sunday salmon

[jimmy72]

Target fly munching salmon

Time & place late start Sunday, got to the heads about 12 midday

After about 10 mins we spotted the birds and founds some big sambos on the chew underneath. Hooked up first or second cast on a 5 - 6 cm surf candy, saw some backing soon after and worked hard to get it in ASAP so my mate could get into the blitzing salmon as the school had moved / we drifted away . .. with sore forearms on just the first fish i landed a 60cms model. After a quick photo and release we then cruised up to the feeding fish again, and positioned the boat for the right angle of attack. Got a few casts into the right spot, missed a hook up and then repeatedly saw fish zoom in on the fly only to short take or completely pull out last second. So 3 or 4 refusals in the same cast, is not good, my mate wasn't hooking up either and after checking he was fishing similar sized fly, it was time for a change...colour or size what do i change first??

Thinking for a second and scanning the frothing surface i noticed i could not see the bait, rookie mistake, i was probably fishing to large, went to my trusty box of eyes flies, pushing aside my favourites from last year and the year before i pulled out a fresh recently tied eyes fly with a just a touch of UV flash in. The results were immediate first cast missed three takes before hooking up shortly after, (those size 8 hooks are tiny !!) To be honest i was yelling "eat it ,eat it, eat it' with each strip much to the amusement of other boats close by. My mate down sized fly as well and came up tight straight after. Very tight to what seemed a much larger fish i think it jumped once and then went real deep and way in the backing first run - it slugged down there and for a while we thought it might be foul hooked, it was so stubborn. After much huffing and puffing and some 'ship' stirring we finally saw it... foul hooked? NO - just a beast of a sambo, judging by my first fish its might have been close to 70cm, we dunno exactly as it jumped out the boat pre photo shoot lol .

A few other boats turned up during the initial mayhem, hard to miss the wand waving and thousand birds i guess. Others were getting into them spinning, and one other guy on fly, some not getting hook ups, but near everyone was hooting and hollering - one guy was yelling out how he should really be home mowing the grass or something, was a party atmosphere out there, and everyone being pretty courteous -with good boat handling

a few more fish and the next thing you know a large pod , (or two pods of diff dolphins) came through smashing the salmon, was great to watch. initially they came through at speed , easy 20kts, which was was a little unnerving when heading straight at your boat and 20 m away, they zoomed around for a while at pace in all directions with sporadic big boofs throwing spay high in the air.

So with it all over on the salmon we were thinking and looking around assessing our options when we spotted some mutton birds low down at speed with gulls in pursuit less than a km further out , we chased a while without really getting a shot in, before deciding it might be better to head home rather than get mega frustrated chasing striped tuna that don't stop moving and won't stay up for long... we later heard there were acres of them further out which was disappointing to miss out on, but we'd had a good arvos fishing anyway. love the sunshine !

cheers

grant

[Sydneyfisher12]

Great work you got some nice salmon there good sized ones

Great to head that there hear at last hopefully I can get into them this weekend or in the holiday

Got to get out the tiny plastics

Cheers sydneyfisher12

[oz_brett]

A great day & plenty of excitement for all being the largest school of salmon Ive ever seen, I was out among them a little earlier then you. I had visitors from China with me it made a great & very memorable experience for them, they landed 1 salmon then the eldest of the group got sea sick (looking down taking pics of our catch) would have been good if they got to see the dolphins come through.

[W4z]

Sounds like a great day, I enjoyed the read

[fragmeister]

Salmon action... always a load of fun!

Great read,, I was there with you in (spirit at least)

Good move switching to the flies

Cheers

Jim

[jimmy72]

thanks, hopefully more again this weekend

i think tiny plazos will work well

we hardly took any photos as the fishing was so hot, half way through the fight you just wanted to get them in and cast again for another hook up ... greedy i am lol

cant wait for the kings to turn up and feed on top in the harbour

[tyrone07]

Plenty of rats off long reef early this morning no size though