A few Port Hacking reports.

[Oscarthebeagle]

Hi, I've been a bit lazy with reports so thought I would put a few trips from the last 2 months into the one report.

Trip 1

Launched from Grays Point on a Saturday arvo with my two boys (6 and 8), dirty water and the summer crowds gone kept the river relatively quiet. Pumped some nippers and started fishing around the ballast heap area. Visibility pretty good at about 1m, first off fishing in the shallows produced a few little bream and whiting. Tried in slightly deeper water which produced a nice mid 30's trevally for the 6 year old, gave him a good fight on his 2kg outfit and went into the esky. Next solid bite was on my rod but I let the 8 year old have it so as to try and even the score with his brother. He did well on my 1kg outfit to land a low 50's flathead which joined the trevally in the esky. 

The current made this spot difficult so we moved back up to the deep water off Lilli Pilli, anchored up and set a burley trail, what followed was a couple of hours of the best easy fishing I have seen in the river. Simple technique 2kg outfits, 12lb fluro trace, no sinker, drop the bait (live nippers) at the back of the boat,  bail arm open and let it sink, when the line sped up close bail arm strike and your on. Every drop produce a hit within 10-20 seconds a mixture of trevally, tailor, 29.5cm Red bream and rat kings. double hook ups were common and triple hook ups if I managed to get my line in the water. All fish were caught on 1 or 2kg line, anytime we tried heavy outfits the bait was just ignored till it got to the bottom and little red bream picked it apart. A live yellowtail was left to swim around untouched.

Notable captures were a Rat king (56cm) to the 6 year old on 2kg line, his first king. I got a couple of Rat kings on 1 kg line, which gave me a good run around on light line and had me around the boat a few times and fighting off the bow a lot of the fight.

Pulled the boat out just on dark and ended up keeping 1x flathead, 1x Red bream and half a dozen trevally releasing heaps more.

 

Trip 2 

Fished similar areas to the previous trip but without much luck, not the exact spot as someone else beat us to it. A few small fish and the 8 year old got a solid salmon casting metal slices at surface fish that were feeding along the edge of the dirty water.

Trip 3

A morning trip this time in the Port Hacking with both boys. Water visibility was terrible, couldn't see my feet once the water was over my ankles while launching the boat, didn't seem to bother the fish.

Fished the deeper water off Lilli Pilli, same technique as previous trip anchored up, fishing un weighted baits down a burley trail on light line. First cast and a solid 43cm Tailor to the 8 year old, could not see what the fish was until it was on the surface, made netting fish very difficult. Pretty much every drop produced a hook up, a mixture of Trevally, bream, Watsons leaping bonito, tailor, 29.5cm red bream and yellowtail. Once again heavy rods and bigger baits were ignored with most of the fish caught on 2kg outfits.

Something for @Yowie now. With yellowtail at the back of the boat the 8 year dropped his handline in to fish for them, after a few minutes it went whizzing off stinging his fingers as it went. He had a bit of trouble with the fight, handlining is not easy, but slowly he got the hang of it and started winning the fight. A few tense moments around the boat before a salmon slides into the net, not a big salmon but a fun capture on handline. 

The boys grandpa @hookerbruce and cousins arrived during the fight and after trying to run over the salmon managed to anchor up nearby and the two boats fish close by.

8 year old drops the handline back in and once again it whizzes off. More stinging fingers and tangles in the boat but he manages to get another fish to the net on his handline, this time a rat king (his first). With the handline put away for now he moves to his next challenge,

"What new species can I catch here?"

I have a think "maybe, Flying Gunard"

"How do I catch It?

So I set up a bottom rig for him, he drops it down, first drop he hooks up and pulls in a little Flying Gunard. Release that fish and he drops down again and pulls up a slightly bigger Flying Gunard, a few photos of a happy boy with his new species before it is released. He puts that rod away after that as he has achieved that goal.

After a couple of hours of catching constant fish the boys decide it is getting boring and we move on but don't catch anything else of note before we take the boat out.

Trip 4 

An ocean trip this time fishing with dad @hookerbruce in my boat.

Start off targeting squid around Jibbon Bombie, no squid but there is a bit surface action so we change over to lures and trolling. Catch a few rat kings and bonito before we head out a bit deeper to drift for flathead. Wind and current make drifting difficult but we manage 8 keeping flathead before we get sick of chasing the bottom and head back in near the bombie and anchor up and fish down a burley trail after an hour or so of catching sweep, trevally and rat kings it's time to head back to the ramp and swap dad for my wife and 3 year old daughter.

We head back out off Lilli Pilli but find it very quiet, move to near Dear park and find some small sweep and red bream to keep my little girl happy. Notice a squid following up one of her red bream, so put out a squid jig which is taken almost straight away by a nice green eye. Give that rod to my wife to cast and she gets a couple more squid while i fish with my daughter. After that it's time for a play on the sand at Lilli Pilli, we stay far to long but it's a nice sunny day for a change, before quickly getting home just in time to pick up the other kids from school.

Sorry for the long report and thanks for reading this far. The Port Hacking has been the dirtiest I have ever seen and stayed dirty for longer than I can ever remember with plenty of stuff floating in it, but the fish have still been there and the crowds have been down.

Ash.

Edited May 14, 2022 by Oscarthebeagle
add photo

[Oscarthebeagle]

A photo from a separate trip in February this year, between rain events, to remind us what the Port Hacking is meant to look like.

Edited May 14, 2022 by Oscarthebeagle

[Restyle]

Awesome couple months of fishing with the kids, plenty of action with the dirty water about. Kids would’ve had a blast on the trevs, salmon and kings. Good write up and top pics

[Isaac Ct]

Great write up mate, very nice quality of fish amongst those. Great to see you getting your kids onto some nice fish.

Well done.

[frankS]

That's what it is all about, spending quality time with the family.

Great report and good reading with awesome photos. Thanks so much for sharing.

Frank

[Yowie]

Good work there Ash, keeping the kids entertained with plenty of fish species.

Handlining for yakkas then hooking up kingies and salmon, do add a fair bit of excitement for just about anyone.

Agree with you that this is the longest period I can remember where the water colour has stayed a bit murky.

[Scooter0069]

Great report and great memories for the kids

[jenno64]

Great post and awesome trips for the kids! Some very nice fish caught there and those kids will be terrorising the Port Hacking fish stocks for years to come!

[DaveBM]

Excellent work. Fishing and storytelling both five stars

[Larkin]

Kids look like they’re having a ball. Some good fish caught.