Wagonga is the place to wet a line
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SIGNS are up for the closure of the Apex Park boat ramp at Narooma, with the first closure from 4th May until the 26th of June.
This closure will impact on fishers targeting the yellowfin and bluefin tuna season, and I’m sure the businesses in Bermagui will appreciate the help that Eurobodalla Shire Council is giving them. It takes a long time to get visitors to come to our town, and something like this will have them looking elsewhere: another example of council not asking the right questions before they start something.
Just as we settle into the calm autumn weather patterns, a winter weather bogan hits us from the south west, putting an end to offshore fishing for most of the last week.
Before the weather hit, there were a few legal kingfish taken on jigs at the north end of Montague Island, but the best catches were obtained by those fishers chasing snapper. Reds up to 3kg have been taken around the island, which just goes to show what you can get when you change your target species from kingfish to snapper this time of year.
Unconfirmed reports from late last week were that some nervous seals were huddled on the rocks at the island as some of their large white predators travelled through our local waters. We can only hope that the great whites had a really good meal on their way past.
There continue to be good snapper around and Narooma News editor Stan Gorton took his nephew William Rask out on Wednesday evening for a quick evening fish off Bermagui.
With only an hour on the water, getting a nice snapper and a flathead was a good effort.
It was caught on the flat, rocky bottom directly off the Bermagui Blue Pool in about 35m using striped tuna on a paternoster rig.
There were stormy skies above and they were treated to a beaut rainbow and rare mammatus cloud over Bermagui once back in port and up the river.
Again, best fishing has come from Wagonga Inlet, with some excellent bags of bream, flathead, whiting, salmon, snapper and tailor being taken at a few different spots. To find out where they are biting best, call into one of the local tackle shops for the up-to-date information.
Fishing Tip of the Week: Make sure you have a mixture of baits when inlet fishing, at the moment some great catches have been taken on striped tuna fillets.
Fishing Joke of the Week: A single mackerel can produce over a million offspring. God knows how many the married ones can churn out.
Fishing Soap Box: The Batemans Marine Park Advisory Committee has not been operating since September 2011 - so much for community involvement! More relating to this in next week’s report.
- John Moore
Narooma Sport and Gamefishing Club report
THE Narooma Sport and Gamefishing Club welcomed as members the new owner of Bob Kerr’s boat, Bob Hirs and his son Sam Guy.
Also, welcome to his friend Warren Horrigan. Over Easter they had a good couple of days both in the inlet and outside with a few marlin caught and released, and young Sam with a nice bream.
On Saturday, April 18, Peter Vaughan participated in the Alliance Tournament aboard Black Pearl and hooked up a striped marlin which he tagged and released.
As usual the Narooma Sport and Gamefishing Club rooms, situated on the inlet near the restaurants, will be open for fish stories, drinks and snacks from 4pm till 9pm on Friday. Visitors are most welcome to come along and have a chat with the members.
Geelong Star trawler opposition builds
THE Australian Recreational Fishing Foundation has announced that discussions with the Small Pelagic Fishing Industry Association (SPFIA), the organisation representing the operators of the trawler Geelong Star.
The Stop the Trawler Alliance meanwhile is calling for a weekend of action and social media campaign around Australia.
ARFF is the national organisation representing the interests of Australia’s recreational fishing community.
According to the www.shipspotting.com the Geelong Star is a 3, 181 tonne, 90m fishing vessel owned by Seafish Tasmania out of Triabunna.
AFFA says discussions had progressed in order to address concerns about the impact of fishing of the small pelagic fishery (SPF) on recreational fishers and the broader community.
Commonwealth Government permission for the Geelong Star to fish the SPF has been granted despite ARFF's legitimate ongoing concerns.