'The Producer' Report, By Parksey

Fishing Report 24 02 07

Hi All

I wish I could say the fishing was great at the moment but
it is just so up and down. The harbour was just teaming with
good fish just a few weeks ago and although the bait is still
in abundance the big schools of kings are not showing up at the
usual haunts. Even the birds arent working.
There are still some fish around including some
small groups of very large fish but they are hard to find and
only want fresh/live squid.
Just came home from another hard day on the water and I
mean hard. We had squid strips and tiny live yellowtail
and didn't lose a bait even after visiting no less than
7 usual kingie locations.
The dirty water and rain might have put them down.
Still plenty of bream around, any wharf I look under.
A few salmon around with the Tailor and Frigates but its hit
and miss. I'm sure this will change shortly.

On the other hand dolphin fish are starting to turn up in numbers
and outside the fish are finally being caught inside the shelf.

Looks like the warm currents are really going to come in next
week - one of the best looking sat pics is up today.
Check the CSIRO SST link on the Sydney Fish Finder weather page.
There is a huge stream of very warm water coming down the coast and swirling back up toward Sydney from the south

Parksey

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Fishing Report 10 02 07
Sydney harbour going off !!!!

Well what an amazing day on the harbour. I don't know where to start this report cause there is so much to tell. But I guess the boat ramp would be the obvious place to begin the day. I arrived at little manly boatramp to find the boom gate still closed at 5.15am- its not meant to open until 5.30 but is usually open earlier. After sitting in the car for 10 mins I checked the gate only to find it was not locked.!
So in went the boat and it was straight to the tip of south head for a squid hunt. The wind was very slight, just enough for a nice slow drift ( perfect for squiding ) The first drift was looking unsuccessful but right at the end I jigged 2 beauties one after the other. These were way to big for live bait ( Tube length about 40 cm ) but great to cut into strips for bait or rings for dinner. I decided I did not need any more large squid today so left to get some smaller baits. First stop on the bait run >>>>Balmoral for some yellowtail. No berley required, just tons of em everywhere.
I quickly got my dozen yakkas and thought that would be enough cause I intended to only fish till 10 oclock. It was about 6.30 so I thought I would spend a little more time looking for some smaller squid. Picked a couple up at middle head and moved round the headland only to see a group of boats and some serious surface activity straight out from Oblisk beach. There were big fish smashing small bait on the surface & they looked like kings but I saw a boat beside me bring in a salmon. Not wanting to waste any time on them I continued to move along the shore hunting squid.
Took about half an hour but I got 2 more. Thats when things started to go off..........
I went to the nearest structure which happened to be the new red channel marker where the western wedding cake stood just weeks ago. Looked into the water and saw 10 - 15 small kings cruising the area. Not wanting to waste a squidly on them I tossed in a live yakka and tried to get it down deep quick in the hope there was bigger fish under the school of smaller fish. Well there was other fish under them, about 50 the same size as the ones on the surface and as the one on my hook came to the boat the whole
school came with it. It went 62cm but was given a second chance and returned. They were really switched on and keen to feed. So i flipped another yellowtail out and watched it get smashed by 2 kings at once only 2m from my boat. One of them ended up with it and was quickly in the kill tank at 67cm. I decided to move on in search of bigger fish and headed for neilson park. I scanned the water around the marker bouys chains but saw no sign of fish. I tossed a live squid down this time and said to myself - if they are here I will get one. It got to the bottom up current of the chains and........ nothing !!! So I wound it up and dropped it down current of the chain. Different story this side and it got nailed half way down and felt real solid. After loosing allot of line it found the structure and the line went dead. Dropped a few more baits here and caught only rats 55 - 65cm but landed 6 in less than 15 mins. Moved back towards the ramp and got small kings on every marker bouy with plastic stick baits - but still no size.
I ended up at the Q spot where a bloke on another boat told me he had lost good size fish. Before I dropped the anchor I cast a stick bait at the marker and was hooked up in 1 rotation of the handle. Another rat,
and when he came to the boat there must have been almost a hundred of them in a frenzy. I threw the pick out and fished a sea of kings for an hour. Then when all my live bait was gone I went through a large tackle box full of plastics, getting every second or third fish reefed on 10lb mono. It was about now that I saw a huge commotion on the boat beside me, only to see two kings come up in a net and only 1 rod in hand.!
You hear about these things but never see em !!! Another fish swimming beside the hooked king found its way into the net. Unbelievable !!!!!!!! I could see it happening cause there was 20 or 30 fish coming up with every hooked fish. After I had gone through about 15 stick baits I switched to metals and after I used every metal I didn't mind loosing I chucked out a frozen yellowtail from my last trip expecting nothing to eat it.!!!!
Well you guessed it - picked up faster than $100 buck note blowin down pitt street during the after xmas sales. This went on until the top of the tide at 11.20 and all three boats that were there had similar results. I managed only 4 fish over 70cm and that rounded out my bag limit.
I never did find the bigger fish I was looking for but with over 30 kings in the boat it was day I will always remember.

Parksey