MOORE RIVER

Herring, Mullet, Whiting

Baby Black Bream

 Moore River

Packed up the car with fishing gear, mozzy repellent and headed out to Moore River for a few days of quality fishing. Moore river is a wicked little spot to go to if you want to get away for a few days. The river is packed with many things to do you can hire a canoe, kayak, picnic or go on a river cruise down the river. There are many walk trails to choose from surrounding the river where you can simply enjoy the natural environment and all it's hidden wonders. The views are truly captivating at Moore river and will definitely lure you in. It's a quiet, peaceful little place to go to where you can fish for black bream, Mulloway or head out for some beach fishing and the best part about this location is that it's only an hours drive from the city. I got there nice and early and set up my camping chair in a nice secluded spot along the river for a bit of fishing caught lots of baby black bream the first day but not any big 25cm plus ones that I was hoping for lol... so it was a catch and release day, the bait I used to catch the black bream was prawns and I must say the baby breams loved the bait :). The peak period for catching black bream is usually in summer time and I would recommend sticking to light spin rods and reels if you do decide to head out for a fish there. The following day I went to the mouth of the river where it joins the ocean and did some beach fishing and boy the herring and whiting were running wild at the crack of dawn. I managed to land a couple of beauties. This little fishing spot is definitely on the favourites list :)

Mouth of the river joins the ocean

   

WOODMAN POINT

Woodman Point

Juvenile Snapper (Pinky)



 

Mini blowfish, Pinky

 
 
 

                                                                                     

 

 

 At the beach life is different.

Time doesn't move hour to hour, but mood to moment.

We live by the currents, plan by the tides and follow the  

   sun.   

Unknown

 

 

 

Woodman point is a popular fishing spot for catching a wide range of bread and butter fish. Personally I like the more remote places but it had been a while since I had fished there, so I thought I'd get out there and check out the fishing scene. Fish mainly caught there are usually herring, Gardies, snapper, tailor and plenty of blowies....lol

Winds were pretty strong when I got out there at 3.30pm for a fish and I must say, I got off to a rough start. Lots of little nibbles and the pesty blow fish kept eating my bait. Wasn't till 4.30 that I felt a decent bite on the line. First catch came in as a trumpeter. Which I filleted on the spot and cut up into square pieces. The fresher the bait, the better the catch and being determined like I am hail, rain or shine, I simply had to catch something. They say persistence pays off and it did, although my fish was, well.... undersized and not the big, gigantic, hudge snapper I was preying for. I still managed to land a juvenille snapper and get a happy snap of this beautiful creature. Put pinky back in the water after it's modeling shoot so it can grow to become a decent plate sized fish...:) 

When Northwest winds blowing, woodman point can be an amazing spot as the fish will come in for protection as there are plenty of rocky, hidy holes for them to choose from. I always aim to get out 2 hours before a tide change as thats when the fish will feed. The hook size I used to catch my juvenille snapper was two size 3.0 suicide hooks dropper paternoster reef rig set up. Snapper tend to go for just about anything ranging from fresh bait, plichards, squid, prawns, mussels and worms. Although some people prefer to use lures like Bucktail or soft plastic tipped jigs. I seem to prefer the use of real bait. These fish are opportunistic feeders and they tend to travel in schools of similar sizes, the bigger ones tend to become increasingly solitary. This is an excellent eating fish and would have to be one of my favourites. Tally at the end of the day was not that spectacular given the conditions, 1 trumpet, 3 juvenille snappers and a whole lotta blowies. I ended my fishing trip at 6.30 as woodman point can be a bit of an unsafe place at night time and the areas renown for breakins so don't leave any valuables in the car if you do decide to go fishing there.    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                           

FREMANTLE BOAT TRIP- WESTERN KING WRASSE

 

Fremantle departing Leeuwin Barracks

 

Northwest Blowfish

From Top: Whiting, Butterfish & Western King Wrasse

                          

'With every drop of water that you drink,

every breath you take,

you're connected to the sea.

No matter where on earth you live'

Unknown

 

We docked off at Fremantle (Leuwin Barracks) at 7am in the morning for some serious fishing. The winds were blowing westly and conditions weren't the best as the water was a bit choppy, but we didn't care we just wanted to get out there and have a fish :). We had plichards as bait and I had my trusty, lucky, red fishing rod for the occasion. We journeyed out for 25 minutes until we arrived at a nice fishing spot which had some reefs so we decided to drop anchor and have a fish. I decided to rig up for herring I used size 1/0 hooks and did a running beam sinker. First cast in and we had many bites but the fish just weren't going for the bait after about 30 minutes into fishing I still seemed to have no luck and neither did my friend for that matter. So I decided to alter my rig set up and reduce the weight of the running beam in hopes of catching any fish. I changed the hooks to bloodworm hooks and did a double hook set up I recasted and bang this time I got Lucky. First fish for the day and I was pretty chuffed as I reeled up my fish in anticipation as to what it could be up popped a  Western King Wrasse fish. These fish are mainly found in offshore reefs close to sands and seagrass spots. These fish are interestingly cheeky in my opinion because they travel in groups and the group consists of 1 male and a school of females.....Thats a lota work for 1 male fish!  Like other reef fish they have the ability to change sex to female at any time. So if the male dies the bigger female of the group will change gender to become the new male of the group. This condition is known as 'protogyny'. Wrasse fish are not what anglers normally would go for but they are edible. I personally don't like the flavour of the fish but some people love eating them. The best way to eat these fish are pan fried with skin on. Two wrasse fish to nil later my friend decided we should travel further inshore and try our luck there. We found a nice sand patchy spot and not even 8 minutes into our fishing and I had hooked something huge I didn't know what it was but while I was battling to reel up my line the fish completely severed my line and I had lost my entire rig set up. I was spewing. As I quickly tried to re rig my line my friend spotted a Northwest blowfish also known as a pufferfish. These buggars have horse like teeth and can cause some serious bites. They are pretty aggressive fish and will pretty much go for any food on offer. We encountered 3 Northwest blowfish on our fishing trip and they are definately not shy. The blowy circled our boat for a period of time in the hopes of getting a free feed. It would flick it's fins out of the water as if to say 'Hello, I'm here, feed me'. The northwest blowy that circled the boat would have been about 60cm long but they can get as big as 88cm. We didn't stick around to fish when these buggars popped their ugly heads up. :) And I think that was what cut my line. We journeyed a good 10 minutes away from the location and sourced a better spot. This time I managed to land a whiting, as I went to soak the bag to put the fish in it. The fish slipped through the clenches of my hand and threw itself off the boat. My friend was indeed spewing our only whiting, one minute on the boat and the next minute....gone! But it wasn't all bad my friend finally caught a whiting which we managed to contain in the boat. :)  All up after catching many butterfish and one baby snapper which we had to throw back because it was well undersized, we finished the fishing trip with 2 Western King Wrasse, 1 whiting and a butterfish.      

 

  

 



PROTECTING SHARKS AND FISH FOR THE FUTURE!

In W.A they have put in place a new culling shark program releasing drumlines across the coast.  Sharks are the top predators of the marine food pyramid. They play a vital role in the oceans ecosystems as they regulate the natural balance of the ecosystems. The removal of these species which are on the endangered list would alter the ecological dynamics and thus be economically devastating. An example of the ecological domino effect would be fewer sharks would increase the octopus population which would decrease the lobster population. Decimated shark population would also decrease shellfish populations and since shellfish actually filter water the quality of the water would also decrease and the dominos list goes on. It takes 20 YEARS for a shark to reach sexual maturity and produce young ones. To me it's simply messing with the food chain. To put another funamental point across when we go diving, swimming or snorkelling we are going into their territory we are choosing to swim in their environment. So why must we set out to distinct an animal for being in their own territory. Every year more people die of car accidents and bee stings than shark attacks. Does this mean we should stop driving cars on the road and cull bees?
Maybe we need to be more aware of where and when we go swimming to reduce our risks of encounter and be more responsible? Some Anglers might think it's not a big deal but heres a thought to ponder on....If they continue the culling of sharks program into 2015. How much is this going to effect future fishing and the future generation....dissapointed Angler???  
Another issue that has popped up is the approval for coal companies to dump 3 million cubic metres of sludge into the Great barrier reef . A world heritage site which could well be on the 'dangered list' this year.

BLACKWALL REACH BLUE SWIMMER CRABS

Blackwall Reach, Bicton

 



 

Blackwall reach is a hidden Jewel spot for crabbing. The bushland and cliffs that surrounds you and the peacefulness makes you feel one with nature. We decided to head down there at 6pm for some night time crabbing. Upon arrival we noticed lot's of scuba diver groups heading out for a night time dive and some local Anglers. We set up the crab nets on the jetty and threw them out. The bait I used was chicken drumsticks tied down with a clip. The wait was on, an hour into crabbing and we had caught nothing. Meanwhile a scuba diving team were heading in and they had caught some monster sized crabs, so I knew at that they were definately there. After relocating to another spot on the jetty we decided to launch the crab nets out further and much to my excitement this time we were lucky, 2 female bumper sized crabs. All up I was pretty impressed with our catch. I had hoped to stay longer but our crabbing venture was cut short, my friend was getting eaten alive by mozzies and I was beginning to feel sorry for her :) yes we had indeed forgotten to pack the mozzy repellant. I presprayed before leaving however failed to mention that there would be mozzies where we were going to my poor friend :). So we decided to call it a night and head back to her place. My friend placed the crabs in the freezer and we sat down for a nice cuppa coffee. After about an hour we decided it was time to cook up the crabs. I opened the fridge to find no crabs. It was when I opened the freezer did I realise she had placed it accidently in the freezer and the crabs were frozen stiff....It's claws had launched onto the railing and it was indeed stuck. After much laughing and many attempts to pull the crab from the railing, We finally had to cut the claws to free the big buggar for tea :). So my big tip here is if you decided to put your crabs to sleep in the freezer put them in there for a short period of time as you don't want to spend another hour trying to defrost your crabs.   :)   

Penguin Island

SHOALWATER

Blue Manner Crabs

Shoalwater is an awesome spot for catching a variety of fish but on this fishing occasion I decided to hunt down my favourite, blue manner crabs and since at the moment it's crabbing season I simply have to make the most of it.  :) I used 3 crab nets and on this occasion I decided to use lamb necks as my bait, but you can also use tuna heads or chicken wings/legs which is also good crabbing bait. I secured my bait with a wire clip, some people like to use cages to stop blowies from eating the bait but I just let it free flow in the water, plus if there are other people crabbing on the jetty you've got that advantage of luring the crab to your net and not theres :) . I decided to crab just off the jetty so I secured my crab nets round the posts threw them in and checked the nets every 10 minutes. Doing the pull is always the fun, exciting part of crabbing, there's always a few seconds of suspense as to whether you've caught a crab or how many are going to be in the net. At times when I did pull up my nets I would sometimes find 2 crabs in there. I caught a lot of undersized crabs which I put back in the water straight away as you want to preserve the stock for future crabbing, however I did catch 4 big male ones which was enough for me. When measuring my crabs I used a crab gauge, however you can place a small indent in a coke can and use the can to measure the crab. The blue manner crabs have to be a minimum of 127 mm carapace width. It's best to always measure your crabs as the last thing you want to cop is a fine from the fisheries​. The catch limit for catching crabs are 10 per person per day. Whenever I go crabbing I always fill up a big container with sea water and take it home with me, as the best way to cook your crabs is in natural sea water. I put the crabs to sleep on ice or in the freezer, prepeel off the back, degutt and clean them out, bring the sea water to a boil then put the crabs in the pot for 7 minutes. Take them out of the pot and cool them in running cold water straight away, as you don't want to over cook your crabs. Serve it on a plate with your favourite summer salad. Delish!!  :)

Albany

                                                                            Albany

Breaksea Cod

Sargeant Baker

Packed and ready to go me and my fishing companion headed out at 5 am for some deep sea fishing we drove down to Albany marina and set out for king george sound and what a beautiful day it was for fishing. A bet had been made on this fishing expedition and I was pretty sure at the time it was going to be a challenging battle of the genders. Although my fishing companion had ...dare I say...more fishing experience than myself. I knew that in general I was pretty lucky and I did have a different fishing style, so maybe I could swindle a win in my favour :).  As we set out in search of a good fishing spot my companion noticed coral sprawls across the waters, but little did I realise at the time just how much this would effect our fishing. After a good 40 minute journey we finally anchored and got set up for some serious fishing. I moved quickly as I wanted to land the first fish there was no time to waste, we used pilchards for bait and some mullies, I dropped the line over as quick as I could and bang... first cast in and the lucky buggar had caught something, first fish for the day Break Sea Cod also known to many as a 'black arse cod' because there arses are black. These fish I must say are great eating, they make nice white fillets and go down well in a beer batter.
While he took the cod off the line I was quick to re bait and get my line out there but to no luck, the fish seemed to be nibbling at the bait but not really going for the bait. I couldn't understand it at the time I mean I didn't pack a banana with me so what was going on down there in desmersal lane! Then bang he got lucky again... another Break Sea Cod. It was Two to Nil... I knew at that moment the pressure was on and I had to pull up something or I would never live this fishing expedition down. Then it hit my line, the excitment set in and I could feel the adrenaline rushing through my veins as I was reeling in my line... preying for a snapper, up it popped and fish slapped the boat. It was a Sargent Baker. At the time I didn't actually know what it was but the fish looked exotic and interesting, when my companion told me it was good bait fish my interest in this fish quickly diminished. But bait fish or not I was glad I had finally caught something :)
What I did learn about the Sargeant Baker is where theres a sargeant there normally are snapper and they are excellent bait fish for Dhewi fish and you can eat them, but they are not good eating fish, probably only good for fish stock or fish soup.
By the end of the day we decided to end the fishing expedition the winds had changed and the fish weren't biting. 3 Break Sea Cod and 1 Sargent Baker, I did indeed get my arse kicked! Since losing the bet I have come up with a few new ideas that I will have to try out next time. Yep I think I will have to call a rematch on this one!  But it was still an exciting day, I just enjoyed being out on the water doing what I enjoy doing the most....fishing!!  Hands covered in bait, the fresh sea breeze hitting my face and the warmth of the sun. Simply paradise  :)