Hello everyone
The shortest day of the year has just past and it looks like the weather should be fine for the next few days , this should give most of us a great chance to head out and make up for lost time . Lake Macquarie has been of fire over the last few weeks in fact it’s some of the best fishing for years , huge bait schools are everywhere throughout the lake attracting Tailor ,Salmon , Flathead , Mulloway and Snapper up to 2.5kg , most fish have been taken of plastics with the Samaki vibes with the 70 / 100 mm size been the most affective .
It’s just a matter of moving around trying to find the bait been broken apart , keeping an eye on the birds should indicate which bait school has fish on it , this week there have been some better size Tailor well over the kg mark getting taken on the Deep Tail dancers , I have even let a few of the Green Parrot’s go out of my collection this week just to make it interesting .
This winter there have been a lot of good size Snapper caught throughout the lake , the largest I have seen so far was 59 cm in length with most around the 45- 50 cm mark these fish are taking both lures and bait and the good news continues with probably the best season in years for Mulloway , some boats catching up to 7 fish per outing all on lures and the best news of all is that most fish are been released this catch and release trend by most lake fishermen will ensure good stocks in the years to come . Around a month ago I left from the Lake Rd ramp and noticed several large Flathead frames a lot the water’s edge the biggest was 90 cm long and not one of the others were under 70 cm’s , I don’t begrudge anyone taking a good feed home but with the abundance of fish around to choose from perhaps it might be better to release the larger Flathead and keep the smaller ones there are already moves trying to establish the Lake as a Trophy Flathead fishery preventing fish over 70cm from been taken , only time will tell .
Offshore water temperature continues to be stable with Bonito still getting caught along our part of the coast line , good numbers of Trag and Tailor are also still in good numbers on the inshore reefs . Two weeks ago both Patrick and I fished the farm and managed 14 Squire / Snapper up to 2 kg along with a Hairtail around 4-5 foot long out of 90 od meters of water , this weekend should see a lot more anglers head out and fish the deeper reefs while the weather holds it’s a great chance to head down the Texas and have a crack at the Snapper and Perch with the new moon on Saturday night .
Out wide last weekend Ross and Lewis Ireland fished the shelf on board their boat “All Zeros” and landed the big one after a 3 hour battle Lewis landed a 477 kg monster Tiger shark Ross was unable to winch the fish on board and needed to tow it back to Swansea through driving rain and wind squalls last Saturday night , Young Lewis became a proud member of the Thousand Pound club , it was estimated the shark would have been well over the 500kg mark when first caught , it could be time for Ross to change his boats name after this one.
This weekend will see the biggest tides of the year with a 2.09 m high tide on both Saturday and Sunday night the new Coon Island ramp will be under water once again so keep it in mind if you are returning late , another great council project failure .
The Advent Energy / gas project is back on the agenda again they have planned to conduct another Seismic survey off Catherine Hill Bay if the findings are successful further more intensive tests will be done which could mean a Gas rig only 22km from shore , to date I have heard nothing from any media outlets and to be honest the average person in the street would know it was planned which is alarming , I think it’s time to rattle the cage .
Regards
Jason Nunn
