BREAM SERIES presented by
Tight bags and tarwhine on the Swan No sooner has the 2022 ABT season been wrapped up have we begun again with the first round of the 2023 Daiwa bream series in Western Australia. The Atomic sponsored Swan River qualifier in Perth was the battleground for 16 boaters and 13 non-boaters, competing for their ticket to the Grand Final in Port Stephens, New South Wales, at the end of the year. This year for WA anglers there are two boater and two non-boater spots, as well as a spot for the angler with the most AOY points that hasn’t automatically qualified. Joseph Gardner took the reins for ABT and ran the
knowledge goes a long way when the ABT comes to your hometown and it certainly helped Joseph Gardner secure his breakthrough ABT win by just 20g. Having got some good sessions in before the pre-fish ban, Gardner had a good feel for the area already when it came time to pre-fish. “I knew there were fish everywhere in the system, but I knew the upriver fish were going to feel the pressure a lot more, so I decided to stay down the front where it was less pressured and congested,” he explained. At just 3.85m long and
Perth’s newly acquired local Karl Stait knows how to catch them all over the country. His plan to target tarwhine paid off, along with the 115 ProXS on his right. It earned him the 1st place $250 Mercury owners bonus as well. fished by casting them into the current, parallel with the bridge pylons and letting them waft down underneath. If the lure made it to the bottom without getting eaten, he gave it ‘a few small rattles’ to imitate a loose mussel tumbling along the bottom. Most of the time the bream would eat it on the drop while it was sinking alongside the pylon and the action wasn’t required. Casting accuracy trumps distance around pylons
where it is essential to get the lure within a couple of inches of the structure every single cast. A shorter length rod around the 6’6” to 7’ length provides far better casting accuracy, so Gardner opted for a comfortable 6’8” 1-3kg JML Accurate presentation – short enough to be accurate but still long enough to get good leverage and keep fish away from the pylons. He paired this with a strong 2500 size Daiwa Exist spooled with heavy PE 1 Yamatoyo jigging braid and
Going home $1,500 richer for his efforts, Gardner’s eyes are now firmly set on the Blackwood River in June.
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tournament in the absence of Steve and Nicholle, getting some good karma for his efforts finishing in first place. In a weekend where tarwhine played a big part in the winning bags, He weighed 7kg neat for his final weight to finish just 20g ahead of second place Karl Stait, who exclusively weighed the bream sub-species. In the non-boaters we saw another first-time winner in Matt McCarthy punch his ticket to the Grand Final while the Atomic Big BREAM prize of $500 went to Kim McIntyre. LOCAL GURU GETS IT DONE A little bit of local
powered by a 25hp motor, having the smallest boat in the field certainly didn’t hold him back from having a go. In some ways, it became an advantage when he could sit back and watch the other boats ahead of him head to other spots and he could choose his accordingly. With others choosing popular spots at the front of the system Gardner settled with the causeway bridge at Herrison Island for the first half of each session. He and his non-boaters each day had a bag in no less than 15 minutes and had the rest of the day to upgrade, with the bite getting better as the tide changed and started to run in
BOATER RESULTS Place 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 110 APRIL 2023
Angler Joseph Gardner Karl Stait Alex Griesdorf Paul Burton Jarrad Stevens Adrian Barbour James Graham Richard Raynham Greg Cooper Paul Furlong
Fish 10/10 10/10 10/10 10/10 10/10 9/10 9/10 8/10 8/10 8/10
later in the morning. Boat control and positioning around bridges is paramount and with the addition of a new Lowrance GHOST trolling motor to his boat – supplied by Tacklewest – Gardner was able to hold into the current behind the pylons all day with ease. “That’s probably been the best piece of technology I’ve put on my boat so far; it’s made fishing so much easier for me,” he said. Gardner makes his own mussel-style lures under the Blue Lip Baits banner, which he used almost exclusively for the whole event. He used the dark knight colour and Full results at abt.org.au
Weight(kg) 7.00 6.89 5.15 4.50 4.18 3.96 3.69 3.10 2.96 2.95
Joseph Gardner ran the event in the absence of Steve and Nicholle and he managed to pull through for the victory, weighing 7kg neat and punching his ticket to the Grand Final.
Payout $1500 $750 + $250 1st Mercury bonus $500 + $125 2nd Mercury bonus $75 3rd Mercury bonus No payout No payout No payout No payout No payout No payout
a 6lb leader, however he went as high as 8lb over the course of the event. Tarwhine featured in both the top two bags as the big schools were in good condition and relatively easy to catch, with Gardner himself bagging one on day one and three on day two to carry him to victory. As for the first guaranteed boater entry for the 2023 Grand Final that he
