Easter Report
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Easter Report
I promised my 2 cousins that i would take them out fishing during the easter break. So with the weather looking good for saturday we decided to go for a casual fish to mornington.
We launched early at 7am and I was suprised that we were the 2nd last in line for a space. It was going to be a busy day on the water.
After launching headed straight to the squid grounds. First cast and I got hit repeatedly but missed all 3 strikes.
Cousins first cast and an arrow landed. From then on it was suicide central. Multiple triple and double hookups were common. We got the whole boat splattered with squid ink. We bagged x 3 and released some more before leaving them biting.
Yamashita yellow/gold and shimano rainbow doing all the damage.
Then moving out deeper too chase some pinkies. We came across a school of baby couta. Had some fun micro jigging them up whike my cousins got donuts on bait.
Moved again to another spot and found the micro pinkies. Had some fun on them again on micro jigs until I lost the jig to a snag. Switched to a plastic and kept going. Couple of red mullet and a snook also came onboard. Baitos had a fish a cast of undersized fish
Got bored of the micro pinkies and moved to another spot and while prospecting i got a few salmon. They certainly tested the newly acquired caldia 2004 on 4lb leader. I got my cousins to tie on slugs they casted their heart out for donuts. I was a bit miffed as i thought they would certainly get into a few, so i decided to sound around a bit and see what they were up to.
Now here's where technology and knowing how to read your sounder certainly comes into its own.
I used my sidescan on the sounder to look around my boat and found the school of salmon sitting down deep about 20m to my port side.
I marked the fish in my screen and used my trolling motor to sit right in top of them then dropped plastics down. But not the outcome i was expecting. Out of 10 drops we got 1 fish. They would chase the lures up and then turn away. They wanted constant movement.
So change of tactics. Drive off from the school and start trolling plastics..i used the side scan again to find the school and trolled straight over them and WHAM...
Multiple hookups. We continued doing this and locating the school using sidescan when tbe fish moved away and trolled over them getting hookups every single time....
Now heres the fun part other boats seen the action and came to join the fun. But they were all casting lures and were not having much luck at all because they weren't feeding on the surface. It certainly pays to do some thinking outside the box... I can safely say without sidescan I would have been trolling blindly like it was done back in the day. There was absolutely no bird activity at all!!!
After trying and not catching almost all tbe boats left leaving us alone on the school.. I joined in on the fun by driving one handed and using the other hand to hold my squid rod trolling another plastic and hooked up as well with my cousins. We had multiple double and triple hookups that way with few fish finding their freedom by jumping and throwing the hooks.
White paddle tails and flick baits did the damage
We had an absolute blast. And only left due to having to be home by evening.
Hope you enjoyed the report as much as I did writing it for you guys, some pics below
Cheers
We launched early at 7am and I was suprised that we were the 2nd last in line for a space. It was going to be a busy day on the water.
After launching headed straight to the squid grounds. First cast and I got hit repeatedly but missed all 3 strikes.
Cousins first cast and an arrow landed. From then on it was suicide central. Multiple triple and double hookups were common. We got the whole boat splattered with squid ink. We bagged x 3 and released some more before leaving them biting.
Yamashita yellow/gold and shimano rainbow doing all the damage.
Then moving out deeper too chase some pinkies. We came across a school of baby couta. Had some fun micro jigging them up whike my cousins got donuts on bait.
Moved again to another spot and found the micro pinkies. Had some fun on them again on micro jigs until I lost the jig to a snag. Switched to a plastic and kept going. Couple of red mullet and a snook also came onboard. Baitos had a fish a cast of undersized fish
Got bored of the micro pinkies and moved to another spot and while prospecting i got a few salmon. They certainly tested the newly acquired caldia 2004 on 4lb leader. I got my cousins to tie on slugs they casted their heart out for donuts. I was a bit miffed as i thought they would certainly get into a few, so i decided to sound around a bit and see what they were up to.
Now here's where technology and knowing how to read your sounder certainly comes into its own.
I used my sidescan on the sounder to look around my boat and found the school of salmon sitting down deep about 20m to my port side.
I marked the fish in my screen and used my trolling motor to sit right in top of them then dropped plastics down. But not the outcome i was expecting. Out of 10 drops we got 1 fish. They would chase the lures up and then turn away. They wanted constant movement.
So change of tactics. Drive off from the school and start trolling plastics..i used the side scan again to find the school and trolled straight over them and WHAM...
Multiple hookups. We continued doing this and locating the school using sidescan when tbe fish moved away and trolled over them getting hookups every single time....
Now heres the fun part other boats seen the action and came to join the fun. But they were all casting lures and were not having much luck at all because they weren't feeding on the surface. It certainly pays to do some thinking outside the box... I can safely say without sidescan I would have been trolling blindly like it was done back in the day. There was absolutely no bird activity at all!!!
After trying and not catching almost all tbe boats left leaving us alone on the school.. I joined in on the fun by driving one handed and using the other hand to hold my squid rod trolling another plastic and hooked up as well with my cousins. We had multiple double and triple hookups that way with few fish finding their freedom by jumping and throwing the hooks.
White paddle tails and flick baits did the damage
We had an absolute blast. And only left due to having to be home by evening.
Hope you enjoyed the report as much as I did writing it for you guys, some pics below
Cheers
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- Bluefin
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Re: Easter Report
Sounds like a top day on the water with your cousins mate.
Nice report and pics with a great haul of fish. Well done :thumbsup:
Nice report and pics with a great haul of fish. Well done :thumbsup:
- mazman
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Re: Easter Report
Nice work steve sounds like a cracking day on the water. I've found the fish at mornington holding deep like that a few times before, usually get them by letting a plastic sink down to the bottom and then rolling it through them
Youtube channel:Hawkesy Fishing
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Re: Easter Report
Thanks guys.
The pics are using a gopro. The quality is not the best @ 2mpx. Combine that with Facebook resizing ut just wrecks the pics. But it is what it is! Might have to invest in some better camera gear
Alex - I never tried slow rolling actually. I'll give that a shot next time rather than use the outboard and troll through the school.
The pics are using a gopro. The quality is not the best @ 2mpx. Combine that with Facebook resizing ut just wrecks the pics. But it is what it is! Might have to invest in some better camera gear
Alex - I never tried slow rolling actually. I'll give that a shot next time rather than use the outboard and troll through the school.