Fishing Report September, Target Red Bass and BFT

To change things up a little bit it was decided that we would head to the South in search of some Red Bass and Blue Finned Trevally. Previous months had been spent targeting Emperors with some success but a tougher challenge call us, so off we went at a gentlemanly hour.

Ryan starts off the day with a nice 'cuda

The fishing started off fairly slowly with Ryan getting a good barracuda as the first catch. We worked poppers hard for the first hour or so with little to show for it.

Small tigerfish probably looking for a mate rather than lunch

A few small fish were taken (tigerfish, Red Bass and Pink Snapper) on a gold Yo Zuri and the above pictured Secret Sauce "Long Cone" popper.
As the tide dropped we started to see some action with the Red Bass and Emperors starting to bite!

A good sized Emperor on the Secret Sauce Long Cone

Good Sized Red Bass

All of a sudden the fish were in a feeding frenzy with young Ben taking 3 Red bass and myself taking 2 Red Bass and a large Emperor all in the space of about 20 minutes. The action was HOT and the size and quality of the fish were excellent with Emperors over 50cm and Red Bass 60cm and over being wrestled to the boat. Our gear was taking a beating with Ben's split rings failing and the lures looking like they has been in a meat grinder!

Even the tiny Mackerel were in on the action

We took a good variety of quality fish on topwater including Green Job Fish, Blue Finned Trevally. Red Bass, Pink Snapper, 2 species of Emperor and a few other odds and ends. Ben managed on of the catches of the day with 2 pink snapper on the one lure!

Quality Blue Finned Trevally

We finished up the day with Ben taking an excellent Green Job Fish on a soft plastic and Ryan getting a 62cm Long Nosed Emperor in more than 100 feet of water!

Green Job Fish

Solid Sweetlip falling for the Secret Sauce

Unconventional approach but great result, thats one BIG sweetip

A truly awesome days fishing with arm cramps and a full cooler telling us it was time to go home with hours of daylight to spare. We might have to go to this spot again!

Fishing Report September, In search of sweetlip!

With a great weather forecast it was decided that Sunday would be a good day to get after some sweetlip (Emperor) at our local sand bank. My confidence level was low considering it was the day before the full moon and the tides were far from ideal BUT the weather was nice for a change so we headed out with great anticipation.
The real interest for me in the day was to try out some lures that I have been making, in the field. I had a selection of 6 poppers that had been water tested but not put in front of a fish before. I was reasonably nervous about it but also very interested to see if the lures were as good as I had hoped. All of the lures swam and popped very nicely and with some tweaking of the colour schemes will be deadly I am sure. As it was they caught fish on the first try on a day when many of the commercial lures were not working at all.

First timer Ryan with a top fish, just what we were after for dinner

As you can see from the picture, the day was beautiful and generally the conditions were good. The fishing was not at its best but we returned home with a good box of sweetlip and other assorted reef species.
On the lure front, the lure that worked for me was a bit of a surprise. The best performed lure was a natural wood coloured lure with a tiny bit of silver on each side. My idea with the lure was to present something that the fish wouldnt have seen, while showing the beauty of the wood.
On several occasions a large school of fish were seen competing over the lure, with the lure being hit by several different fish before finally getting a hook up - exciting stuff. The colours in the commercial lures that worked best that day were gold/brown/red varieties with the blue/green lures catching only one fish all day (Ryan's sweetlip pictured above).

My best lure for the day, who would have thought that this colour would be the best? Pictured here with a good sized (45cm) sweetip.

So a great day and some good fish and a even better BBQ with sashimi and grilled sweetlip the stars.