Jervis Bay - Jackets & Navies

[seacow]

Fished Jervis Bay Thursday. What a cracking day except the fishing wasn't great.

Early rise saw us on the water about 6:30. Got 8 squid pretty quickly off Callala but no livies off the red bouy even though we burleyed hard. I couldn't hit a bull in the arse with a bucket of rice. My excuse was the colour of the jig.

Jetting off to Perpendicular we were stopped by a rather large boat who advised us that the navy was bombing and that there was a big exclusion zone right where we wanted to fish. In no uncertain terms were we to fish there. Rather inconsideration of them I thought!!! Is there a website when they inform you of the bombing or is that a national secret?

Anyway, trolled Longnose bombie instead with squid till they were devoured by the plague of jackets. Any place we went we seemed to find them. Any bait school we found turned out to be jackets. They all seemed to be about 15cm in length and voracious.

Drifted the backside of Bowen Island cause the 40 metre mark outside had you guessed it - leather jackets. Ended up with two nice flathead to 45cm.

Tough day apart from the wildlife sightings, whales dolphins and seals. Man that seal population has exploded since I was last there.

Would have liked to see the navy unload into some of those jacket swarms. They even bit some of our hooks in half.

Seven hours of fishing ended up with 8 squid, 2 flathead and a few leather jackets that were unceremoniously thrown back. Even the sea birds wouldn't take them.

Better than a poke in the eye but no sign of snapper or kings. Probably needed to go outside to find them.

[zmk1962]

Nice report.... thanks for sharing... certainly a better day than being in the office.  Those jackets can be pesky especially if they are small.... don't mind a feed of the bigger models but the small ones are just a nuisance.  

Cheers

Zoran

[sam bros]

Thats  unfortunate

Hopefully conditions improve