Changing targets set for the cold

MANDURAH

Jesse Choy

As we begin to see the end of autumn, the winter weather begins to set in and our targetable species change along with it. We can expect to see fewer of the

These spots will produce well when it comes to your normal resident species such as herring, whiting, silver bream and trevally as well. When targeting these fish, a moderately weighted pilchard, prawn or some squid will work well and can often result in some fish, which are hesitant in committing to feeding. bread-and-butter fish to go around. Using your smaller baits, herring, sand whiting and silver bream are plentiful around most beaches from the town and all the way through to your drive on stretches like White Hills or Preston. warm water fish like tailor or numbers of yellowfin sticking around, although the odd fish will still get pulled up and generally be a bigger specimen that is happy hunting on its own. whiting and skippy will become more frequent and their activity gets the other predators, like mulloway and shark interested. In turn this means good fishing for beach anglers.

Pink snapper are another very viable option if you are chasing something different from the stones, with great sized specimen roaming close to shore looking for an easy meal. Quite often pink snapper will patrol such areas, as some of their favourite food sources will get dislodged from the rocks as a result of the heavy surge and can often become a disorientated meal.

Chasing some of your bigger specimen like salmon, snapper or mulloway will be very much an option, although you will still need to put a lot of consideration into where you fish and placing your baits into a gutter where it can sit for an extended amount of time. Though at times you can get lucky with regards to hooking up almost immediately after putting your bait in the water, in most cases you will have your best chances where you can soak your bait and let the fish find their way to you. With the larger swells, Silver trevally are great fun on light gear, just ask the Hill brothers who rate them as a target on many of their outings.

Fishing from the town or Dawesville rock walls is a great option at this time of the year, as the narrow entrances offer great flow of water with tidal movement and will quite often be some of your first spots to clear up of debris as a result.

The other option, although they can be fickle at times, will be Australian salmon. They should turn up? If you love chasing salmon there is a great Facebook page that is worth following

If you are looking to get some sand between your toes, the beach should produce quite well if you are able to find a section of clean water that is weed free and has some contour to it. Although some of your larger specimen can be harder to target due to the abundance of weed as a result of surge, there is definitely plenty of unlikely by-catch. Anglers should expect that salmon schools will now be passing through these areas, although the quantities of fish coming through may range from evident schools to smaller numbers of singular fish that can be quite shy in their migration. In previous years, a moderately weighted pilchard, scalie or whole herring has worked well and in others it has been the lures that have picked up some of the more finicky called “Salmon School Tracker”. If the salmon are around, this page will tell you where they are.

Ryder is a great example of persisting in order to achieve the desired result – he managed to go from one beach personal best to catching an even bigger one after this!

INSHORE Our inshore water is a veritable smorgasbord at some quality squid and King George whiting. You may just need to change locations a bit as, in particular, the whiting will move around.

Rene is an avid bream angler who lives locally and absolutely loves the challenge of bream on lures.

Any broken water or it can only be assumed that foraging fish will be looking through overturned sand as it exposes new food sources and offers easy pickings for minimal effort.

River fishing is a staple all year long, though it can be challenging for some during certain points of the year. Fishing in Autumn provides ample opportunity for anglers to get stuck into some great sized bream, with there also being a possibility of coming across some of the elusive river mulloway that frequent the Murray and Serpentine. If you are fishing up the rivers, lightly weighted or unweighted prawns or worms are ideal and will not last long when casted relatively close to structure that provides fish with a sense of security. If fishing lures, you will find that the fish can appear shy, though aggravated and hungry fish will be readily willing to eat a variety of lures you will find in your box. the moment. During the day our shallow reefs will hold plenty of skippy and herring, while these same areas will hold snapper at night. A good berley trail will improve your fishing.

Broken ground in 10-12m of water will hold inshore reef systems along the coastline will have tailor holding in and around it. Metal lures, stickbaits or gang rigged mullies will be your best options to catch them.

The bluefin tuna fishing has been on fire recently and this should continue. The 25-40m line seems to be where they are most prolific. Keep an eye out for birds as they are your best indicator as to where the tuna schools may be located.

As you head a little wider (30-50m), reefy areas will hold dhufish (some really big ones are being caught), baldchin groper, breaksea cod, the occasional big King George whiting as well as snapper of all sizes. On top of that, samson fish, yellowtail kingfish and salmon should all be on the chew. It really is a great time for our inshore anglers.

Offshore

Our offshore fishing continues to be dominated by the mahimahi fishing around the FADs. Not only has the fishing for them been fantastic, the quality of the fish this year seems to have improved as well. A win-win for anglers fishing for them. Anglers targeting them are generally using live baits or are casting stickbaits or minnow style lures around the FADs.

Deep dropping will be a little more difficult (less weather windows to get out to do it), however this is always a viable option off our coastline and the resulting captures are some of the best eating fish in the sea.

May is a fantastic month to get out and wet a line. I hope you all have a chance to do it and I will catch you next month.