Competition Winners!
Recfishwest and Perth & WA Fishing Reports recently ran a competition on Facebook. All you had to do was tell us your fishing safety story, where you and/or your mates found yourselves in a sticky situation where some fishing safety equipment could have come in very handy, it was that easy! We’re thrilled with the response on a topic that is not always easy to talk about, but needs much more exposure to change behaviour toward safety, the responses were great from you all. We decided to pick 2 winners, 1 land based and 1 boat, considering WA’s recent boating tragedies. Congratualtions to our winners Stephen Bxaxa and Conrad Dalais, we hope you continue to be safe on the water and enjoy your new Fisher Safety Vest: Crewsaver 165N Sport.
Make sure you read their stories, click HERE.
Albany Catches
Picture: The large spots on harlequin are yellow in juveniles and adult females but turn to green then blue as males mature. Individual fish have different spot patterns like human thumb prints. (photo courtesy of Nicholas Drummond)
There are still salmon turning up along the local beaches as well as those east and west of town. The 3 to 7kg fish are not appearing in the same numbers they were a few weeks ago, however there have been many shore-based fishers who have been managing to pick up at least a couple of fish a session. Spots that have been producing the better salmon catches have included Bremer Bay, Bluff Creek, the rocks at Cheynes Beach, Nanarup, Lowlands, Perkins and Shelleys. Tailor have also been picked up among the salmon, especially at the traditional tailor haunts of Nanarup and Bornholm. Herring of mixed sizes can be sought from just about any of the beaches and headlands. There have also been some nice catches of the popular bread and butter species picked up at the marina and Frenchmans.
Skippy between 1 and 2kg have also started to show up in the surf gutters with the trickier-to-get-to locations tending to produce better numbers of the bigger trevally. When conditions have been suitable, the boats hitting up the lumps in 60 to 85m are decking reasonable numbers of queen snapper, breaksea cod, red snapper, harlequin fish and pink snapper. Schools of samson fish and yellowtail kingfish have also been encountered. Smaller boats working both harbours are getting among a few King George whiting as well squid and sand whiting. Baits have been outperforming hard-bodied and soft plastic lures on black bream in the King and Kalgan rivers.
Esperance Catches
Picture: This species of squid, the southern calamari lives for just under a year (photo courtesy @kirbyfishing)
Good catches of bread and butter species including herring, garfish, skippy and squid have been coming from the Taylor Street Jetty. Bandy Creek Boar Harbour has been producing mostly herring and a few black bream. Small schools of salmon have been appearing along the local beaches with Blue Haven, Salmon Beach and Fourth Beach among the better performing spots for the 2 to 7kg fish. Surf fishers have reported bigger salmon schools turning up at Roses Beach. Stockyards and Fourteen Mile are worth a visit with big skippy and plenty of herring on offer. Thomas River has produced its usual catches of school-size mulloway and skippy to 2kg. The small boat and dinghy fishers have generally been doing well on sand whiting and squid within a mile of the local beaches.
