Baysic

Hey Raiders, I’m Josh, and have been fishing Botany Bay for a few years out of an old de havilland and now a small polycraft. Been getting the new boat running right and been out a few times for a fish with mixed results and only a few keepers. i ma either out with my mate chasing a feed, trevs, flatties and the elusive legal king, or with my 2 and a half year old who is yet to catch her first fish. i fish the runway, mainly get undersized snapper, molly point rarely catch anything, or the oil wharf where I’ve had most success, took ok a day out with Scotty Lyons but could not replicate that success myself.... so looking for a mentor to come out in my boat a few time and up my productivity so I can be more productive.... mainly available on on weekends and the odd weekday.... fully equipped tackle and boat just need the no how

Ended up with a poly 455

Overdue a catch up with my old mate, who happened to be working from home we decided the new boat would bet he days office with a sunny low 20s temp and next to no wind. a lazy 10 am start saw us pottering around the third runway with no bites and all we got at watts reef was huge rock cod... with the day being so flat and the weather so tame we decided to head out out and past the heads, i set the trolling rods out basically two rods horizontal from mid ships.... let them out 30 metres and with then speedo showing a little over 4 knots we hit the north coast and started trolling without much of a clue what we were doing..... well I see my rod bend pretty hard and we are on... old mate drives us out to sea a bit and the fish fights hard as they tend to and landed at 38 cm sashimi for dinner. after trolling a bit further we decide to drift a little with baits down and my mate lands a cracking bream. Then all hell breaks loose something takes the trolling lure a deep dive that must be just sitting there as the rod bends right over, it takes old mate a good twenty seconds to wrestle the rod out the holder. 30 seconds later and two oh fcuks later and we lost the beast.... a good day out for sure. say a dolphin breach 6 feet away the westpac heli and even Greenpeace looking very dodgy doing some kinda training some questions once you get a hit trolling should you hit this spot by spinning or just troll again? whats some good spots for just outside any tips on trolling should I be faster Etc The Greenpeace guys cheers raiders Josh

Thanks mate no substitute for experience, but I am a bit of a gear head and like hacks and reckon there are a couple of people out there that have .had an epiphany after 100 trips out and bought a deck pump or a thermos or a knot tying tool or something else kind or obliquely obvious that most people don’t bring... here is the boat by the way

Hi Raiders, so I am back on the water with a PolyCraft 455 CC, which I am starting to deck out to fish Mainly Botany - Bait Fishing in the main, with some lures targeting Trevally Flathead, Bream and of course Kingies.... My question is what invaluable piece of equipment do you treasure most in your fishing expeditions and why - I am really keen to hear about stuff that may be attached but mainly whats in your tackle box.... Cheers

Ok folks so the motor on my old dehaviland has finally given up the ghost and it's not worth fixing up.... so so new boat time for me my my old boat was a 4.9 m fibreglass runabout and I am thinking of something like a triumph boats 1700 cc although there are few about any suggestions as to what boat for the bay... budget 15-20k

Brilliant Thanks for the tips

Good info... I am not looking to venture too far out, and would expect to stay within 2 nautical miles just hugging the coast, maybe get up to Malabar. Plan is to get a little bolder as time goes by but for now looking to stay close to the coast. I will pick up a sea anchor... Any pointers ? Already have a decent pick and sand anchor with a few metres of chain. Any other fishing insight around spots or techniques that are worth trying as close as possible to the heads ? Help much appreciated all

Thanks for the comments guys, agreed a 12 litre spare tank and hose is sensible. I normally use 10 l and I am generally flat out to the oil wharf and back as well as some manouvering, Bonito are definitely a target as are larger flathead. Snapper would be great too. I have a vhf radio so would log in with marine rescue, not really necessary in the bay. Would I need a longer anchor rode or do people just drift ? I have 70 foot

Hi Raiders, I have been fishing botany bay in an old 79 dehavilland 4.9 m glass runabout. Having spent the last 6 months getting to know the bay and the boat, I am inclined to venture slightly further afield. With 25 litres on a 70 Hp outboard I have limited range. What spots are worth trying if I stick my nose out the heads, which is something I would only be doing when the wind and weather are pretty benign. Thoughts much appreciated

The trav off a soft plastic was more of s bream lure white wriggler 2 inches the salmon of a gulp paddle tail in diesel (green)

I just checked the picture of course it's just over 50 not 60 which makes it smaller than last weeks flathead and a lot less tasty but still a Bonza day out

So the misus recons I have been neglecting her of late.... And she may have a point as we have been having plenty of boys boat trips since I bought Baysic. Why don't we go for a nice picnic I say..... Let's take the boat have a little fish and beach it at towra point for lunch and a swim.... So off we go... Start out at the runway see some surface activity.... Which is gone by the time I tie a metal on.... We head off instead to the oil wharf try the east side for a bit with little success then realising the tide is running out we head to the west and Berley up with pilchard cubes.... We start to get a few small snapper then I hand her my new finese set up bushy legand sp rod with a small sinker and bait on it. She is sitting on the back of the boat when the rod goes off and she hooks up and lands her first decent fish a legal trevally, over the next few hours we get a fair bit of action landing 4 with her with the hat trick... Next up we beach the boat..... I leave two anchors out as its a run out tide still and enjoy a bit of beach and food.... Waiting for our crab trap to fill.... No luck today. We drift away from towra and I finally tie a soft plastic on my brand new rod flick it out and first cast I am on.... Can't believe it as I have only caught 1 fish on a plastic before.... It's another trav. We end up at the runway again and the sounder looks good but not much action ..... I have pretty much finished for the day but muster up the effort to flick out the sp this time with a diesel gulp paddle tail. A few casts later the rod goes off hard.... Surely not a king I think to my self.... Before we see the fish start to jump like a small Marlin..... A fight ensues with the fish alternating between sounding for the bottom and reaching for the sky.... We land it safely measure it up and it's a 60 plus cm Australian salmon my first and probably my largest fish..... What really tickled me was that I had kinda given up fishing and decided to push on for those last few casts and it was on plastics which I am really inexperienced in..... Good day out for sure took a while to take smile off my face

G'day Raiders, Had a cracking morning out on the water at Botany last Saturday. We woke early and hit the ramp at foreshore drive just on first light... The plan scout out some surface action then try for squid at watts reef before hitting the west of the oil wharf.... And maybe hit up the drums... So we looked around the runway first cast of the bumper bar hit a tailor way too small... With my mate pulling in a juvenile tailor too we decided to head for watts. Disaster strikes and the outboard an old 79 70 Hp will only do 7 knots rather than the usual 28..we stop have a flick at one of the Nav markers and start her up again after a pump of the fuel bulb and crisis averted as the bow rises and usual service is resumed from the evinrude Parking a little runabout over the reef is easier said than done, and what ever I did seemed to take us away from the reef, spotted Scotty Lyons out there in his green boat and and all our manoeuvring seemed to be getting in his way and doing us no good so we ended up a little east of the oil wharf I burleyed up with Pilchard cubes and with 4 rods in the water between us things started to get exciting... We got hit up with some trevally landing 5 keepers between the two of us, then pulling in my bait I got hit like a freight train and spent the next 10 minutes wrestling with a fish before finally netting a bonito which is a first for me. Really lucky To net it as I had foul hooked it in the side.... Still a keeper and an excellent fight. We moved to the west of the oil wharf and anchored a lot closer to it than 100m right in line with 2 other boats... On seeing the road bend, I've gone to reel it in and had another ridiculous fight on my kingfish rod and reel, which seemed about to give out on me, it felt like ages until we saw colour and then realise it's a ray..... It certainly took some line off me had it up from 40 foot and back a couple,of times... It broke off at the last which saved us the effort of cutting the line.... But it was a beast for sure..... To top it all off next fish is a Pb Flattie 60 plus cm which was a good little battle to end the day So there you go raiders not a bad day out

Thanks guys, took out the burley bucket, drained the internal bulkheads which held water that was seeping into boat and replaced drain plugs, now watertight thankfully