The start of the springtime northeast weather is here,

Small Fry member Riley Holley fishing with his dad, Lucas, Sunday morning on our local reefs caught these two thumping snapper among other fish.

The start of the springtime northeast weather is here, and with that the warmer sea currents and whales pushing down. Over the weekend there were plenty of whales in close jumping around. We had an experience on Sunday with a baby humpback whale about 3 meters long swimming around our boat for half an hour. Mum appeared after that about 300 meters away by leaping out of the water and baby went back to her. Magical.

Fishing outside on Sunday morning was superb. Very little current, not much wind and the sand flathead were biting their heads off up at Tura Heads. It took us only one hour to catch our bag of sandies. The fish averaged 40cm and odd fish to 50cm. We also caught flying gurnard and a gummy shark. The depth that was good to us was around that 40 meters and just on the northern side of the headlands. There were a few small flathead in the mix, baits we used were salmon and mackerel fillets.

The local reefs also fished very well early on Sunday. As you can see by the photo, young Riley Holley caught two magnificent snapper 61.5cm and 60cm. He caught a third at 59cm and then found a Gummy shark at over 1.2 meters long. Fresh burley was the key to their success. We also found snapper luring, best went 51cm and also caught morwong, leatherjackets and a gummy shark. Best baits were fresh salmon strips and squid.

The local beaches at Bournda down to Tura Beach have good numbers of salmon to 50cm on them. My reports are from fishos using lures and walking the beaches, from gutter to gutter. Their casting metal slugs in sizes up to 40grams, and the fish are averaging from 40 to 50cm long. 

The estuary fishing is still a bit patchy in some of our systems. The Pambula river still has plenty of salmon although they can be hard to catch at times due to the amount of boats targeting them. I am told that trolling with lures up to 100mm long, like double clutches is catching them when they are in that mood.

 Merimbula Lake is still quiet with only odd small dusky flathead being caught in the top lake. I did not see too many fish in the front lake channel when we came in on Sunday, but once at the boat ramp noticed quite a few blackfish milling around and rolling in the sun on the ramp. The ribbon weed bloom is starting to happen in the lake and with the water temperature around 15 degrees, this will spur the blackfish on to start feeding and hopefully other species will follow. 

The Bega River at Tathra is fishing the best lately, anglers are catching a few small dusky flathead and still the odd jew fish along the rock walls. There are also a few estuary perch being caught off the walls, but perch fishing is still closed till September 1st.

The Merimbula Big Game and Lakes Club rooms are open every Friday night, opening at 6pm. Come on down and chat with the locals, catch up on some current fishing reports and buy some tickets in the club’s Friday night meat tray raffle sponsored by Goodall’s Butchers. All welcome, hope to see you there.

Fishy Fellow