers so the berley could go in those small, screw top, plastic berley pots.
 

 
My berley BEAST! Ok not a beast. I actually chipped the blades on the fish frames
 

 
The berley mix looked awesome and sooo very tasty.
 

 
Packed and ready to freeze.
 

 
Now I just have to get out on the water and give them a go   
 
I'll definitely have to make more at some stage.

Port noarlunga was slaying on saturday, all day. There were plenty of schools of small salmon trout that kept coming past. We managed to land over 40 fish and kept only 24. It was awesome fun
 

 

 

 

final result, a few vacuum sealed packs of worms ready for the northern flats

Worms everywhere tonight

Indeed, nice one
 
Half doz or so blokes up on the fishing platform when i arrived at round 2115. 
 
Quick G'day to Kelvin and i netted mine from the platform's footings just below.
 
1/4-1/3 a 10lt bucket in 35min. Took me longer to get there than collect what i wanted!
 
Easier than cockling and didnt even get wet.  1000s were just floating right past the rocks at your feet. A most satifying 1st time worming session.
 
A pleasant evening, not all cold, farily calm and gentle winds. Beat staying home watching on TV.
 
Recon ive 'saved' $300 based on the price i paid for a little tub at the tackle shop last week .
 
!

carp + 4.5HP 4Stroke =
 

 
......a bit of bran to soak up the excess juice.
 
Kinda reminds me of the movie Fargo.

Here is a shot I took this morning on my way for a morning Hills fish! Loved the colours and cloud formation in the sky. I couldn't help but stop and take it in!
 

Found these pages from Plankton's link as a good start
http://alantani.com/index.php?topic=4579.0
http://alantani.com/index.php?topic=50.0
http://alantani.com/index.php?topic=3.0
 
Still going to have a chat to Trevor from Gotcha first!

I mixed vaseline with tuna oil put it in a syringe, Tommies liked it but it didnt stay on that great.
 
I bought a little bottle of stuff from bcf not sure the name but they had it in mullet scent and few others. Works really good snook were all over it. Seen it in tackle world for like $4 cheaper
 
I have about 7 packs of flickbaits just so i could get the s factor, lucky there my favourite rubber

Im keen too. Want some ready for the YFW when my wading season starts.
 
Never collected bloodworms before......Sounds like we might be looking at a S&H bait collection session?

I work as a chef so I tend to save the left over juices from packets of prawns, mussels oysters etc.
Can mix garlic, water, curry powder, fish sauce, fish oil, aniseed essence just to name a few
If theres an asian store nearby you should be able to go in and pick up all sorts of whacky seafood items dirt cheap.
When I was at tafe for my apprenticeship I stopped into the vietnamese shop next door to find dried cuttlefish, dried oysters and believe it or not dried sea cucumber.
Get some of those and rehydrate them in water with some other cheap items like curry powder and garlic freeze it down in small bags and defrost it as you need to avoid it going off, take a small bag out a day tip it in a jar put any lures you're using into it and let them soak then go wild

easier than that mate.
On the nights mentioned in the coming months, they will "commit suicide", jump out of the mud and float out of the port river during the run out tide. You simply sit in a boat or on a rock wall with a torch and net, and scoop them up

Walked out to 2nd marker about 630am, passed a couple of guys who were there real early. Knocked off about 11 and saw quite a few on the way back, had a quick chat but not sure which ones you were? If you did see me I was the guy pouring with sweat in a jacket.
 
Picked up a couple of decent size ST's but was really quiet even with a decent burley trail going. Not sure it was worth the rock hopping effort, not the best tide movement though.

Give you a tip mate.
Dip them in metho when alive then put them in small containers and freeze straight away.
When you use them keep them in the shade and as cool as possible.
This method gives you firm and reliable worms for fussy bream, and they don't mind the metho one bit.
I tried salting them live, but they squirt the blood out, and end up mushy after being frozen.
Usually dig for them at low tides below .20m, and when used live, are one of the best baits out.
However during the bloodworm run, using them as bait will be useless, coz most of the fish that eat them will be fat and full.

Walked out to 2nd marker about 630am, passed a couple of guys who were there real early. Knocked off about 11 and saw quite a few on the way back, had a quick chat but not sure which ones you were? If you did see me I was the guy pouring with sweat in a jacket.
 
Picked up a couple of decent size ST's but was really quiet even with a decent burley trail going. Not sure it was worth the rock hopping effort, not the best tide movement though.

Vxman and myself soaked some big baits off the local rocks on Sunday morning. No luck at all, but that's not surprising considering the dodgey tides!  So we changed tactics mid morning and started berleying for Gar and slowly started to get a few keepers. Vxman was expertly picking out all the undersize ones and much to my amusement dropping all the legals he caught before getting them on ice!  Managed to get a small feed of "dodgey" Gar on a slow but enjoyable morning.

i too like Ale got out metro yesterday. i took a mate and me 3 little ones. the youngest two played wth thomas trains on the floor and loved being out in the boat as always. my six year fished hard all day throwing plastics and squid jags. we picked up 9 squidleys and half a dozen snook by dragging a double clutch around. we only kept one snook which my son was extremely proud he caught. was interesting if the 5 different colour jags we tried they would only hit this one

I managed to get out yesty locally. Mainly drifted around squiding with one paternoster in the water in case I stumbled on a tinger patch.
Only got hook ups on throw backs, leatheries, weedies , red mullet, even a juvenile blue throat!
Ended up with a good feed of squid (2kg of clean edible goodness) n the biggest cuttlefish I've ever caught. The thing was a beast.
 
Had a really good time just me n my girl, for a 5 year old she is really getting into it and guess what show n tell will be this week?
My little whiting rock looked killer on the sounder, the blue blotches where hordes of pigmies tho.

Found em north last week, metro this week, n my mate found them on all his tinger drops down at wirrina!!

Have to speak the guys at the desal, c if they can run a backwash trial again, keep the population in check!

This one is my personal favourite, flies well on the cast and really works. It's a Samaki Flash 55g, colour is Blue Mac. The outside colour tends to peel off after a few dozen salmon , but still works well.
 

 
Cheers!

Had the day off school today i decided to have a flick for bream down the port. ended up with 35 bream and 2 salmon on 2inch zman grubs. unfortunately no legal bream which was my goal but got 5 within 3cm. would also like to thank keenfisho for his knowledge which helped today hopefully next time a can crack a good fish on the lures

Catching a bag or 2 … or 6! of Yellow Fin Whiting has not been a problem recently. There are always plenty around in the right places.However I have struggled to land many of the better size fish. I have had my share of bites, even plenty hook ups, although I was not happy with the hook up rate. And lastly and most frustratingly staying hooked up. I have had some big blistering runs, from big bruising YFW on light tackle in the shallows. Only to find my hooks pulled. Yes they are definitely YFW and not Flathead. You can tell by the distinct differences in their head shakes. The Flathead thrash and swing their heads from side to side whereas YFW tug their heads downwards trying to get back down to the sand. And on occasions I have seen their tell tale silver flash. They are nearly always hooked on the longest cast when you do not get much of a chance to see colour. I have never landed the best of the Yellow Fin Whiting that I have hooked.Well I can find them. I can get them to bite, although with a poor hook up rate and when hooked up my hooks would pull once we were into a fight. I had to have a rethink about what I was doing.
 
I paid a visit to a congenial veteran of the tackle industry, Trevor Rea at Gotcha Tackle on Magill Rd Stepney. Trevor has extensive experience as a land based fisho with many an unbelievable tale. There has been plenty of tales of monster size YFW, but Trevor is the only person I know that can look me in the eye and tell me he has caught a 55cm YFW. Albeit a while back. And a mate of his has had 60+ cm fish, whilst fishing along side him. When he digs up photos, which I am urging him to do I will scan & post them up. Well you cant buy that experience and it soon became apparent.
 
Trevor listened intently to my problem, then quietly walked down along a display shelf, returning with a packet in hand saying “This is what you need. Give up the long shank hooks” In his hand was a packet of Gamakatsu #4 octopus hooks. He looked at me and said “stop thinking Yellow Fin Whiting and start thinking Bream” Big Yellow Fin Whiting behave more like Bream than whiting. The penny dropped. I have always inspected the stomach contents of the fish I catch. I find the bigger YFW always have, apart from worms, crabs, nippers, prawns, whitebait, and even a baby octopus. Below a pic of stomach contents from a previous catch.
 

 
Exactly the type of food you expect a Bream to eat. So they could be expected to attack your bait in a similar manner to bream. I once had a huge YFW attack and hang onto for a while a whole pilchard on 3/0 hooks intended for Flathead. I described my current trusted and very reliable rig (below) to Trevor.
 

 
He said “you are assuming it attacks the worm from the bottom” Well yes! He was challenging my hard and fast assumptions. Great! I was getting a fresh look at what I was doing. This is the rig he suggested and assured me from his own experience, of changing his own technique, that my hook up rate would double. This is his suggested rig;
 

 
I have tried this rig out in my last 2 sessions. On the first session it was very windy and the big YFW that normally hang around the shallow nipper beds are not around in these conditions. I did finish with a bag of YF between 30-34cm It was interesting to note all the bigger YF took the top hook and I doubled my hook up rate. It was only small YF and Puffers that took the bottom hook. Yesterday the weather was looking good and I headed out with great anticipation. It was on the first 2 casts that I found a couple of 31cm YF. From then on I tried to avoid them. There was an easy bag of fish for the taking, in the 29-33cm range but my focus were the bigger specimens. So I focussed on areas that hold less but larger fish. The rig works well! I did not lose a single good fish today and probably only missed one great bite. I kept 15 fish 31-40cm.
 

 
The best sizes were; 2 @40cm, 2@38cm and 2@36cm
 

 
Taking up the whole shelf of the fridge while chilling down before filleting.
 

 
I thought I was doing pretty well, but there is always room for improvement. Listen, review and have a rethink. Well it is satisfying to have changed my rigs with great results.Now a 50+ cm Yellow Fin Whiting can realistically go onto my bucket list! Cheers, Des