Focusing on targeting the right species this month

CENTRAL COAST

Jamie Robley

There’s no escaping the fact that it’s rapidly cooling down on land and sea. The standard of fishing, however, should remain rather good this month – it’s just a matter of chasing the right species for this time of year and rugging up.

It’s been one of those years when warmer ocean currents have lingered a bit longer, and although temperatures are definitely cooling now, it’s still not that cold. I remember this sort of water in years gone by, and it’s common to encounter species like dart and whiting in the surf, or cobia just off the headlands or around inshore reefs. So, to begin with this month, I recommend approaching things with an open mind and always consider the water temperature.

As I mentioned last month, we’ve had plenty of smaller tailor along the beaches. I thought they would have thinned out more by now, but I’ve still been finding lots of small tailor, around the size you’d normally expect in the estuary. I mean quite small choppers. They’re fun to catch with light spin or fly gear, but they are annoying bait-wasters when you’re trying to aim for a jewfish (mulloway) or bream in the surf. Thankfully though, a few better-size tailor are also showing up now and theoretically, the cooler it gets, the bigger the tailor. We’ll see if that turns out to be true in the coming weeks!

It’s interesting that I’ve also found plenty of undersize bream wasting my baits at the beach over the past two months. I’m assuming they are around for the same reason as the small tailor. That could possibly be a result of all the flooding we had in 2021 and 2022. Whatever the reason, it’s good to see healthy numbers of fish, big or small, and hopefully a lot of these little ones will get to grow big in years to come.

Tailor have been the mainstay of our beach fishing this year. Although plenty of little ones have been around, the sizes should improve as it gets colder.

Salmon, jewfish and whiting are the other main

Offshore anglers trolling, lure casting or live baiting are still getting into bonito and kingfish in close, with a few tailor, salmon and the occasional cobia and tuna around the close-in reefs. Dropping baits in close at the moment is also likely to produce the same species, along with a few pan-sized reds and early season trevally.

The weather has been much friendlier to us this year, which translates to better offshore fishing and the ability to head out wider instead of being forced to remain in close. June can have variable winds and is often quite calm, so take advantage of the good times while they last. We all know that the latter part of winter can be very windy!

The lakes and Brisbane Water have been fishing well species along our beaches at the moment, and as the weeks roll on it’s likely the whiting will fade away and salmon numbers increase. in recent weeks, although it’s certainly slowing down a bit now. The usual bream, flathead, whiting and blackfish have all been

Silver trevally also start to show up about now, but the general size of the trevally has been a bit disappointing in recent years.