howies

Planned ahead this time as I wanted to get out early on Wednesday, so Tuesday afternoon I headed out to west head and loaded up on yakkas, tried for some squid but no luck. To keep them alive I hang a clothes basket of the swim platform overnight It keeps them fresh for the morning. 4.30 I was up and out heading round barenjoey headland at 5.45, arrIved at long reef around 6.30 as the sun came up there was already 6 or so kayaks trolling around the wall with a few hits as I anchored up. I burleyed up and dropped a snapper rig down with some pillys and Lunds squid and instantly got smashed and lost my rig. I set up the heavy leader and sent down a yakka and after about 5min that was smashed but no hook up, the next one landed me a 75cm king, at this point I sent down the squid on another rod, every time I was smashed instantly and Reefed which I would think were large hoodlums with the fight they put up. I caught a couple of rats too, Now out of squid I went back to yakkas which I landed a few more in the 60-70cm mark, the biggest king at 77 was hooked on a micro jig which I foolishly used on my egi rod which resulted in the rod snapping in half and me fighting the fish with the butt end with one eyelet left and the the other end down near the Kingy, I had 4 legal on ice now in just over an hour . By this time around 20 boats had arrived mostly charters who were downrigging and drifting the wall. In the burley slick I had created you could see the kings swimming underneath it so I floated out some pillys unweighted and they were getting taken too but by now only rats were around. packed up and headed back by 11.30 intotal I landed 12 kept 4 67-77cm and was reefed 3 times. after years of chasing kings and only catching one legal so far, this was one morning I will never forget.

Good work, reading reports like this makes me keen to give the yak a go, what a catch I'm still after my first Cobia

a little sports cruiser not the ideal fishing boat but needed to keep the trouble and strife involved. not too sure who Papafish is hiding behind that bream!

so many jelly! it was the most I have ever seen, I need to get out soon too much rain of late.

Haha nice pickup, But was referencing my lack of target species Aka "The Elusive Kingy" which I have spent hundreds of Hours and $ chasing this summer for far too many doughnuts.

Yeah all the crabs have fattened up and are full of sweet meat, I had heaps of marks too for kings but even the squid was left and were being destroyed by pickers.

After dropping a couple of crab pots off with some frozen mullet I Spent the day trying to chase kingies in Pittwater, I went to poke my head out through west head this morning but backed off Half way down palmy as the swell was getting big already and I am sure it would have been hell out there, Popped over to the basin for a dozen yakkas, 3 squid and 2 slimies, I trolled these up and down from palmy to Scotland island, I had one Slimy bitten in half near clareville wreck, The only joy I had was a 62cm kingy caught on a butterflied yakka drifted unweighted at Scotland. Called it a day and checked on traps 9 in total one full of eggs that lived to beed. Singapore chilli crab for dinner.

Cheers Blood Knot, John Dory and Mike89. It was a great end to the day and I am the Chef

About time I gave my own review. After many years chasing kingies land based (without any luck) I purchased a boat last year to get amongst it. It's been a steep learning curve but reading this and other fishing forums has given me an idea on how one would go about catching this elusive beast. After an early start yesterday the water was perfect without a breeze, I tried to catch some squid without any luck around taylors, Macmasters and palmie. I then headed to west head for yakkas and picked up a mixed size bag in less then 1/2 hour. I trolled the larger yakkas on the downriggers all over Pittwater along the drop offs and wrecks, I was hit twice but both times left the head and hook. The rain settled in and after 8 hrs I was ready to pack it in. I decided to grab a mooring near Scotland island on the west side and clean down the boat which was in need of a sort out after several days on the water. I left the downriggers down as I was cleaning up started burleying up with the remainder of the pillies and frozen squid, I decided to throw a baby yakka on my squid jig set up a small craft squid rod and stradic 2500. I continued to clean when the Stradic started screaming and I knew straight away what it was, I tightened the drag up as it swam away at an alarming pace from me to try and turn it around, I achieved that but now it was heading straight along side off the boat and pulling off more line and heading deeper at this point, I kept working it up slowly with another 3 big runs but then came straight at the boat and heading for the downriggers so I now had the rod tip in the water trying to direct it away from the steel cables and boat while I wound the downrigger up with one hand and battled the kingy with the other, At this point the adrenalin is pumping and I honestly didnt think that my gear would hold out. I raised the kingy to the surface twice more but as soon as I get it near the net it's off again, finally she gives in and comes up on her side so I could finally net her. Last night I had it sashimi and baked Thai style and was the best I have ever tasted so fresh! When cleaning it's belly was full of little yakkas.