Fishing Victoria Forum

Went out from Hastings yesterday arvo with the old man and decided to blow the cobwebs off the boat. the weather was fine and not as cold as we had expected, the wind was only a breath. just 3 other boats out... We hadnt been out for about 6 weeks and the freezer was empty so action need to be taken.

We caught the tide at about 2 30pm at buoy 12 without losing a bait. Then went down to seal rocks to try for some pike or sweep. no good there either. We caught some nice sized leatheries though. By this time it was about 5 30pm.

Fished the fairway bouy solo as the old man was cold and whinging about this winter fishing crap and went to bed... until about 9pm as the rain and wind had picked up significantly. Managed 5 couta and dropped 2 others. Caught 5 or 6 swell sharks. Seen a navy vessel (which was anchored off cowes earlier when we went past) come past all lit up like a Christmas tree. tried taken photos, just didn't turn out..


decided to get out of the wind to bunker down for the night and went into cat bay. Only managed 2 more swell sharks and dropped a nice size arrow squid as I was lifting it to the boat... the sea lice (giant sea lice) took over and that was it for me, went to bed just before midnight. got up in the morning and tried for some calamari but had no joy. just a couple of small leatheries on the bait rods.. off the water at about 10am

all in all was good to be back on the water even if I did get soaked to the arse. wind played havoc but theres always somewhere to fish in westernport if you know what you are doing. 2 of my favourite fish to eat and they will be dinner tomorrow night

Man thats a Solid effort. those leather jackets look like great size.
hopefully next time you can land some more.
and bad luck about the arrow, funnily enough, both my arrow squid ive landed were on soft plastics and in the same location

Bad night fishing better then sitting in front of tv.
Glad you got a few

Nice report mate!
Those leather jackets look really good size! Nice work :thumbsup:

Nice fish the couta are a good size as are the elvis Presley

yeah they were good size, I didn't measure them as we were trying to dethaw still when we cleaned them. the mrs grilled a bit of couta for me tonight as she was grilling dinner and it was brilliant. the rest are for the bbq tomorrow night. couta are such an underrated fish, maybe the bones, maybe the worms... who knows. but I love them. and leatheries... well they are just so easy to catch and taste nice.

Nice work

Bm

I agree on the eating qualities of the couta - but how do you deal with the bones?

good job mate ! how do you cook those leather jackets

bilby wrote:I agree on the eating qualities of the couta - but how do you deal with the bones?

I just bite half way in and slide the flesh off the bones. Then half of the bone is exposed and if cooked properly are easy to pull out. Which then gives you the other half of the fillet as a boneless piece of meat..