Plan B - Australian Salmon — Gavin Hicks

PLAN B - B FOR BOYS

Snapper was off the radar - so the boys and I went for Plan B. Gavin Hicks.

Plan B – Salmon…

The usual Friday arvo text messages were sent after having a look at the weather and a plan was put in place for the next morning.

An early start was going to see us meet Simsy and his daughter Ebony at the Devonport boat ramp at daybreak, take both boats out and look for some snapper. The boys were pumped with this plan because neither of them are yet to catch a snapper. So keen were they in fact that we found ourselves on the water about half an hour earlier than the planned meeting time.

It was a fair bit windier than we had anticipated on the drive down and on arrival at the Elimatta boat ramp looked a bit choppy further out. So we decided to chuck a couple of silver slice lures out the back and go for a quick troll, more to check on conditions than anything else. We got about halfway along towards Wrights Island in the time we had, but that was enough to decide it probably wasn’t going to be the day they got their maiden snapper. So we turned and headed back to meet our partners in crime for the day. A quick discussion was had at the ramp and then we all piled in the TABS to go for a quick run so Jason could see what it was like. We only had to go to the mouth of the Mersey and he had seen enough.

All his knowledge of the local area came to the fore and he knew straight away it wasn’t going to be a snapper day. On the run back to the ramp it was decided to load the boat back on the trailer and we would all head for Port Sorell and see if the salmon were still about in good numbers and size.

With myself, Jobie and Kai in my boat and Jason and Ebony in his boat surely we could find some fish for the kids to have some fun with.

Within half an hour we had both boats on the water and tied up at the Port Sorell jetty. We then headed for the river mouth with the intention of doing some trolling to hopefully find some fish reasonably quickly.

Jason was near the break wall and us the western side. Jobie started with a small no name brand blue skirt lure (I have no idea what brand) on his Terez/ Saragosa rod and reel combo, whilst Kai started out trawling a white soft plastic on his Penn/ Samaki set up. Me, I had to settle for my 7 weight Sage Xi3 sitting in its rod case on the boat shelf and hopefully if the boys got sick of it I would actually be allowed to have a fish. No sooner had we got our spread set up and in the water than we looked over and young Ebony was leaning back with her rod bent, they were into the salmon straight away. So as all good mates do I got the boys to bring their rods in and motored over to their area straight away, no use them having all the fun! By the time we got there Ebbs had shown her angling class and had a nice salmon of a couple of pounds or more subdued and in the boat. This had all the makings of turning into a real fun day for the kids. www.tasfish.com - Get the knowledge - Get the fish.

The rods were put out again and the trolling re commenced. We did big loops up and down the break wall for about an hour and a half, the whole time the boys hooking into salmon with great regularity. They weren’t the biggest salmon that we would encounter for the day but averaging around 2 pounds or so they were a whole lot of fun to catch and they weren’t fussy.

We caught them on everything from skirts to hard bodies to soft plastics on the trawl. The hot colours at the time seemed to be white, blue and silver in a variety of different combinations. And every time we looked at them either Jason or Ebbs were hooked up as well, there was plenty of fish about and hardly another boat to be seen. Perfect, because I’m not too big on crowds at the moment.

There were so many fish that the boys even said I could try and get one on the fly rod, so I did. Just so happens that it was one of the smaller fish for the day, but at least I finally got a cast in on a fishing trip. Then as can happen with all things fishing the action dried up and things went strangely quiet all of a sudden. It didn’t take long before Kai chimed in and said “Dad can you put that fly rod away you’ve scared off all the fish”. Had they gone down or just moved to a different spot in the system chasing what I suspect was schools of whitebait moving through the river.

We kept trolling for a while and tried a few different spots inside and outside the mouth. Jason hooked a nice fish of about 3 pounds in his boat and we thought we had found them again but unfortunately this guy was flying solo. By now the North Easterly breeze was starting to come in reasonably hard and the swell was getting quite confused and choppy so we headed back to the river mouth and what were some calmer waters for now. Fantastic plastics doing the job.

We had only just got inside the mouth and Jobies rod bent hard and started losing line at a rate of knots. He grabbed it out of the rod holder and his initial comments were something along the lines of I don’t what this is but it’s bloody big. After a couple of minutes of losing line and gaining small bits back the hooks pulled and were to be none the wiser what it was. I think we all knew it was a bigger salmon but it’s still a pisser when you lose a good fish without actually seeing how good it was.

The spot was marked on the sounder and as soon as we went back over it the action started again, this time on both rods. The boys leapt into action and were both bent double on good fish.

I was sitting back in the driver’s seat with my feet up keeping an eye on the choppy waters and listening to kids laughing and yelling and reels screaming. A quick phone call was made to Jason to let him know we had found some bigger specimens and they were in on the action as well. When we finally got sight of these fish it was clear they were big and easily the biggest salmon the boys had caught, the weight net would tell us that the biggest models went 5.5 pounds.

We spent the next couple of hours trawling over the same area and every time on the sounder mark a rod would go off. If it was only one rod went off on the trawl the other was picked up and cast back in the general area and that would get slammed straight away. There were single hook ups, double hook ups, and hooks pulling out of fish everywhere I looked. It was pretty much fishy madness for a while and they were loving it, I believe at times they were even complaining of sore arms on some of the longer fights.

Jobie had saved some left over school money and bought himself a Savage Gear MPP2 rod. At 7 and a half foot long and rated for 5-8kg it seemed like a perfect time to break it in and it didn’t take long. He tied on a blue and silver slice lure and lobbed it out the back of the boat. Half a dozen winds later the rod was bent double and he was grinning from ear to ear. At about $40 on sale I think it was it proves you don’t need to spend a fortune on fishing gear to catch quality fish and have a whole lot of fun, and it made it so much sweeter for me knowing he had saved his own money and bought something he wanted with it. Sure they have all their more expensive rods and reels and they all serve a purpose but it’s great to know there is so much good gear about these days for very little money.

Finally it just got too rough at the mouth of the river and became too hard for me to handle the boat and deal with kids hauling in fish everywhere safely so we called it a day. I’m not too big on counting numbers these days but the boys reliably informed me they would have landed at least 30 fish and lost plenty more with only a couple for bait on future outings. When we caught up with Jason and Ebony they said they had landed the same amount if not more with plenty lost as well. I suspect they didn’t want to make us feel bad though and had caught more than that as they are both quality fisher people with plenty of local knowledge. Plus the fact that every time I looked at their boat they were fighting a fish!

So that’s how we encountered the boys first run of big salmon and it definitely won’t be their last. So much fun and right on our door step, we really do live in a great part of the world. For me it was just another fishing trip where I barely even touched a rod and you know what, I wouldn’t want it to be any other way. Being out in the beautiful fresh Tassie air watching my two boys have so much fun together is what it’s all about for me these days. As I said to someone the other day “I still go fishing as much as ever, but I very rarely fish these days”.

Stay safe on the water, and enjoy it.

Australian salmon are great fighters on light gear.