Landbased Yarra Bay ripper

[ParaPaul]

Hi all, first post and just thought I'd share my bonus evening with you all.

It was the first clear evening after the storms and decided to try and break my recent drought of decent fish having only caught the odd flattie and squid when targeting them. I went to the Yarra Bay groyne out in front of the sailing club at about 4.30pm. It was the slack tide, and about to start coming in. There was barely a wave in sight - as flat as a millpond, which was a welcome sight after the recent crappy weather. Rigged up and had my first cast at about 4.45 just as the sun was setting behind the clouds.

The setup I used was a Shakespeare Outcast combo I got for a good price at Ananconda. 10' rod and 8500 reel. I took off the generic line they had on it and spooled the reel with 300M of 40Lb JW braid and whacked on a rod's length of 30Lb mono. The rig was a metre of so of the same mono, size 4 swivel down to a gang of 3 x 4/0 hooks with a drop loop and size 1 snapper sinker about a third of the way down from the swivel. Bait was a whole servo pillie and cast out towards the container wharf approx 30-40 metres.

Nothing but the odd picker for the first hour or more until BAM! Line started screaming off the reel. I set the hook and let him have a bit of a play. Back and forth, back and forth until I netted a beautiful shiny 45cm tailor at my feet, Iki spiked him, bled him out and straight onto ice.

Cast straight back out again and rolled myself a smoke, waited about another hour and was about to go home. I actually packed up my bag and reeled in what I thought was an empty hook but saw the pillie was still ok, just the head flopped off the top hook. I readjusted and thought 'Righto, this is the last cast' when I got another hit! Same again, line screaming off the reel, more play, more drag, I thought it was another Tailor as it fought much the same as the first one, when out of the light of my headlamp I saw it was a Snapper. Beauty! Netted him up, unpacked my tools, cleaned him up and straight onto the ice with the Tailor. 44cm, fat and heavy, I don't know how heavy. 

Stumps on day one, I decided to drive home via the bottlo and attempt to placate a fuming missus with two lovely fish. (It worked). The Snapper will be baked whole with eschallots and Asian flavours, the Tailor will be filleted and floured for me young bloke cos he doesn't like to eat fish off the bone (time for some education on that methinks.)

Anyway, after a month of bugger all, seems the hungry winter fish are on. Hope this helps.

Edited June 18, 2019 by ParaPaul

[dirvin21]

Welcome to fishraider, nice report for your first post

[kingie chaser]

Great effort there 

 

Although I do have to mention imo your set up sounds a but on the heavy side for fishing in botany bay.

That is unless you are targeting legal size plus kings.

My usual set ups for boat are 8 to 10lb braid with 10 to 12lb fluro & I have a 20lb braid/30 or 40lb rod ready for kings.

For shore casting mono is preferred but if Im using braid it will be 15-20lb with about the same leader in fluro again.

Personally I think you will get more hook ups on lighter gear without compromising the success rate to much.

 

Just saying but each to their own & what you are doing seems to be working!

[wazatherfisherman]

Welcome and well done, got to be happy with that!

[masterfisho7]

Nice report Paul and well  come to Fish Raider  looking forward to more reports top stuff 

[GoingFishing]

Welcome to Fishraider Paul

That's a cracking snapper for inside botany bay. Great effort.

I agree with Kingie Chaser and would advise you to reduce the size of your line when you have a chance. Another thing you can do to increase your catch rate is burley. Take an onion bag and about 10m of rope, throw it out into the wash and inside put some goodies such as old fish frames, a couple of cat food cans with 2cmx2cm punctures, expired bread and whatever. The burley will bring the fish to your location. When your done drag the onion bag back with the rope and dispose of whatever is leftover!

[ParaPaul]

17 hours ago, kingie chaser said:

Great effort there 

 

Although I do have to mention imo your set up sounds a but on the heavy side for fishing in botany bay.

That is unless you are targeting legal size plus kings.

My usual set ups for boat are 8 to 10lb braid with 10 to 12lb fluro & I have a 20lb braid/30 or 40lb rod ready for kings.

For shore casting mono is preferred but if Im using braid it will be 15-20lb with about the same leader in fluro again.

Personally I think you will get more hook ups on lighter gear without compromising the success rate to much.

 

Just saying but each to their own & what you are doing seems to be working!

Thanks for the advice kingie chaser.

The setup I used was out of pure laziness and opportunism. I had been in jervis Bay for the long weekend and had been using this outfit off the beaches in Vincentia (with no luck I might add until I took my lighter outfit to the estuary and jigged a couple of flatties on SPs.)

I had a couple of ganged rigs already setup from my beach sessions and on impulse decided to have a crack off the rocks with the whole shebang after the weather broke. Glad I did. I'm still not sure on whether it was just pure dumb luck in combination with a good tide and full moon.

Incidentally, my new Alvey Estuary Special 55 rod (3.2M / 10' 6") just arrived by courier this morning so I'm looking forward to setting it up with my Alvey 500 reel and trying the same spot on a lighter setup and rig. Thinking 8-10lb mono with a 6-8lb fluoro leader onto the same (but lighter) paternoster type rig. Whaddya reckon?

Not sure on whether she'll be able to handle the ganged hooks, or even the same sized fish as they were bloody good fighters on the heavy setup I used last night. Any advice on hook/ sinker size for targeting good tailor on this outfit?

Edited June 19, 2019 by ParaPaul

[ParaPaul]

2 hours ago, GoingFishing said:

Welcome to Fishraider Paul

That's a cracking snapper for inside botany bay. Great effort.

I agree with Kingie Chaser and would advise you to reduce the size of your line when you have a chance. Another thing you can do to increase your catch rate is burley. Take an onion bag and about 10m of rope, throw it out into the wash and inside put some goodies such as old fish frames, a couple of cat food cans with 2cmx2cm punctures, expired bread and whatever. The burley will bring the fish to your location. When your done drag the onion bag back with the rope and dispose of whatever is leftover!

Great advice, thanks GoingFishing.

I know where those fish frames are going now. Usually I make a nice fish stock and use it in my seafood risottos. Reckon the stock will be better served attracting some choppers.

[noelm]

2 hours ago, ParaPaul said:

Thanks for the advice kingie chaser.

The setup I used was out of pure laziness and opportunism. I had been in jervis Bay for the long weekend and had been using this outfit off the beaches in Vincentia (with no luck I might add until I took my light outfit to the estuary and jigged a couple of flatties on SPs.)

I had a couple of ganged rigs already setup from my beach sessions and on impulse decided to have a crack off the rocks with the whole shebang after the weather broke. Glad I did. I'm still not sure on whether it was just pure dumb luck in combination with a good tide and full moon.

Incidentally, my new Alvey Estuary Special 55 rod just arrived by courier this morning so I'm looking forward to setting it up with my Alvey 500 reel and trying the same spot on a lighter setup and rig. Thinking 8-10lb mono with a 6-8lb fluoro leader onto the same (but lighter) paternoster type rig. Whaddya reckon?

Not sure on whether she'll be able to handle the ganged hooks, or even the same sized fish as they were bloody good fighters on the heavy setup I used last night. Any advice on hook/ sinker size for targeting good tailor on this outfit?

That setup will handle those fish all day long.

[Rah]

Great first report mate!! Keep em coming! Welcome to Fishraider! 

 

Cheers

Rah

[Rebel]

Great report, keep them coming.

[Yowie]

I would try 12 pound mono if you are looking at what you have already caught. Buy a quality brand - some are made thinner than others for the same breaking strain.

12 pound will enable you to chuck out pillies without a sinker, and be strong enough handle most fish. A kingie or bigger jew will give you a workout.

Lighter line if you are targeting bream, whiting, flatties.

[Gabm]

Great report. Cracking snapper for inside the bay!

[ParaPaul]

1 hour ago, Yowie said:

I would try 12 pound mono if you are looking at what you have already caught. Buy a quality brand - some are made thinner than others for the same breaking strain.

12 pound will enable you to chuck out pillies without a sinker, and be strong enough handle most fish. A kingie or bigger jew will give you a workout.

Lighter line if you are targeting bream, whiting, flatties.

I'm thinking primarily a setup that will allow me to switch between targeting  luderick one day, to bream/ drummer/ whiting/ flatties the next without having to re-spool every time.

I might just have to get an Alvey 60 reel to spool a bit heavier and use it with that same rod if chasing tailor and the like. 

[Yowie]

On ‎6‎/‎19‎/‎2019 at 6:52 PM, ParaPaul said:

I'm thinking primarily a setup that will allow me to switch between targeting  luderick one day, to bream/ drummer/ whiting/ flatties the next without having to re-spool every time.

I might just have to get an Alvey 60 reel to spool a bit heavier and use it with that same rod if chasing tailor and the like. 

Assume you mean an Alvey 600, which I have. Had it spooled with 12 pound mono, but when I started lifting out salmon around the 4 to 5 pound mark from the rocks, and the biggest broke the line, I moved up to 15 pound mono.

Only use mine from the rocks or beach, still can cast an unweighted pillie a fair distance. I use mono that is of a thinner diameter for it's size than average. Sufix brand from Finland is very good though hard to find. There are now comparable brands in the big tackle stores.

You could try the larger Alvey, like the 600, for heavier work, and also change to the smaller 500 for lighter work. You will need a fair bit of line on the spool, you can buy line on 600 metre spools, which is more than the reel will hold, but maybe better than 300 metres.

A mate borrowed my Alvey many years ago, 600 model, with 500 metres of 12 pound mono. Hooked up a live yakka under a bobby cork south of Jibbon at Curracurrang. One big hit and at the end of 500 metres, the fish was still going towards N.Z., not stopping at all. Busted off luckily at the hook.

[wazatherfisherman]

3 hours ago, Yowie said:

Assume you mean an Alvey 600, which I have. Had it spooled with 12 pound mono, but when I started lifting out salmon around the 4 to 5 pound mark from the rocks, and the biggest broke the line, I moved up to 15 pound mono.

Only use mine from the rocks or beach, still can cast an unweighted pillie a fair distance. I use mono that is of a thinner diameter for it's size than average. Sufix brand from Finland is very good though hard to find. There are now comparable brands in the big tackle stores.

You could try the larger Alvey, like the 600, for heavier work, and also change to the smaller 500 for lighter work. You will need a fair bit of line on the spool, you can buy line on 600 metre spools, which is more than the reel will hold, but maybe better than 300 metres.

A mate borrowed my Alvey many years ago, 600 model, with 500 metres of 12 pound mono. Hooked up a live yakka under a bobby cork south of Jibbon at Curracurrang. One big hit and at the end of 500 metres, the fish was still going towards N.Z., not stopping at all. Busted off luckily at the hook.

Hi Yowie "The Gulf" at South Curracurrang often has giant"evil-size" Kings, unlandable (from there!) but exciting to see and hook (always live in 'hope'!)