A transition period for all the Sydney waterways

SYD ROCK & BEACH Alex

Bellissimo

alex@bellissimocharters.com.au

You have noticed the days getting shorter and milder. You have to love this time of the year. Some people say it wasn’t a hot summer and early autumn, but it was stifling on some days, especially with the Sydney humidity.

We are heading towards what I call the ‘transition period’, when the first of the winter species start mixing in with other species for the next month or two. You will note, especially towards the end of this month, the ocean water temperature will be dropping a degree or two. That not a bad thing, as it has been really warm. It should hover around 20-21°C this month.

Now let’s check out what has been biting lately, and my predictions for April.

Beach Fishing

For the last several months it has been a sporadic whiting season. Some beaches would produce great size fish and numbers for a while, and then the complete opposite would happen.

Fishing the right time of the day is really important, with the best option being low light periods. I can hear some of you say, “I’ve done really well in the middle of the day”, and I don’t doubt it, but the truth is you’re more likely to get consistent results during lower light periods, either AM or PM.

The ideal scenario is to fish a high tide a couple of hours after sun up or around sunset, but that’s often not practical for the weekend angler, and there are a lot of weekends when the tides are not right. When the tides are low, choosing the right gutters will give you a better result (preferably at dawn and dusk). Look for gutters that do not ‘white out’, which means that during the low tide the gutters still have a reasonable depth. It’s a good option if you are unable to fish the right tides at the right time of the day.

You can encounter whiting, bream, tailor and salmon in these low tide gutters. My clients have been catching some great whiting to 44cm, with the average size being between 30-35cm. Pink nippers are a great bait. I use them off the ocean rocks, in the estuaries and off the beaches, and they work well everywhere. Of course, beach worms are the number one bait off the beach, but if you suck at catching them, nippers are the next best thing.

Bream are a common bycatch, along with dart. Lately some of the dart have been up to 36cm. You may think that’s not huge for a dart, but it’s pretty good for Sydney beaches. If you’re wondering whether they’re good on the plate, I can assure you that yes, they are!

April is a cracker time of the year for beach jewfish (mulloway) and dusky whaler sharks. You can have your more regular 2-hook snelled offs from the sharks, reducing the loss of terminal tackle. There are nights on Sydney beaches where you can hook half a dozen or more sharks. If you’re trying to avoid these very aggressive creatures, you can move to a different gutter, or just put up with them until you hook another species. People often ask me whether you can catch jewfish at the same gutter when the sharks are in numbers. The answer is yes. Many’s the time I’ve taken a group of clients out beach fishing, and had one client hooked up on a shark and the other hooked up on a jewfish.

Live baits are very effective on these fish. Live yellowtail can be nearly on tap from your local wharf/jetty in the harbour or in Pittwater, and live mullet are a great choice also. Both can be butterflied or used as a whole fillet. If you are using squid it’s best to catch your own.

Jewfish to 110cm (around 12kg) are being caught at the moment, along with big Aussie salmon, and tailor to 60cm as well. The tailor numbers will be increasing this month, and we’ll see more bigger fish as well.

When fishing for tailor and salmon, it’s good to berley up with pilchards, tailor or salmon cubes to hold the fish in your gutter. However, you should avoid the berley trail if you find that there’s too much current, as you will be sending the fish away from you rather than bringing them to the general area you are fishing.

Rock Fishing

There are still plenty of bonito around, with mac tuna and frigates available too.

The kings have been sporadic this season. On some days we have caught better fish to 80cm, but most of the kingies have been undersize fish in that 55-63cm range.

There are quality whiting on the sand flats at Pittwater and Narrabeen lake, with flathead and bream as well. Ahmad Jayyousi caught this whiting on a very lightly weighted pink nipper.

The reliable sea gar on either a 2-hook snelled rig or a set of 4x 5/0 to7/0 hooks works well. A occy skirt over the top of the nose adds to the attraction as well. Having a few different lure types and sizes can be a big help on your outing. For example, you may not have much luck spinning lures or baits that are much larger than what the predators are feeding on. I have found that the Bait Junkie Jerk Shad and jigheads work a treat. The 5-7” size coupled with a 1/4-1oz jighead is good enough when using 15-24kg gear.

For the pelagics, try Bluefish and Old Mans Hat at Manly, South and North Curl Curl and Ovens South Whale.

A few snapper are being caught in the washes and distance casting (‘wash fishing’ is fishing the sudsy white water with lighter sinkers, while ‘distance casting’ is fishing with 3-5oz sinkers casting out to the less snaggy bottom). Generally, when fishing a lot of the popular snapper spots, wash fishing is preferred to distance casting. One of the reasons is that the terrain you are fishing may be too snaggy to distance cast.

I like to use a more robust bait when distance casting so it can withstand the big cast, which could be from 60-110m out. When wash fishing you can get away with softer baits like half pilchards, bonito fillet or tailor fillet. The white stretchy thread that you can purchase from a tackle shop can be the answer for soft baits. If you wrap your bait up in this thread, it will remain more intact. The downside of the stretchy thread is that you may need to cut it off each time you need to bait up as it gets tangled in your hooks.

Snapper to 1kg are being caught from the washes and distance casting, as well as some salmon and bream.

Luderick, bream and rock blackfish available in good numbers from Curl Curl and Long Reef.

Spots to try for snapper are Bluefish, South and North Curl Curl, Bungan Head, North Newport and North Whale headlands.

ESTUARY FISHING

Just a short report in the calmer waters (estuary) of Pittwater and Narrabeen Lagoon.

Fishing the shallows of the Pittwater waterway can be really rewarding. You can catch bream, whiting and flathead with mullet and gars as well. On a recent trip we caught whiting up to 38cm and bream to 32cm on pink nippers and beach worms.

Beach worms obviously aren’t a local bait, but they work quite well regardless.

Try Riddle Reserve in Pittwater, a large sand bank where you can pump nippers and have a relatively large area to fish. Wade out at low tide casting very lightlyweighted baits into the deeper water, fishing the edges of the ribbon weed for the species mentioned.

At Narrabeen Lake, all of the same species mentioned can be caught this month. The new walkway on the Pittwater road bridge North Narrabeen now has a lot more structure than it used to. Try spinning for flathead on the southern and northern ends. You will have a greater area to fish if you fish the western side of the bridge. Try for luderick and bream as well.

I say every month has something great to offer, but April is a special month for a diverse range of species. If you’re travelling to the coast and you want to rock or beach fish, bring extra outfits like the estuary gear just in case you can’t fish the ocean front because of adverse weather. • For rock and beach guided fishing or tuition in the northern Sydney region, visit www.bellissimocharters. com.au, email alex@ bellissimocharters.com.au or call Alex Bellissimo on 0408 283 616.