As noted last week, yellowfin tuna and marlin are scarce offshore although one angler reports fighting a southern bluefin. Large bust-ups of albacore are the order of the day and numerous albacore were tagged and released during the Merimbula Open.
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On the beaches Australian salmon have made it hit and miss with reports of sizeable fish at north Tura Beach one day but not the next! It should be worth trying Haycock beach for salmon. Best bait remains pilchard or try silver spinners.
The snapper season is in full swing and good quality snapper are available along our reef areas with early morning and evening prime fishing times. With the moon full, some excellent gummy sharks have been taken as well as great morwong. Chinamen leatherjackets are beginning to be a problem away from the reefs.
Up north at Tathra, chinamen leatherjackets have moved in with a vengeance over the flathead grounds and it has become almost impossible to get our gear to the bottom where the flathead are quite voracious. Looks like wire braid lines and hard body plastic lures are needed to fish the flathead grounds.
So far off Merimbula and to the south there are only a few chinamen.
Slimy mackerel remain plentiful at the Merimbula Fishing Platform together with a few calamari squid. Locals and visitors continue their wait for big kingfish to visit.
Reports from the Bega River, which council has kept open, include magnificent bream upstream from the launching ramp. Best bait is without doubt nippers. Flathead as well as trevally, tailor, bream and good size mullet are still biting in our estuaries.
The Merimbula Big Game & Lakes Angling Club’s next event is the 25th Merimbula Broadbill & 5th Southern Bluefin Tournament scheduled for July 7-10 & 14-17. It will be the second year this event has featured braid line allowing daylight fishing of the deep canyons for broadbill. This is a new technique pioneered in the USA.
Last week the Daily Telegraph featured Al McGlashin’s magnificent 222kg broadbill taken in daylight off eastern Victoria. To quote McGlashin; “Swordfish mania really has gripped Australia this season…and suddenly fish are being caught from the Gold Coast to Tassie. Sydney has certainly produced a few, but if you want monster broadbill swordfish then eastern Victoria is the place to be.”
Now that the “secret” of daylight Broadbill capture has been publicised, Merimbula’s Tournament provides an excellent opportunity for keen anglers to successfully make daylight captures off the Far South Coast of NSW. Perhaps the Merimbula and Tathra Canyons will match those in Bass Strait?
