North Australian FISH FINDER TM forums

I still have a look at old FFF 2-3 times a week,even though I'm living down here these days. The time has flown since I left,well over a year now....(still haven't unpacked some of my stuff ). I've recently bought a place down here off the plan,had to take advantage of the full FHMG the government were offering,so I'm pretty much grounded until that place is built...so for now,the medium range outlook is Melbourne,so there will be no retruns to the NT in the next 2-3 years I wouldn't think.

I frequent a lot of fishing forums,and this one is hands down the best as in people giving detailed reports of there trips and helping others out. The bigger sites down here are either ego fests or over run by 12 year old kids talking about fishing the local park dams.

Last year I said I'd keep putting up reports even though fishing 3000kms away,may be of interest to some,didn't do too many,but I'll have another go this year.

Over winter my life becomes entrenched in AFL culture. Pretty much all my life revolves around that time of year. Going to watch the saints,travelling interstate sometimes to games. Was a great year,almost our greatest year,but inevitably we fell short in the last 3 minutes. Was very hard to swallow.....was the one wish I had in life,too see them win a flag,we almost had it....anyhow,life moves on,slowly....time for fishing!

Think during winter itself the only fishing I did was a few trips down the surf around Kilcunda for salmon on a few sundays.
Didn't catch too many, a couple of good one's, but nothing to write home about



A few weeks ago I went down to Bemm River in far Eastern Vic for a quick trip on the weekend. Couldn't be bothered taking the cracker,(basically as I hadn't touched it since easter and knew it would need stuff fixed). Just a relaxing bank fishing weekend the river for Bream,and the surf for Salmon. The mouth was blocked,so the river was up high, managed a fair few nice bream,no monsters,all around the 450-650 gram mark.

Had a couple of go's in the surf,as it's normally ridiculous for salmon down there,but had a very clam surf for the weekend which I don't like fishing,but managed a few to about 1.3kgs


Fortnight ago thought I'd give a new destination a try. Lake Elingamite in SW Victoria,an old small Volcanic lake,doesn't cop much press,but heard whispers of some good trout and Redfin coming out of there so attached the cracker and went for a drive for the weekend. On arrival and driving down the crater I was annoyed to see 17 boats on the lake. It's only about 2kms long,and shallow,so was not looking good for easily spooked trout. Turns out there was a local fishing comp on that weekend.

Spent most of the day catching nothing apart from a 1lb reddie. Towards dark all the riff raff headed home and I was the last one out there shivering in the cold. In the fading light managed to get a good 3lb Rainbow casting a pink Tassie to save the day.

The next morning I was up ,but unfortunatly another 12 boats were on the water,so the trout were going to be put off again,so decided to chase the reddies,as saw a few caught the previous day. Was dead all morning,saw 2 fish caught for the morning. So went sounding around to try and find some structure or something. Found a nice little weed clump that rose 2 foot of the bottom,so anchored just up from that and cast out a small orange vibe and whack,first cast onto a great Reddie that was 3-3.5lb. Afew minutes later I got his twin,but alas that was to be it.


On returning to the ramp i noticed the wheel on the trailer was on a weird angle...closer inspection unveiled a blown bearing. Did the same one in the 08 run off coming back from Shady....must have done an ordinary change over job...pretty sure I did them about 6 months ago (could of been 12 months ago realistically...in fact was probably when I left Darwin)

Last weekend hit Port Phillip Bay for first time of the season at 4am hoping to open the account on the Snapper. However drew a blank...first one for a long time. It's been pretty cold and wet lately,and the water temp is still only hovering around 12-13.....so think they're still a few weeks off. Don't like going out there catching nothing,so i put a two week minimum suspension on going back out....(even though tommorrow mornings forecast is great..a suspension is a suspension!).

The outlook for the next few months is good. Snapper season is any minute away. We've had a really good spring in terms of rain, so all the Dams are rising. Eucembene is up to 32 and rising about 1.5% a week,with 150cm of snow still up there. It's going to be a cracking early summer up there,so I'm going to try and make 2-3 quick long hauls up there before New Years.
Eildon was up to 30% last week,which I'm not that happy about as I think my secret Yellow Belly bank is now well under water, and my other old favourite isn't fishable until it's at 38%....so will be an intersting season on the yalla's there,have too see what this years water level brings.
The south west has had some great rain also,so the estuaries down there should be good coming into summer.

Heading over the ditch again at the start of febuary for a fortnight to fish the Rotorua/Taupo region,can't wait for that.

The last week I have been buying lots of gear online(hence why I'm not away this weekend as i blew the budget).
You can make some great savings online if you know what you're looking for. I bought 70 trout flies the other night for $110...quite ridiculous.
With the Aussie dollar almost matching the U.S,thought it would be a good time to buy some lures over there. So I've put in an order for a squillion lures.....just hope they arrive now! With shipping and the $ diff,worked it out that it cost 1.52 times more than the advertised price,but still some great saving.
Have a look at Cabela's and Basspro
If you like you're rattlin spots on the barra you can buy them for dirt cheap.
Storm thundersticks are $4! Plenty of other good barra lures there too for next to nothing. Can also make some great savings on braided lines. I bought some trout lures that go for $16-18 here and got them there for $3-6....just hope they arrive.

That's about it for now. Next weekend I'll be heading away somewhere....forecast is not much chop next weekend,so might go for a drive and try out some of the Grampians lakes with the fly rod...never fished them, and they're all rising at the moment so might be worth a look.Weekend after up to the Vic high country for some small stream fishing and rabbit shooting.

Wowee,ended up going a bit long

Great post jonesy, those reddies are good ones.

I see Tassie has had record rain this winter, I suppose Vic would have copped some of that and lifted inland fishing prospects.

Magnificent report Jonesy, it was well worth the wait. I love reading about fisho adventures, and in particular I like the style of reports on FFF. I look forward to your next report and pix.
Cheers
tim

Hi Jonesy,

Nice report.

I lived in Melbourne for 7 1/2 years.
Spent a few years in Albert Park near Beaconsfield parade.
So I often would walk to the pier, where the spirit of Tasmania anchor.

And I often saw people fishing there.
One evening, I saw this old guy fishing, and something about him was not like the other...
So I went closer and started a little chitchat with him.
Seeing the size of his hooks (BIG for down there), I asked him what was he trying to get?
And first he told me :"ho just some mullet"...
I looked at him and told hime that the size of his hooks where actually just the right size to use the mullets as livies...
He turned around looked at me and told me: Ok kid, (I was nearly 40...), first I catch the mullet, then I put him on the hook, and then I catch one of these mulloways that swim just there...

What?!?!
I lived 5 minutes by foot from this spots for years, and was about to move and I just learnt that there is some mulloways to be caught from Melbourne itself?!?!
He then told me that it is just at certain time of the year, and proceed to show me the wake that one of them was doing just under our feet...
That must have been one of the best guarded secret in Melbourne, as apparently all the other guy didn't know about it...

Now, will you try?


Have a good day,
Pecheur

Enjojed your report, stay posting!

Great report Jonesy

Looks like you have settled back into the southern life

Miss seeing your reports and running into ya round the traps up here though.

Ya know ya can take the boy outa da Territory ... but ya cant take the Territory outa da boy .... we'll see ya up here soon again, I bet

Great to see you back on the post after your shattering GF day. Looks like you are still keeping busy on the fishing front great report and pics.
Did you photo shop the blue sky into the bream photo it almost looks sunny.

look forward to the next installment.

Brrrrrr..ice fishing in Vic

Over ruled my 2 week PPB ban this morning and headed out for a quick go before work. A squidgy fish hooked up on my Barra raider....great fight,11.5lb of first fish of the season Red!


Ended up with another on Scad


Gotta love heading out before work in spring time!

Great fish Jonesy they are good reds any where but cracking reds form PPB.

Snuck out thursday morning for another look. Masses of fish on the sounder,but they're just not feeding, think next weeks warmer weather will set it off.
Just the one and dropped one

Went up to Eildon to chase the yella's this weekend. Was quite warm and humid up there,into the low 30's,so I got burnt to the shizenhouzen. Was sitting on the bank yesterday disgusted with the sun thinking,there's no way I can head back to the NT....I hate heat!

Lake is up 10% to what it was last year,so our secret bank was way under water,so had to do some new exploring. Didn't do much damage,then found a couple of fish on a rock wall. They were fairly lethargic,follwing the lure in first,then hooking them on the next cast..three times this happened, only landed one,went 8lb,was the fattest little football you'd ever see.
After mid morning it was dead,and it stayed that way for the rest of the day.
Got a big storm around midnight that flooded out my mates swag which was a good laugh....about 2am he woke me up to tell me my boat was gone....the storm broke the shrub it was tied too and it drifted out,luckily tangling with a bait rod we had out and had only drifted 50 meters away and up against some trees,was able to pull it back with the rod,minor disaster prevented.

Sunday got up and tried a different area...wish I had of made that decision saturday. Got a couple more,and dropped a heap,the hooks just weren't sticking. Got one on a little vibe,the rest on old faithful custom craft extractor. By 8.30 they shut down,so we went home
Saw another bloke get about 6-7 on Jackalls. Seem to be deadly on them...at $35 a pop they'd want to be, will be getting myself a couple before I head back up however...

Good size fish Jonesey. You seem to be doing it pretty easy for a fish down there. I still cant get over the quality of the Reds that you have been pulling. Keep the reports coming.

Time for an update due to boredom.
Have only done a couple of trips on the reds past fortnight, for a couple of smallish one's each time. Hearing people say best season of all time,me and my mates marks aren't giving us those results though? Will get back into them next week

Took a few days off work and headed up to Eucembene for 4-5 days to get out of the stinkhole for a bit. Finished work at 8 and thought I'd have a crack at doing the 8 hour trip in one swoop through the night, last hour or so was a struggle but did the entire thing,keeping ourselves amused by having a scoring comp between roos and wombats running across the road. Had roos as the short priced favourites but the wombats punched above there weight and we ended up with a tie....enthralling stuff it was

Stayed at Buckendera again,good spot. Good bay right in front of camp where all methods are god,fly,trolling,bait. The lake was at 34.7% and onto fresh ground that hasn't seen water for 4-5 years. Unfortunatly they started dropping it last week again,but the fishing was still pretty good.

The trolling was ok for us,but others struggled. People just persist with Tassie Devils and that's it, however I've loaded up on Crickhoppers from the states and they're dynamite on a flatline compared to any other lure. The downrigger and leadline went off a couple of mornings on Pink Tassies,then the rest of time they struggled. Fickle things trout,they have pink days,when they'll hit a pink tassie with gusto,next morning they wont touch them or anything else apart from a crickhopper.

The mudeye under a float was pretty quiet as it's usually very reliable of an evening. Don't think they're quite on them just yet.

One arvo decided to lower myself to using powerbait much to my mates disgust. I'd used it a few times and caught nothing just like I'd thought,was reasonably convinced the reports were a myth. My mate who worships trout didnt want to lower himself to using it,thought it was disrespecting the fish. anyway I talked him around,we were out to mythbust. Put a worm on one hook and a pink powerbait nugget on a longer leader,a shoot off between a worm and a powerbait nugget.
10 minutes in and bang I'm on. Would it be on the worm or the powerbait? Up comes the fish and the worm is still dangling on the other hook,powerbait myth busted! Ended up getting 3-4 on the stuff. It's supposed to have salmonid feromones pumped into it,still,most ridiculous bait you'll ever use,especially the rainbow coloured one.

The flyfishing on dark was ok,the evening rise was spectacular but the fish were very selective. They came into the shallows on sunset on masse,never seen so many. They were on the tiny midges. We threw midgeball patterns at them to no avail apart from the odd one. Wasn't til late in the trip we did ok by putting a small nymph dropper 20cm behind the midgeball and they'd eat the nymph.
If you hooked every fish that rose and you covered it would of been a cricket score capture.

Ended up with 44,42 rainbows,2 browns which were both caught deep on the downrigger.

Will be back up there for 4 days over New Years.
Until then more snapper and Yella's at Eildon. Will try and sneak a trip down to Nelson also over xmas. Then end of Jan back to NZ for a few weeks.

Another early morning crickhopper victim


Couple of Browns caught on the downrigger


Powerbait strikes!


The freshly covered thistle line,where the rainbows would come in on dusk


Early morning trolling

Good work, just found this post sum top fish your making it look good down that way . I like the look of those reddys , tastey . Wats the go with the porn glass's , is this a fashion that will creap up to the territory ?