Chasing Silver

St Helens silver trevally Nathan Huizing

Located on Tasmania’s northeast coast is a popular estuary system that is home to a large variety of the state’s best light tackle sportfish. Georges Bay hosts big bream, King George whiting, Australian salmon, snapper, kingfish and flathead throughout certain months of the year. However, one species, in particular, may well be the biggest drawcard for many anglers. Silver trevally or ‘Trevs’ as they are often referred to tick just about all the boxes you could hope for when chasing inshore fish on light tackle. Their feeding habits present anglers with the opportunity to practice a variety of angling methods when pursuing these fish and once hooked they certainly know how to use every centimetre of their bodies to their advantage. With a moderately elongated and compressed body, soft blubbery lips and forked tail, these southern speedsters are similar in appearance to their northern cousins, the golden trevally. Despite their name, silver trevally will even display a series of vertical gold bars down their flanks when caught around weedbeds, particularly on the larger specimens. The best part of all is that they can be caught year-round and the coming months are prime time!

Locating Trevally In The Bay

Silver trevally can be found just about anywhere throughout George’s Bay due to the endless amount of fishy looking habitat. That being said, there are certainly a few hot spots around the bay that fish better than others at certain times.

Roughly in the centre of Georges Bay is a network of flats and channels that are marked out by several green and red posts. Both the channel and flats are worth fishing as the trevally will often move onto these flats to feed on a high tide and are often caught as bycatch by anglers chasing bream with hardbodies. However, the channel edges are where your efforts are best focussed. Trev’s will patrol these channel edges hoovering up any small prey items that they may come across and a well presented soft plastic fished close to the bottom is rarely refused. Although due to the excessive amount of weed in this system, these channels can be quite difficult to fish when the tide gets moving and I have found these channels to fish best an hour on either side of the tide change.

Towards the northern end of the system is Moulting Bay. This is a bay that takes up a relatively large portion of the whole system and is a great option to explore when the tide starts pumping as it isn’t affected as much by the strong currents and floating weeds. There are many shellfish leases and some nice weedbeds towards the centre of the bay and fishing deep with soft plastics around these habitats can often result in some great action with trevally sometimes coming in cast after cast!

Further down towards the mouth of the system around Dora Point and following the shoreline of Akaroa are a couple of channels that are very popular amongst anglers and for good reason. These channels are not only fishable by boat but also by land-based fishermen and from my personal experiences, this part of the bay consistently produces some of the larger specimens in the system! On our last trip to St.Helens, we found this part of the bay to fish exceptionally well during the first hour of the run-out tide and towards the last hour of the run-out as well. Unfortunately in the hours between, we found the current to be too strong and the weed being flushed out of the system made it unfishable. I believe the trevally congregate in this part of the bay during the run-out tide as it acts as the bottleneck of the system and all the small prey items such as baitfish, crustaceans and other aquatic invertebrates that the trevally love are drawn into the area with the outgoing tide. This can result in some crazy fishing, especially when the bigger fish show up!

Tackling trevally

While silver trevally in some parts of the world is rumoured to grow up to 1.2 metres in length and weigh as much as 18kg, that is certainly not the case in Georges Bay. The average fish you’re likely to find in the bay will range anywhere from 30-50cm and these fish will still give you a great scrap on light tackle. However, there are some slightly larger models kicking about and these are the fish that will give you hell on light gear. Trevs in the 55-65cm range are encountered semi-regularly and when hooked will certainly test your knots and angling ability! While there are rumours of anglers hooking some unstoppable fish in the bay I’m personally yet to see photographic evidence of any 70cm+ models, but I believe the potential is there.

Given the size range of the trevally in the bay, light spinning tackle is the preferred option and provides the best sport. A 1-3 or 2-4kg rod around 2.1 - 2.2 metres in length with a fast or med-fast action is ideal. A rod with a sensitive tip section is important for feeling the fickle bites as well as absorbing the headshakes these fish can give throughout the fight. If the rod is too stiff your chances of tearing the trevally’s soft lips increases substantially. When it comes to reel selection, I opt for a high gear, 2500 size. A 1000 size will suffice for the average trevally but I like the extra spool capacity of the 2500 which offers a little more insurance if you manage to get connected to one of these 65cm+ unicorns. As far as line choice, I run 3 or 4kg braid on all of my 2500s and have found it ideal when fishing Georges Bay. The sensitivity of the braid is great for feeling the little ‘tick’ the trevally will often send through the line as they pluck your soft plastic off the bottom giving you the chance to get a solid hookset before they spit your offering back out. It can pay to have a couple of different size leader options at hand when chasing trevally. If the water is super clear and the trevally are a little shy, I’d suggest fishing 3kg but no lighter. If the water is discoloured as it often is in Georges Bay you can get away with fishing 4 - 4.5kg leader which definitely helps if you hook a reasonable fish as they will often try to bury you in the dense weed beds!

Lure choice and how to fish them

Fishing with soft plastics is by far the most popular and productive method amongst anglers when chasing these fish. Simply because they can be fished deep in the channels and over weed beds where the trevally predominantly hang out. There are a variety of styles which are all proven trevally slayers and these include ZMan Grubz and Slim Swimz in the 2.5 inch size, Gulp Turtlebacks and Fry, 80-100mm Squidgey Wrigglers, 3 inch Powerbait Minnows and the Holt Productions Swimprawn just to name a few. As far as colour selection, I’ve had most success on natural baitfish patterns as well as classics such as bloodworm and motor oil. It pays to have a variety of jighead sizes in your tray as well. 1/8 and 1/4 ounce are the two sizes I find myself using the most when fishing the channels and it is important to fish the size most suitable to the depth and tide phase you’re fishing.

The most effective way to fish plastics for trevally I’ve found is to cast up current from your position and allow the plastic to sink to the bottom as it drifts back towards you while keeping light tension through your line. Once the plastic reaches the bottom you’ll notice the tension in your line will instantly drop. Proceed to lift your plastic with two or three quick hops and then allow it to sink back to the bottom while slowly winding the slack and repeat the process all the way back to the boat. It is often as the plastic sinks or is sitting on the bottom that the trevally will inhale it so be ready for that tick through the line! Hardbodies can also be effective on trevally with both shallow and deep diving suspending jerkbaits in the 60-80mm sizes working a treat over the shallower weed beds and flats. A steady paced retrieve with sporadic twitches and short pauses will often get results!

It can also pay to keep your eyes peeled for birds working the surface. This will usually be a sign of Australian salmon feeding on baitfish but the trevally are never too far away and will quite often just be hanging a few metres below the salmon, picking off scraps. This is when casting a soft plastic into them can pay off. Try to allow your plastic to sink a few metres without applying any action to the lure as this will grab unwanted attention from the salmon. Once you feel your plastic has sunk far enough, begin a slow retrieve. This is a method that has proven itself plenty of times!

Nathan Huizing