Techniques for tackling tailor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . by Gavin Dobson

Techniques for tackling tailor

WE are starting to get deep into this very unsettled year.

A fair bit more rain is forecast over the next three months but at present things have been OK.

On the fishing front, it has been quite good, especially in the estuaries and on the beach.

The Tweed River has had a great run of tailor, the best I can remember for a long time.

From the mouth to Chinderah and up the Terranora arm to the lake has been going off and not only with numbers but quality too.

Often the river fish are on the smallish side, but this year they are averaging at least 1kg, with fish to 2kg not uncommon.

Now is the time to be catching and wrapping some tailor for the upcoming mackerel season.

To locate fish, trolling lures around the cleaner water on the higher parts of the tide has been the go and, once found, casting lures or bait is the most efficient way to get a few numbers onboard.

Likewise on the beaches, tailor have been thick.

And while I would expect tailor to leave the river soon, I’d guess that the beaches will still fish fairly well until the end of September.

The Tweed beaches have fished better than the Byron coast beaches over the past month, but that could turn around for September and October.

Places such as Fingal and Cabarita beaches have had some massive numbers of tailor schooled up in the surf.

The size has been good too, with 1kg plus fish the average and closer to 2kg the norm.

The occasional fish to 3kg has also turned up among them.

While all this is fun, the mackerel fishos are complaining there isn’t a troll bait among them. Down on the Byron coast though, tailor have been not nearly as thick or as large.

This has suited me to a degree because I’ve been able to stock away some good mackerel bait.

Having quality bait for mackerel season is a huge advantage, especially if good numbers of live bait are difficult to find. I’ve gone back to the tried and trusted method of wrapping my bait firmly in cling film.

Vacuum sealing bait seemed like the perfect way to store them when I bought a machine a few years back but come mackerel season I was disappointed to find all my hardearned bait was fairly mushy.

This didn’t seem to make sense because the frozen fillets for consumption were coming out of the freezer in prime condition.

Mangrove jack will start to move around as things warm up. Steve with a 50cm fish from last season.

Then I had a good look at the process of vacuum sealing, and I could see that the suction created was actually crushing soft fish such as bonito, slimy mackerel and pike.

Tailor are a fairly soft fish too but their skin is a bit tougher and they aren’t too bad as a vacuum sealed product, however I now freeze everything in cling film.

Maybe I have an over-enthusiastic Cryovac machine, as every now and then it will actually split a slimy mackerel during the vacuum process.

Anyhow, now is the time to stock up on mackerel bait because tailor usually get smaller the closer we get to Christmas, and as long as they are legal, smaller tailor are easier to tow.Offshore this month there will still be snapper in close and the occasional jewfish.

Out a bit wider in the 40-fathom depths, snapper will be in better numbers and probably a few kingfish and amberjack for those so inclined.

The shelf has been fishing well for bass groper this past month, along with a few cod and flame snapper. It’s definitely flathead and whiting time in our estuaries now and a few trevally will start to show up.

Mangrove jack are biting reasonably well at the time of writing, which is a little odd, but by the end of September they will definitely be on the improve.

Things are looking good, so let’s hope the forecast is a bit off and we don’t get too much rain.