Pickles

Brilliant Scratchie, you’re a legend

Hi Anthman, sorry to take a while to reply. I get most of my kings on fresh (live or recently killed) squid or cuttlefish. At the moment they have been taking smaller jigs (1.8 -2.5) Mostly they have been plentiful, but windy days are harder than others.

Caught up for a fish with John (hadn’t been out with him for 2 years) who had a Flexi day on Friday and “Hutch”, a school mate. ”Raiders” are a great bunch of blokes and had feedback from several FR buddies on the water. We shared intel and got a heap of ”slimies” In between he heads, we kept a dozen of the bigger ones for a feed (if the throats are cut and they on ice immediately they are great - smoked or BBQ are my favourite). The perfect conditions meant a run outside and we were headed for the fads to chase dollies, but the sounder interacted our plans and we ended up with a bag of Pannie reds and suffered a “rat attack” of little kings, which monstered anything of any size that hit the water. a good day out with mates - perfect weather, flat conditions and heaps of fish “”Thank you God””- life doesn’t get much better.

Haven’t been to Broken Bay for a while, but heard the bream were going nuts, turned out I couldn’t find the hungry hoards, so targeted my favourite Kingfish and boated 7 rats all in the 60-70 cm range just of West Head. Lots of boats collecting bait (Yakkas) and everyone seemed to be getting busted off by rogue rats hitting jigs I tended for the Yakkas. Plenty of bait around and swell and wind good until 11 am. Tried outside at several of the offshore reefs, but boated all the little kings inside at Pittwater. Got a good feed of flatties, but all little (40-50cm) Squid we’re not hard, but only little green eyes. - No pics as we’ve all seen little Kingies. The boys hard a good time on light gear and lost as many as boated.

Great report anthman

Haven’t been to Broken Bay for a while, but heard the bream were going nuts, turned out I couldn’t find the hungry hoards, so targeted my favourite Kingfish and boated 7 rats all in the 60-70 cm range. Plenty of bait around and swell and wind good until 11 am. Tried outside at several of the offshore reefs, but boated all the kings inside at Pittwater.

Great report James, be careful under the bridge, it’s being targeted by water police, even if youre moving, you’ll likely be moved on.

Great report Salty Creek. Poddies & flatties - best bait ever

Great report Scratchie. Sooo jealous as I was planning on heading up last night for an early morning sesh off Broughton to try some of the spots you suggested, but couldn’t get anyone to join me ( driving a bit of an issue). hope too get up in February and trust the snapper will still be around.

Great stuff Jon, really good your back into it and all is looking up. cheers Pickles

Great report Jeremy, Thanks for the feedback. It’s great to spend time with your dad and “teach the old dog new tricks”. Yet to try soft plastics on snapper, but keen to give it a go. Hoping to get to the Port very soon

Sloppy swell and strong winds have made the harbour uncomfortable for the past week. Added to this has been a heap of traffic and very full car parks at all the ramps. Never the less, Friday provided a window to get out for a quick fish with my nephew and his son for a few hours, I wasn’t too confident of getting kings, but there have been heaps of salmon and mackerel schools from the Bridge to middle harbour, so I thought we’d have some fun casting on light gear. They’ve been feeding on small white bait so “matching the hatch” with 10gm metals and 3” (white) plastics has been their downfall and great fun on 6-8lb gear. The salmon were all in the 2-3kg range and gave the young bloke a real working over as he was not used to “playing” a fish. After bagging some salmon we turned our focus to Kingies. Ben got smoked by two big ones until we bagged several, biggest going 90 cm. It was a great introduction to catching Kingies.

33 cm whiting - a very nice fish.ive never had much luck in Crooked river, but when it’s open the prawning is great

Was very sceptical about how the harbour would fish day after the Sydney to Hobart harbour circus, but decided to go anyway. it was a bit sloppy and windy, but I was chasing 12 more kings to get my 500 target for 2019 - I’m glad I did. “Steve” and I boated 13 between us, (all rats, but were fishing light gear - 15lb after the first few were boated). All on live squid, which were pretty easy to get. Yakkas, were another story, tried all the usual spots and only got a few in the livie tank. We got a triple hookup and boated All three - and released of course. None to take home as biggest was 63, but a good quick session and Kingies are tough fish, recover well and swim away hard - a joy to see.

Champion effort JonD - nothing better than getting newbies blooded on Kingies, it’s great to be net man when kings are coming thick and fast