zen801

Well done mate. I know the feeling as much the same happened to us on the 10th in 90 fathoms. Its a great feeling after all the hard work to succeed at a catch and release. We are going back for more on Thursday east of Long Reef.

Hi raiders, Long time no post. Four of us went out on Sunday early looking to go wide and chase dollies. We had no trouble getting yakkas at Balmoral then headed straight out to the Sydney fad. It was dead and the water was putrid so moved onto the Long Reef wide area for the same result. Decided to head east towards the shelf and motored all the way out there for nothing. Water was blue and warm out wide and that was encouraging. No bird action or bait balls noted. Highest temp noted during the day was 25C. The day wore on and we started to feel discouraged so stopped and re organised the spread. Took the skirts off the corners and replaced with divers. About half an hour later the bedlam started with the good old words "marlin in the spread". Snapped out of my dream state to see the marlin going from lure to lure. Looked at the divers but was interested in the skirts. He hit the the short rigger and the tiagra started singing but he dropped it after maybe 20 seconds. The crew were crushed but we decided to set the 50 again in the outrigger and keep going. Within a minute or so he was back having a go at anything he could see. This was a seriously hungry marlin. He hit the day Daiwa spin outfit on the long rigger and it screamed off. The crew did really well to clear the decks and Cam was onto his first marlin. It jumped all over the place out wide and we started to get worried we would get spooled so we decided to chase it down. About 15 min into the fight i couldn't believe it when i hear one of the guys saying "fish trap" and i look over to see we were in big trouble. Of course shifty old marlin wrapped around the buoy rope. I thought well thats it another one to good old Murphys law. I got on the wheel and started backing around the buoy and to our amazement the line came good and the marlin headed away and went deep. The fight lasted about 30 minutes or more and we wore him done and he eventually came up perfectly on his side on the starboard side of the boat. We traced him and grabbed his bill and put a temporary rope around his tail. Kept the boat in gear and we all had a good look at the beauty. He was hooked on his bill and the hook came away without even having to really pull it out. We got some pics and eventually realised him to see him swim off tired but alive. Great to get that result and all four of us worked hard for the result. Gotta say i was very impressed to see him landed on the Daiwa catalina with 80 pound braid. Cam did real well to handle the beast. Thanks to all but especially Captain Bretto. Cheers mate. He was caught in approx 90 fathoms with water temp at 24.8C at 1pm. Mike

It happens every time you put a cheapie combo deal out - you get smoked. I saw a guy land a 25kg jew on a bream rod used for the first time. Good pic. Second run was probably a jew. Mike

Well done and they are there more than most people think. I caught one i think from memory at 70cm a few years ago on, like you, a yellowtail fillet but during the mid afternoon. Someone told me around that time that had a friend who lived at Seaforth on a deep water prperty with a private jetty that they had a pet snapper estimated at about 7kg. They used to hand feed him over a few months then he moved on or was caught. It was so good to eat, i ate the whole thing. Mike

Just to let people know in the Frenchs Forest and Forestville area there has been some theft from boats parked in the streets recently. Know someone who had their 30hp outboard removed from the boat during the night.

Geez mate your old man is a legend for doing that. My braid recently got wrapped around a prop out wide and i really didnt fancy getting in the water. Lucky for me and crew i was able to unwrap from the duck board once fully tilted. I got wet but didnt offer myself as shark bait. Had a few sharks lurking around the boat recently at LR so i prefer to not go in. Mike

We fished MH on sat night. Picked up a big calamari at north head then back into MH west of spit bridge for the high tide. Got a lot of bites on school jew landing two but they were very finicky about biting freely. MIKE

Sounds like a jew. Burley King is right as MH fishes much better during the day. Most of my jews are caught within the first few hours of sunrise. Through in a high or low and chances are good for jews, kings and big flatties. Mike

Great feed there from a beautiful part of SA.

Awesome report. I watched river monsters on fox last night and he was fishing Thai and India. He fished a few ponds and caught a lot of big fish in Thailand. India was a waste of time and I could of told him that as its so polluted and overfished. Look forward to the pics. Gotta love Thailand. Mike

Good eating size mate. I will be getting into MH as soon as the weather clears. Mike

I am a huge fan of poly boats. I fish in a mates 195 triumph CC and it is awesome. It is never going to sink. We were recently at Browns and noticed we had taken on a lot of water and the bilge had failed. Now normally this is a big problem, but we got her on the plane and water started draining out and we motored home no problem. Found and fixed the problem and the marine shop said we had about 1200 litres in the hull at rest. That is enough water to sink many a boat. Mike

We had a similar experience on a big blue past browns. We didn't keep enough pressure on him when he was up on the surface and when he was getting air and he got tangled up and snapped off. Like you said it was awesome anyway. We have had success finding them last year in similar area as you so might give NE a go instead of SE next time. Mike

Hey Bartos don't waste your time with the miserable bugger. Ignore him and keep fishing there. Mike

Hi Pete, Always good to catch a jewie. I might have to stop chasing tuna and or Marlin and go back to Jewies so i actually land a fish Lol. Mike

Well we headed out in pretty average conditions, choppy and windy. We went out to 12 mile and almost pulled the pin but decided to head towards Browns and see if it got any better. After awhile it settled down and we got out a spread when we came across sauries getting harrassed and jumping. No luck there so moved on. Browns was a ghost town due to wind and current and in fact we only saw one boat all day and i think we would have done close to 200 Ks in the day. Decided to keep going wider into the unknown zone for us and go further than ever before. We were a long way past Browns when the long rigger exploded. To be honest i couldnt believe what i was seeing and hearing out of my T50 with 24kg. It was screaming and running like i have never heard any reel before and i looked out the back to see a monster Blue Marlin going ballistic. I realised that i had set the outrigger clip too tight so quickly got it down and unclipped but lost precious and critical moments. The marlin came back up and tail walked and smahed around then went down and ran again. He didnt want to stay down but came up again and went aerial. He settled on the surface and stuck like half his body out and smashed his head side to side displacing huge amounts of water. It was better than any nat Geo stuff i had seen before. All of a sudden he was either tail or bill wrapped and snap. I think maybe tail wrapped as i had a long wind on leader of a few metres and when we brought the line in it was all busted above the wind on and about 200mm of damaged line. We think it had to be every bit of 200kg. I caught some Blues in Vanuatu of 70 - 90 kgs and this one dwarfed those considerably. It was a very fat and powerful fish with a massive boff head. Tried a bit longer in the zone and moved on back towards Browns to do a deep drop with the electric. Current too much so pulled the pin and trolled back to 12 mile area. Motored back from 12 at 25 knots. Great day although we were keen for a tuna. If targeting the big blues you really need to go 37kg. That fish if we got past the initial frenzy would have taken a couple of hours to land on 24kg and in rough conditions would have been epic. It did not take a squirted lure so try other options. Mike

We will be out browns area on Tuesday looking for fin etc on "men at work" and on channel 21. Any info sharing on the day would be awesome. Fished LR wide sat and radio chatter was killing us as we had no game gear on board. Saw a baby marlin in 21.8 degree water hanging around an object in the water. Mike.

Go the Pro. Mike

I love screen shots like that with an explanation - thanks. Is it a whale also at 20m? mike

Love Vanuatu and great fishing. Caught a Blue Marlin there a few years ago. Last year only Wahoo as was a bit slow. Those are good sized Wahoo you caught Did you hit the "grand" in Villa? Cheers

Unlike a lot of fishing forum posts yours was entertaining. Cheers.

Any gutter near the pole is worth fishing if tide etc is right. Mike

Will be out there on Saturday. Call sign "men at work". Can't wait. Mike

This coming new moon should be good. Mike

Yeah I catch them occasionally at my Jew spot in 90 - 100 feet in MH. Mike