East Coast
VIC
The flatty fishing just keeps getting better GIPPSLAND LAKES
Brett Geddes b.geddes@bigpond.com
It seems that with the passing of each month I’m reporting in with more amazing stories of bigger fish and more of them! With commercial netting gone for nearly three years now, and two years of life-giving floods, I have to tell you the Gippy Lakes really is going from strength to strength, and the standout species this month are the whiting, black bream and especially huge dusky flathead. KING GEORGE ‘TINGS The whiting action has hardly slowed down over the last four months, but the sizes have improved for sure. Even as the coloured floodwater slowly clears from the western parts of this huge estuary system, it doesn’t really stop the whiting bite. Alison and Rod Tatterson make Lakes Entrance their home for about a month over their holiday break and they have got the whiting sorted. Using bits of prawn and pipi for bait, they have been bagging a ripper feed each trip. With her first cast for the holidays Alison wrestled in a cracker 43cm King George slab, and it wasn’t her only big fish for the day. It seems the whiting have yet to push up in towards Paynesville or
Raymond Island like last year, so the best option is to try from Metung down to the entrance. If you don’t get
fish in about 30 minutes, it pays to move until the bites come thick and fast. Often you get short bite windows,
Tyler Metherell released this ripper 77cm dusky then went and caught a heap more.
Sonny Brown is one happy angler as he shows off a PB smile and Gippy Lakes flathead.
so check baits after every enquiry, because there’s nothing worse than wasting valuable time trying to fool finicky fish on bare hooks. BLACK BREAM Slowly but surely the bream action is improving every week, mainly because of the waters clearing up but also due to the increased angler effort. Quite a few reports are coming through, with bait anglers having the best success using plain old frozen prawn. Lure anglers are also now starting to stack up good numbers of bream to 40cm. Most of the best areas are around Paynesville or Raymond Island and mainly up the Nicholson River. The good news is that bream are now showing up around Hollands Landing after nearly 12 months of constant flooding and the muddy water is slowly moving on and mixing with
a bit of cleaner saltwater. DUSKY FLATHEAD I can only describe the flathead fishing as out of control! From in town at Lakes Entrance right up to Loch Sport, which I understand is a huge area, but it shows you just how widespread the duskies are. The average size of these fish is staggering, and I have never received this much feedback from all the 19 years writing this report. Let me start with Justin Brown, who proudly watched his young boy Sonny pull in some whoppers. They had a cracking day with a nice run of flatties all around 50-55cm. They were all caught on soft plastics around the Sperm Whale Head area. Next up we have Gaven and Kerry Metherell, who for the last five years have sent me so many ripper
reports and stunning pics of their boys Brodie and Tyler. They caught 38 flathead over their holiday break, with most of them in the 50cm range. But notably, they also caught them much bigger including five over 60cm and three over 70cm, with the biggest going 77cm. You won’t get better family flathead action than that, and all of them were caught on lures! The big easterly winds played havoc with some outings, and Gav also said the flatty bite will only get better as the water clears in the weeks and months ahead. But the king of the Gippy Lakes flathead is my buddy Justin Dingwall, and I swear this man even thinks like a mega flathead and may even talk to them! He always has a knack of finding the biggest fish of any species and his last
PRODUCT NEWS
New lures from Daiwa Two of the latest lures released by Daiwa Australia are the Steez Current Master 93SP-DR and the Steez Soft Shell 90. STEEZ CURRENT MASTER Designed in partnership with Japanese engineers and tuned to suit the needs of Australian anglers and
to handle the rigors of hardpulling Australia species the Steez Current Master is one of the must-have jerkbaits for keen barra anglers. The Current Master 93SP-DR is the perfect mid-size silent jerkbait with a lively action when jerked and suspends on the pause inducing hard strikes from predatory species like barra
and mangrove jack. The patented Mag Lock Silent Oscillation Casting System has been installed inside the Current Master 93SP-DR enabling incredibly long casts while keeping a subtle and silent presentation. The “MAG LOCK” system also creates perfect lure balance delivering a super consistent swimming action in still waters, heavy current or faster retrieve speeds. Fitted with ultra-strong split rings and BKK Viper
treble hooks there is no need to upgrade any of the hardware which comes standard on all Current Master 93SP-DR and is ready to fish straight out of the box. STEEZ SOFT SHELL 90 The Steez Soft Shell is a uniquely designed soft vibration bait developed in Australia to deliver anglers a new take on the soft vibration lure concept. Designed with two crawfish like appendages to impart a unique action as the lure sinks to the bottom,
Steez Current Master 93SP-DR the Soft Shell will rest with the claws up thanks to the stand-up design of the head and the buoyant nature of the material. Designed to be fished close to the bottom with either a hopping or shaking retrieve, the Soft Shell excels on our freshwater predator species such as yellowbelly, barra, Australian bass and more. While in the saltwater it draws strikes from
Steez Soft Shell 90 Spawn Shrimp
Steez Soft Shell 90 Vibe Lure 86 MARCH 2023
prawn feeding species such as flathead, mulloway, and snapper. The Steez Soft Shell can be rigged numerous ways and comes standard with both stinger hooks and BKK Fang treble hooks in the pack. For more information on these and other new releases from Daiwa, visit www.daiwafishing. com.au. - FMM
