swong

One of my mates is getting married in march, and so we're having a bucks party for him in the next few weeks. Atm looking to hire a boat at Brooklyn and looking for suggestions on what to do with the Buck! If it makes any sense, 'clean' suggestions would be appreciated (i.e. nothing dangerous, or disrespectful to his fiance). . .that's not to say by clean i mean things cant get messy tho!

I know that lure clips can be used for hardbodies, but i was wondering it anyone uses them with soft plastics? i tried it today but with no bites to report - but no idea if it was just a bad day, or it genuinely doesnt work. . .when i checked it in the shallow water, it seemed to swim properly so that doesnt seem to be the issue. All the info i've read about plastics point to directly tying the line to the jig, but dont specifically mention NOT to use a lure clip. (obviously the appeal of a lure clip is easily being able to change jig heads quickly)

I was with Dchu yesterday. . unfortunately our day was quite average Picked 3 undersized fish: 2 bream and a tailor (altho the tailor was my first fish using the berkely worm, so that was a small consolation) On one occassion DChu had his reel buzz for a second but it didnt stick :/

Any luck??????? weather was insane. . .hope it paid off!

Cheers for the day out Rikki. . .i know me and Dan were really thankful for sharing your knowledge with us, so even though we didnt land anything, that in and of itself was worth the trip cos without that we'd have zero idea Have to say though, there is something about blackfish fishing that is pretty alluring . . . we'll definitely have to go again so i can try and even the score with the one that got away!!

Heyas, It's been a while since posting - but unfortunately it's been a long time away from fishing until recent. . .spent quite a lot of time "working out SPs" and have finally been able to get on the water (landbased) to put into practise the things i've learned (H/T to Mako for giving me a ton of help at the SP Social last year). . anyways. . thought i'd jot down things i've learned so far and looking for any helpful advice to improve. . . plus maybe it will be of help to other people. Lessons/Observations: 1) Gear means everything Since going out with TidenKnots last year and speaking to Mako I realised that gear needs to match the exact type of fishing you're doing . . .i know this is obvious in hindsight, but hey, I had to start learning from somewhere. So I picked up a rod for SP with 4lb fireline and mono backing underneath. . currently I use a 1m 6lb mono leader. . .(ideally i'd get fluroc but thats pricey). Braid makes all the difference with SPs. 2) Lighter the jighead the better I started out using quite heavy jigheads (I was using 6grammers) cos i had little casting distance on my old setup spooled with mono. . .but after Mako told me to top my reel up with braid (or fireline) i worked out that the jigheads didnt need to be anywhere near as heavy since casting distance was now not a problem. Now I'm on 1.5g jigheads and the hook-up is substantially higher. Lighter the jighead also means better swimming action of your plastic rather than it dropping like a brick all the time. 3) Picking up a flatty is easy street. . bream/whiting on the other hand Pretty self-explanatory . . .flatties will hit anything thrown at them. I feel confident enough about picking up flatties that if i dont get any hookups from a flatty, i'd say that there are ALMOST none there. Aside from that, taking a bream/whiting has proven to be a lot more difficult. From what i've noticed, if you want to take a flatty, use a slightly heavier jighead and just lift and drop it as you want contact on the bottom. For bream what's been working for me has been the lighter jighead + smaller bloodworm wrigglers or gary glitters. It terms of retrieve I still try lift and drop, but on the lift I twitch it twice to keep it swimming that little bit more off the ground. They're much more picky and much more finicky than flatties. Although i've watched a fair few videos about retrieves, personally i think it's all very, very subtle and unfortunately you just have to get out there and work out what works for yourself. What helps a lot is not thinking so much about the retrieve itself, but thinking about what action the lure is taking given the conditions of wind/current etc combined with your setup and retrieve. . .you just want it to swim as naturally as possible. In terms of time, evening/night has caught me more than day. . but perhaps this is cos it's way too hot during daylight recently. Although i've read tide-out is ideal. . .i think whenever you can get out is ideal . . .In fact, on my recent trips out, they were all tide-in and that seemed to work well. 4) Plastics So far i've used gulps and wrigglers and i've caught squat with the gulps (well not squat, but definitely not as much). . .i guess this has to take into consideration that i just use wrigglers more often as it's my 'confidence' lure now. On my last effort i tried some gulp camo worms and although it took some serious bites i just could never manage to hook anything up. . .should i put a stinger hook on the end or something? I did cut about 1/3 of the worm off cos it was so long. I've got a pack of resin heads and some squidgy flickbait . . still trying to work those out, but no luck so far. I'm still trying to up the catch rate of bream as it's such a good fighting fish. . .if anyone else has any pointers/suggestions/corrections that would be awesome!

Got given a pack of 4" black sardine Tsunami soft plastics ("secret scent" + paddle T). I'll probably have a go with them next week some time. . . but just wanted to know if anyone's tried them before? I've pretty much just used berkley/squidgies.

Is it possible to get worms from Kelso beach Iceman? or do u buy them? I usually go to fish around East Hills with prawns from Ace's as well. . .if i get anything worth reporting, i'll let everyone know.

I found this which should be of help! http://cnettv.cnet.com/make-your-laptop-hot-spot/9742-1_53-28619.html much easier to follow i think

I found this link which should be of help... http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/networking/setup/adhoc.mspx Because you're not using a hub/router you'll be wanting to set up an "Ad Hoc Network". . but dont worry about all the jargon. .there are plenty of pictures and instructions there I've done it a few years ago and it was pretty straight forward (granted computers was my industry so i know it's not everyones cup of tea) So by the sounds of things you want the eeepc to be directly connected to the internet, and the other computers will access the net via the eeepc. . . in that case you'll want to set up "Internet Connection Sharing" on the eeepc and it actually becomes the 'hub/router' of communication. . Obviously if/when you get to the "How to set up additional computers" section in the instructions, you'll be using your mac to search for the network Anyways, lemme know if you're going to go ahead with it. . i can try and give you more help if needed!

We have both macs and netbooks at home. . .both are definitely good and have their place My wife uses an MSI U100 - is there a specific model of EEEpc you have? It's not important to know. . but helpful nonetheless (esp if it has major problems) Are you using Windows? or some other operating system? If you have windows and you havent got an antivirus program, i'd recommend putting one on. . .I'd suggest AVG (it's free). . and make sure windows firewall is on and updates are regularly being updated. Tho not essential, i'd stop using Internet Explorer and download Firefox and if you need a free wordprocessor, OpenOffice is impressive for something u dont have to pay for. When you say your mac cant pick up the wireless signal from your EEEpc . . .are you trying a direct connection? Or both computers are trying to connect to each other via a hub or router?

Gday FR, It was a ball to go out with Pete yesterday. . .i think i've read a ton of articles/books/forum posts - and even youtube - but it doesnt really make any 'sense' until someone shows you how everything fits together on the water! Like with any sport, you can only tell someone so much about how to kick a ball, swing a racquet or how to move. . .u just to see it and do it yourself "on the field". As we got to wisemans Pete said, "I feel likes it's gonna be a good day". . .he proved to be quite the prophet as well as fisherman Sure, it started off a little slow - but after that it was all like running downhill and after taking photos of all our catches Pete decided we'd stop and only take photos of the legal ones. . .which was a good idea cos i think even the digital camera would have run out of film It was huge lesson from hitting the water and fishing, to cleaning the catches (and having a peak at what they were eating!) all the way to parting company when i was still asking questions and he was more than happy to share his wisdom! Tho i still have a long, long way to go, it's definitely worth aspiring towards and only helped me to appreciate fishing even more For Pete, you can see his passion for fishing is more than just fish, rods and lines but a lifes-narrative of stories and people! He clearly has a high respect for FR and an equally high respect for many of the people here who he has received from and given to. . .he's a valuable asset to this community with a gold-mine of knowledge to pass on. . some day down the track hopefully i'll be able to repay the favour to someone else Pete - hope you finally got some well-deserved rest

From what i've heard, poppers are best used in summer when the cicadas are making their noise and fish are eager to make a move while its not cold. . . does that mean it's just going to be a lot harder in winter? or would i just be wasting time?

wow, that's awesome! Thanks Pete (and Mike for your rec ). . it's ok . . not in any hurry at all as i have some things to kill off as well. . but look forward to benefiting from your wisdom cheers Simon

Thanks Mick. . .yeah i see his posts every now and then and im always tempted to have a go. . .unfortunately (as with all things) i had to weigh up the costs of time/money/etc and decided i cant really commit to it atm :/ Having said that, i do hear many good things about it and if/when i can do it ill definitely contact him Sorry, i should clarify my post. . im not hoping for a magic-silver-bullet of an angler to be a one-stop shop for all my questions. . .im happy (and this is my preference actually) to learn all these things over time. . .so even if someone said the only thing they can do is help catch live bait. .then that would be awesome too Or if someone said they're going to fish for bream on bread and am happy for me to tag along . .then that's perfect too Basically, if anyone's willing to teach. . im definitely willing to learn.