Bream and whiting are dominating bags

When the winds allow, boaters are getting offshore and getting stuck into some serious fishing.

King George whiting have really made their presence felt of late with the odd fish measuring a whopping 55cm. In depths from 4-10m, many boaters are drifting with long shank but sturdy baitholder hooks with a strip of squid topped off with pipi meat. Once a fish has taken the bait, the anchor is dropped and the berley bucket is lowered over the side to sit just off the bottom. Placing the berley bucket off the boat’s nose rather than off the stern allows the berley to flow under the boat and reduces possible tangles with set baits if lowered off the stern.

Apparently, there are plenty of undersize pinkie snapper about when chasing the whiting and can be a

Flathead

Fishing in Apollo Bay has been red hot over the last few weeks with all species being on the bite right along the coast.

There have been some really nice flathead caught, some fish reaching 60cm. The larger fish have been caught in deeper water between the 55-65m mark.

nuisance but sooner or later the bigger ones will move in closer to shore so it pays to have a sturdy hook when chasing whiting as you never know what might come along and steal your bait.

From 35-70m depth over a rubbly bottom or actual reef sees the bigger snapper at the moment along with school and gummy sharks. Again, fresh squid is the number one bait. Speaking of squid there are a few about so don’t forget the jigs. Flathead, morwong, nannygai and leatherjackets are the quality by-catch here.

Yellowtail kingfish have made their presence felt with fish to 14kg responding to trolled lures over inshore reefs. Slimy mackerel baits rigged and towed behind a slow moving boat are also taking fish. Often where there is one, the rest of the school won’t be far away so others on the boat can consider casting to following fish once the original fish is boatside of course.

Boaters are launching off Boat Bay at Peterborough, Warrnambool and Port Fairy.

The Hopkins continues to produce bream, perch and the odd mulloway as the waters continue to calm down after the rains and the fish remain on the bite. Plenty of bream are up for grabs with most fish averaging from size up to 34cm with the odd fish weighing in over a kilo. Bait remains the number one option, and don’t the bream love it! A recent trip with good mate Bruce Roberts saw us catch at least 30 legal bream in a session and if you want to count the just undersize fish, over 50. All fish released. It was a great day as no matter where we went, we caught fish; as long as it was upstream as these fish want to spawn. Bait such as brown shell, Port Fairy shrimp preserved in sawdust and even packet frozen prawn and pipi worked on the day. So too did scented shrimp patterned soft plastics but to a lesser extent.