Yowie

I have 3 younger brothers, and during school age, being the eldest, I was always given the job of mowing the lawn. The other bastardo's laughed as they were never asked to mow the law. Soon fixed that, I mowed down everything in the back yard, including the old man's good plants, and was not asked to mow the lawn again.

Another successful day, a few for a feed and the release of a big girl.

Fab, 'The early bird catches the worm', same applies to fish. I have been rising early to go fishing, since early high school days, though now past the 60 mark, it is not as easy. Dave.

Good work on the jew. Memo to self - 'always use the net for a large flattie' - so many are lost on the final lift out of the water.

Have had a number of the eagle rays do that over the years. They can jump out 4 to 5 feet, as they ramp up a lot of speed when heading to the surface.

Thanks Scratchie. The eagle rays go hard on a handline. If you have to chase after a flattie, it would be a record size.

Headed up river for a change, out from Lilli Pilli. Took my son along as he had a day off work (he did not like the 3.30am wake up time though) The water temp is still a bit cool and clear. My son pulled out the tailor, then he dropped a legal sized reddie as he was lifting it out, it was lip hooked only and the lip split once out of the water. I pulled up the flounder, and a short while later thought I had hooked a nice jew. The rod was bending nicely, it was running different angles, until it swam near the surface. A long tailed brown stingray about 2 and a half foot across, fought nothing like a normal stinger. A few little reddies, then the handline started moving, so I picked up and it was the flattie. Put up a good fight for a deep water flattie (some times the flatties don't fight as much in the deeper water) It had swallowed the ganged hooks right down, I did not know how it would go upon release, so I kept it (normally release them over 60 cm). The handline started moving again a short while later, picked up and it felt like another ray. I could not gain any line (12 pound) and it was powering away down below for some time. Could not pull it up but I could feel it's wings flapping away. Then it headed for the surface under the boat at such a rate of knots that I still have the burn marks in my fingers. It jumped out of the water, an eagle ray about 4 foot across the wings, so I busted off. The sun came up and the bites stopped, so headed home. As I was cleaning up, I saw a few ducks eating floating bread crusts just out from the boatshed (the kids a few house away were feeding them), with a few big hits on the bread from underneath, so my son hooked up a few bread crusts and flicked them out. One was eventually taken, and he pulled out a 30cm bream, but that spooked the others bream in the shallow water.

Sounds like some fun time when you did find a fish or 3. Nice reddies.

Did you stand on or near a numb ray that was buried in the sand?

Wrong view, not good. You need to go fishing more often.

Thank you Fab. Have been able to find a few lately, not big ones, but they do taste good.

Just before sun-up as I was heading out.

Headed out this morning, dropping the first bait down just as the sun was popping over the horizon a few minutes after 6am, and hooked up almost straight away. Very light winds from the south, current heading to the south, and not much swell, so not too much drift. Had my bag limit of 10, a few minutes after 7am, so headed back home. Took longer to clean the fish and put the boat away than it did to catch them. Only a couple of spikies in the mix. Some slimy mackerel buzzing around, hooked up one and then they disappeared. A few humpbacks again cruising south just on sunrise. Heard a fisho on the radio that he was in 20 knot winds out from Port Kembla, but it was only a passing storm front. The wind picked up from the south as I was heading in, and stopped a little while later. Not too many other boats out there.

A few fillets in that lot. The red rock cod are good eating. Have eaten the moari's before, they are reasonable quality, the flatties are better.

Good work Krispy. Both good fish, and both fight hard but in different styles.

A good reddie like that should just about make up for the bouncy seas.

The ocean flatties are good eating. Saw boneless flattie fillets in 2 Sutherland Shire fish shops over the last 2 weeks. $50- and $53- per kilo. FFS. I paid that for red emperor fillets a couple of months ago in Qld. Now they are good eating.

Nice reddie. Darker colouring along the back and head.

Certainly is. The fillets will be on the BBQ today to feed a few people.

Thanks guys. The flatties have been around for a while. Knocking the bag limit from 20 down to 10 is a good idea. 10 flatties equals 20 fillets, plenty of feeds to go around. Tiger flatties were in big numbers off Sydney many years ago, but the trawlers just about killed them off. The odd 1 or 2 are still caught, mainly around this time of year when they are in a spawning mood in shallower water, but the blue spots are in bigger numbers now.

Thanks Rick.

Headed out into Bate Bay around sun rise, just in time to see humpbacks cruising south again. One drift and caught all the fish in about an hour, plus a few undersized ones. Only 2 spikies amongst the blue spots. Some small ones there, a few more like the 50cm one would have been nice. Swell from the south, a smaller swell from the north-east, a light west-south-west breeze, but the southerly current pushed me slowly south. Very little bird life, nothing moving on the surface that I could see.

Size looks good for this time of year.

As I said earlier, the fish needs to be filleted to determine if there is any deformity in the bone structure, or if the dorsal bones have been chewed off. The best way to tell. I caught a few tailor many years ago with what appeared to be a deformity of the backbone, and when filleted, the backbone was actually deformed and curved a bit. Bream with those bits missing along the dorsal fins, when filleted actually had the dorsal fins chewed off (obviously from a bite from a larger fish) and the backbone appeared perfect. Have only caught a few bream with a missing section of dorsal fin, and do not remember ever finding the backbone to be deformed. No doubt some fish have imperfections in the bone structure, like humans, caused by other factors apart from mechanical injury (eg. collision with a boat), or bites from bigger fish. Fish swim in polluted waters at times, and there is no escaping toxic water when it spills into the ocean and rivers. I can speak with some experience, as I have caught and filleted fish for something approaching 60 years.

It can be quite difficult to have kingies take a good looking bait or lure at times, yet I have hooked a few on a yakka hand line with small hook and tiny piece of bait (have not always won the fight) As you found out, you need to vary baits and lures, and it paid off.