How now, brown trout
most of his bigger fish early on, but from 10am the fishing slowed down with only the occasional smaller fish coming aboard.
With strong winds and rough seas stirring up the bottom over the last few days, Jason Treloar tried his luck from inside the breakwater sheltering Portarlington’s har- bour on Monday morning.
Not in vain, as it turned out, for at around 8.30am his rod wrapped over, the reel growling to the tune of what turned out to be a snapper of about 5kg, which — fortunately for him — attracted the attention of a nearby angler who was able to net it for him.
Mike Windsor of Clifton Springs Boat Hire reports that legal-size pinkie snapper, along with flathead and squid, were the main catch last week, with Gerard Miles and Danny Walker catching all three species over the Curlewis Bank.
They also tried for whiting, but those they caught were small, with the ever-present but undersized pinkie snapper taking their baits.
Whiting, though, were on offer for Andrew Johnson and Dennis O’Brien, who eventually found a good patch off Curlewis on Friday afternoon in about 4.5 metres of water.
Initially there wasn’t much doing but after making several moves, they picked up 30 fish to 41cm following the midafternoon tide change, using pipis and squid for bait..
Rod Ludlow of Beachlea Boat Hire at Indented Head reports that, prior to the heavy weather over the weekend, he had quite a few boats out, all without exception returning with squid, which have been plentiful over the past few weeks, most being caught between the Governor Reefs and Grassy Point.
Geoff, I read with interest your somewhat dismissive answer to a question on jellyfish in Corio Bay, 20/02/18, and have decided to respond: Jellyfish are becoming a plague worldwide by clogging fishing nets, power plants, and decimating aquaculture projects.
I refer you to the publication Spineless by marine biologist Juli Berwald, which explains how overfishing, coastal devel- opment and climate change have contributed to a jellyfish explosion worldwide.
Deborah, I did a doubletake on Spineless because I have a formal treatise on marine invertebrates with the title Spineless, written by marine biologist and photographer Susan Middleton.
Unlike Juli Berwald’s Spineless, it is unencumbered with ideological baggage. It was published in October 2014; Juli Berwald’s book was published three years later in November 2017.
While some postulate that jellyfish plagues, like climate change, have occurred because of human activity, documentation from Captain Cook’s arrival noted “swarms” of jellyfish being present in Port Jackson; so we humans may not be totally responsible after all. https://theconversation. com/ humans- causeocean- wrecking- jellyfishplague-or-maybe-not-5141