foulhooked

Hi everyone, I'm after a fish smoker for a present for my dad. Don't mind spending a bit of money on something good. Any advice? Also wouldn't mind knowing what wood chips etc I should be buying? Any info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I think most decent rollers are braid friendly now. Used to have some rollered rods but even after taking care of them some rollers seized up (may have just been bad rollers). Never have to worry with good fuji guides. Just one less thing to worry about. Never had an issue with line joins getting caught either.

Ive been using 30 sized overheads tyrnos mostly packed with braid and a mono topshot. You can fit close to 800m of 80lb on a tyrnos 30. I then attach 50m of 80lb momoi with an fg. Outfits have caught tuna to 70kg and marlin to 150kg no problem. Outfits also double as beast kingfish livebaiting gear Using 24kg game rods with all runners. No rollers

nice work!! I was a bit north of longy and found a patch of about 2000 birds. Slow trolled some live slimies around but no fish. Didnt mark too much bait around either. Should have gone south! Tried Sydney north fad as well but nothing but tiny dollies. Next time! What leader were you running? I heard people were going as low as 80lb to get a bite. Cheers

Thanks for the reply rick! I also messaged trapman bermagui and be said they get them sometimes way offshore off the south coast. Very interesting

I was just looking at the NSWGFA records and i noticed this entry. I'm guessing this was a pacific bluefin? Were pacific bluefin a common catch in those years? Also do longliners ever pick them up off australian waters?? I also noticed it was caught in november, which I thought would be out of season for any bluefin... so many questions.. Anyone got any answers? Cheers

Couldnt read the article either but I'm also a little concerned about our kingfish population. However, I think maybe we now have a resident population in the Sydney area, hence why the same fish might be caught multiple times. This may be the result of banning commercial fishing in sydney harbour, giving the fish a stable food source (also tagging has become more popular, so we might be noticing these catches more). I do believe we need to restrict ourselves to keeping fish under 1m. I read a scientific paper that stated that larger fish produced substantially more eggs than smaller ones, I just spend 20 minutes trying to find it again but I can't sorry! If we took this into account and let the big fish breed, hopefully there will be more kings to catch. Plus the smaller ones taste better anyway!

looks like the cool water is being pushed way back down south. No chances of a bluefin sydney way but maybe still a yellowfin. Has anyone heard anything?

Lately I've been thinking about trying for a swordfish off sydney. However all the bent butt rods they seem to be using are atleast $750. I've been looking at the shimano status PE 5-8 as a budget alternative, but it says it is designed for deep dropping with electric reels. Is there something about the design of these rods that make them unsuitable for swordfishing? There is also a tiagra bent butt at around $350 with runner guides and a roller tip that looks like the next cheapest option. Has anyone used these rods before or know of another cheap equivalent? At the moment my plan is to use: Status or Tiagra bent butt Tiagra 50A or Tyrnos 50LRS 1000m 80lb braid + 80 or 130lb mono topshot Thanks

anyone thinking of heading out this weekend? flying up to sydney friday night to fish saturday and sunday for toona! On a side not.. Whats everyone using for their water temp? ripcharts of fishtrack? been using fishtrack for a while but it doesnt seem as good as ripcharts when I used it a few years ago. Is it worth getting the premium subscription or just the standard?

years ago when I used to fish long reef in a yak with my dad, fresh squid drifted around on jigheads always seemed to work pretty well. Especially on snapper but also kingfish at times. Fish for squid the night before in the harbour, then use it at dawn at long reef. If you get a big calamari put one big tentacle on a 3/8 ounce jig head. Almost always produced a nice fish. And just use the navionics map to find the reef. Theres usually atleast 10 other boats out there so shouldnt be too hard to find goodluck!

Anyone heard any news of tuna off sydney yet? Looks like some good water south east of botany bay but quite a far way offshore. Heard from some facebook pages that longliners have been getting some good fin around the 2000fathom line near Bermi. I'm down in Melbourne for the next few months so want to be sure before flying up to go for a fish. Cheers

Had a few big calamari harass my live baits at Lion island on sunday so that might also be an option. You can also catch yakkas at Juno point if you burley up, but west head is definitely the better spot as Scratchie said

Avet do left handed jigging reels. Check out bustedfishing.com Look at the 5 SXJ. Should be around $330 Edit: The 5 SXJ might be a little low drag wise for you so the raptor editions might be better. Look at the Avet 5 SXJ 6/4 raptor Or avet mxj 6/4 raptor. The narrow models would be more suited for jigging

Thanks Jon, I think I'll be going for the 50/200 transducer and the LSS2-HD. Thanks for all your help! Now I've just got to ask some stabicraft owners about using a transom or through hull

ok so with the addition of the sonar hub its getting a bit too expensive again just like the simrads. Is a 1kW transducer completely necessary? What about if I went for the HDS12gen3 with a 50/200 lowrance 106-77 with a 3d structure scan? Would the 106-77 do everything I want to do offshore if I ran it at 50Hz? Also does the gen3 allow a 3D transducer without a sonar hub?

The boat is currently coming with a lowrance hds 12 gen 3 so instead of switching it out for the simrad we might stick with it. Few questions, does the hds 12 allow mulitple transducers to be connected unlike the simrad? Or would i need an additional module?

A combination of kingy snapper fishing in 20 - 100m, trolling beyond the shelf and some deep dropping 300-500m

I like the sound of that second option. Researching it now. Regarding the b265LH, it says its suited to boats over 8m. Would this be a major issue? The boat would be parked at marina its whole life so there would be no damage caused by a trailer, except for when its put into the water for the first time. Thanks for all your help by the way, hard to find the right information online.

Thanks for your reply amkr! I think we've decided on the NSS9 evo2 + BSM3 + 1kW transducer for now, as we have a roughly $5k limit on the sounder. Then later on we could always add the 3D structure scan transducer. Now I'm wondering what 1kW transducer to get. We'd like a thru-hull transducer for the ability to see bottom at high speeds but would love recommendations. The hull is 6mm aluminium if this helps..

My family is getting a new stabicraft 2400 in the beginning of 2017 and I've been tasked with doing all the research regarding sounders. So far I've decided on either a simrad NSS9 evo2 or NSS12 evo2. However I'm confused as to whether we need the bsm3. We want to run a 1kw transducer as well as a structure scan 3D transducer. Is anyone running a similar setup that could give me some information? I've read conflicting posts on different forums that you need the bsm3 if you want to run 2 transducers, but cant find any information from simrad to back this up. Thanks in advance!

Great report Jon! Were you using frozen pillies? or the ones bought fresh from a fish shop?

love your videos mate keep them coming! Might have to invest in a similar setup

I generally find the hawkesbury to be really really hit and miss this time of year. Best bet is to poke out through barrenjoey to the reefs off palm beach. That fresh squid should get you a feed of flatties, snapper and mowies. I went out today in this area and got a nice feed. Other option is to anchor up close to barrenjoey headland and cube pillies. Usually find a few legal snapper and any pelagics in the area

just found this after i posted... http://www.fishingmonthly.net.au/Articles/Display/9817-Take-a-harder-line i guess it has been done before. Would still like to hear peoples experiences though. Cheers