Pinkies still on the bite
But beware sharks chomping on catches
ALTHOUGH pinkie snapper to 50cm or so have been the main catch in the outer harbour, Aaron Habgood, of Red’s Fishing Adventures, caught one of 7.5kg in 9m of water off Clifton Springs last week.
While night-stalkers Andrew Phillips and George Uranus have put in the occasional unrewarded vigil recently, that was not the case on Wednesday.
After moving north of the channel junction off Curlewis — mainly because banjo sharks and other unwanted fish were taking their baits — they had their first snapper by 9pm.
It was all hands on deck after that, though, with five snapper from 3.5kto 5.8kg — one short of their bag limits — coming aboard. They stayed until midnight hopeful of catching a fish to make up their legal total, but that was their lot.
Mike Windsor, of Clifton Springs Boat Hire, reports pinkies have been plentiful in daylight hours, and among those to catch them were Jason Hockey and Stephen Budzienny, who found a school east of the mussel farm.
Whiting have been scarce, said Mike, but on Friday afternoon Andrew Johnson and Dennis O’Brien caught a dozen beautiful fish to 43cm, while David Jeynes picked up several while fishing from his kayak out from the harbour.
Also seeking the whiting on Wednesday were Rod Ludlow, of Beachlea Boat Hire, of Indented Head, and Jeff Richards, who picked up half a dozen to 40cm offshore from Indented Head.
Jeff also had another go at the whiting on Friday afternoon, this time with Chris Hateley, of the Keysborough Angling Club. They took eight to 44cm near Dead Man’s Stick, a kilometre or so inside the Prince George light pile.
With the bite slowing down, they moved out to the gutter inside the pile from where they picked up six pinkie snapper, all over the 50cm mark, and — with the inappropriate length restriction of 40cm on pinkies — were back at the ramp by 6.30pm.
Making an early morning start in 22m of water off Breamlea on Saturday, Rici Hedditch and Colin Crook were disappointed to lose what they thought was a good-size gummy shark. Later on though, they did catch a female gummy shark of about 10kg that they released; both took yakka (yellowtail scad) fillets.
John Clements. of Lake Purrumbete Holiday Park. reports that trophy-size brown trout are still on offer with Milan Radocaj, of Geelong, catching one of 4.42kg on a Tassie Devil, with yet another fish of 4kg being taken by a gent from Murtoa.
Rainbow trout to 1.5kg or so were also on offer, said John, taking both on bait and lures, along with some large redfin; the biggest to date being taken by Jackson Toff, from Pakenham, whose fish measured 50cm, weighed 1.9kg and was taken on a scrubworm.
Trevor Holmes, of Victorian Inland Charters, along with former Test cricketer Merv Hughes and Jason Kennedy, filmed forthcoming segments of Channel 1 HD’s Fishing with Merv Hughes at Lake Wartook, Rocklands Reservoir and Lake Toolondo, where good-size redfin took centre stage.
Trevor also spent a couple of days at Lake Eildon with Michael Evans and Matthew Grinham, whose persistence in deteriorating weather was rewarded with several redfin, a golden perch and three Murray cod to 70cm; the biggest of which took a spinnerbait that Michael had cast to a snag. Ben asks: Geoff, while fishing for snapper off Point Wilson last week, I hooked what seemed to be a good-size fish, but was bitten off by what could have only been a shark. The same thing happened to a friend who was fishing nearby. Are there usually sharks about at this time of year?
Ben, from late November through to late January, large female sharks, predominantly bronze whalers, and sometimes other species, are present in Port Phillip, Corio Bay and Western Port, to bear their young. Having experienced such an encounter it is best to move.