Into the seaway at 1.30am with the bottom of the runout tide the water was fairly dirty with a 1m swell and there was a 10kt Southerly breeze.  Tried a few locations but not even a bump so moved back into the broadwater caught 1 small bigeye on a popper.  Moved back into the seaway around 3am for the run in tide tried again in a variety of locations but still not even a bump.

Anyway while I was scooting about I noticed some garfish on the surface near the north wall, quite a few of them so I decided to do some trolling incase there was something hunting them.  A couple of minutes into the troll run the XR10 got smashed and it took off at warp speed heading out to sea, he then changed directions heading towards the south wall so I followed him over, then he ran back to the north wall side and I followed, then back to the south side again.  By this time we were getting dangerously close to the pipeline and it was still hanging close to the bottom. I knew I had to go hard on him or lose him as he swam under the pipe so I redlined the tackle using my finger to lock up the spool on the lift, careful to release if he made a run.   Whatever it was was big and heavy and didn't appreciate being lifted, I managed to get him over the pipeline though and he took off heading towards wavebreak.  Down near wavereak I got my first look at him as he came close to the surface, a big eagle ray.  From there he stubbornly sat under the boat with me gaining a little bit of line and him taking short runs for the next half hour.  We we neared Crab Island and the water got shallow I finally managed to get him close to the boat and unhook him, he was hooked in the mouth as well.  He was a big fella, wingspan was well over a meter, probably close to 1.5m  Anyway I sent him on his way and headed back to the seaway.

Dawn was well advanced by this stage so I switched to shallow running minnows with the zipbaits system minnow 15f the first choice.  That was smashed a couple of casts later and yielded a nice tailor at 59cm.  Over the next hour I landed 10 more tailor  half were 54cm and over, the rest were around 30cm.  I alternated lures between the 15f, vision 110 and 20g twisties.

They went off the bite there so I tried the pipeline for zip had a look down at wavebreak just incase.  Nothing there so I headed offshore to get some livies, managed some nice yellowtail and slimies.  Back at the seaway I livebaited for a while and pulled in a nice jewie at 82cm, then followed it up with 2 more small jewies at 40cm & 65cm.   That was pretty much it for me, a couple more hits but nothing solid.  There were quite a few small jewies landed but I didn't see any more big ones, a couple of decent tailor landed buy other boats though.

So an interesting morning, the wee small hours are yielding little as the Tarpon seem to have moved upstream into the rivers.  I'll give it one more shot then I will probably only fish from predawn(3.30) until summer is over.  The summer tailor season is now well underway and the seaway should fish well for them until the end of december, should be a few bigger fish around as well.  Hopefully we'll see some bigger popper munching tailor as we get close towards december.  No sign of the bait yet, water temps were 21 degrees in the seaway, up to 25 degrees in the broadwater.

Into the seaway at 2am, the swell was up to 2m+ and wind was still blowing at around 10 knots from the south.  Checked out a few locations but only had a few bumps so I moved back into the broadwater.  Picked up a few small bigeyes & tailor  on plastics and poppers but nothing too exciting.  First light was at 4am so I moved back into the seaway, fished the pipeline briefly for zip before moving out to the north wall.  With the swell up there were some excellent wash areas to fish and I switched to a vision 110,  on the second cast got hit by a good fish which turned out to be a 57cm Tailor.  Picked up another tailor around 40cm shortly afterwards.  Tried poppers for a while and had a few good hits that didn't connect but other than that it was quiet on all fronts. I did see one salmon caught by another angler.

I left there as I wanted to spend some time in the broadwater looking at some spots that usually hold bigeyes this time of year as well as checking out some new ones.  First spot I looked at held plenty of bigeyes and tailor and it was a fish a cast on 20gram twisties but they were all small fish between 30 & 40cm.  That lasted about 30mins before they shut down so I moved on.  Looked at a few more spots before finding another big school of bigeyes in a new location, same thing again a fish a cast for about 30 min then they shut down all small fish.  I started off with twisties but after 10 or so fish I switched lures to the new 68mm shimano waxwing, an interesting lure but the hookup rate with its standard heavy guage double hooks was shocking,  I'm going to switch to size 4 owner ST56 which should solve that problem.  It has a nice twitching action though and I'll give it a go in the seaway washes over the next couple of months, there's a bigger model which should be ideal for it.

Anyway tried a few more spots for zip then called it a day around 8.30am.  Water temp was around 21-22 degrees.  Visibility was about 5 metres near the top of the tide, about 2 metres near the bottom of the tide so very nice clean water. No weed.  No sign of the bait schools yet.  Way too rough to go offshore.

I thought it's be interesting to keep all the sharked fish pics from the seaway in one place so here they are.  A reminder of what lurks in the depths of the seaway at times.  I'll add more as they happen.

Jayde had this GT sharked just north of the north wall on 28/6/13

Gordo had this estimated 85cm Jewie sharked near the pipeline on friday 26/4/13

Thanks to Steve for this pic, an est 85cm Jewie was sharked in the seaway on 25/4/13

A 50cm Tailor bitten by a shark in close to the mid north wall on the 13th December 2012.  The shark must have been following the school, as soon as we hooked the first fish he was chasing them.

Thanks to Mick for this pic, A 60cm + jack eaten close to the boat. March 2012.

15/3/12 Another jewie est 65cm sharked in the deep hole...

27/2/12... A small jewie eaten along the runway, we lost a few other fish as well.   We also had a 2 metre+ whaler chase another jewie up to the surface and came out of the water about 2 metres away from the boat..awesome!!

Small bigeye taken along the dropoff of the north wall flats, a place I've named 'Shark Alley", thats the 3rd bigeye I've had eaten in that stretch this year.

Thanks to Gordo for this pic, an est 9kg jew sharked near the pipeline.

And this is what does it.. plenty of 2 metre plus whaler sharks hang in and around the seaway.

Moved into the seaway at 1.30am, the moon was up but the swell was way down and there was a light SW wind.  I had a quick flick around to see if any tarpon were around but I had other plans in mind for the wee small hours.  I left the seaway and headed into the broadwater, I wanted to find some pike before sunup and spent a couple of hours checking out any likely holding locations: Bridges, jetties, marina's and beacons.  Most locations were barren and the bottom of the runout tide did not help but I did find a decent school of pike in one area and managed 3 before they shut down, the only trouble was that they were huge, around 45cm long.  Big pike are not as effective as the smaller models as livies as they are only taken by very big fish, the ideal size is around 30cm.

Anyway once I had them I moved back into the seaway and tried again for tarpon but only managed a couple of half-hearted hits.  Dawn was arriving so I setup the livebait rod and sent down one of the pike, the runin tide had well and truly started by now and the strong tidal flow made it impossible to fish such a large livie even with a 5oz sinker.  I gave that away and started off with lures, it was pretty quiet around the north wall with only 1 tailor to show for it, though I did get a few decent hits working the edges with shallow running minnows.  Another angler managed a nice little kingfish.

I moved down to the pipeline and sunk a twistie down along it.  By the time I tightened up I had a decent fish on which turned out to be a 57cm GT.  Next drop the twistie was smashed a couple of turns into the retrieve and the fish powered off, a much bigger fish than the GT it called all the shots and despite my best efforts I couldn't keep it away from the pipeline on 6lb braid and soon enough I feel the line grating over the pipe and the line busted.  Tried a few other spots but it was quiet so I moved offshore to get some livies for the top of the tide at around 8am.

The forecast for the morning was light to variable 5-10kts which was dead wrong as the wind was blowing strongly from the south at around 15knots.  As a result it took about 20 minutes to get to the bait ground pounding through the chop.  Once there I managed a nice mix of slimies and yellowtail, some of the slimies were huge, nearly 30cm long.  I headed back to the seaway slowly and began livebaiting with slimies.  Straight away the tailor were chopping them to pieces and I landed 4 Tailor in a row all between 45 and 55cm.   Unfortunately that was it, after the tide began to slow the livies were ignored and most of them died on the hook.  Surprising that I didn't catch any jewies even small ones but thats fishing for you.  I did see a nice cod and a small jewie landed on a 7inch gulp by another angler.  Tried a few other places but nothing was interested so I gave it away at around 9.30.

Not exactly a stellar result but the pike spot I found should prove handy for first light livebaiting on the right tides.  The weed has almost gone now with only a few small bits at the bottom of the tide.  There are quite a few schools of small kingfish in the seaway at the moment, could be a return to the awesome 2007 summer season where there were hundreds of kingfish that held in the seaway for a couple of months. Lets hope so.   The frogmouth pilchard schools should show up between now and the end of november, when that happens prepare for some action packed sportsfishing.

Yesterday me and mate come down to south wall around 4pm.  Try spinning around all over the wall.but nothing .and than i decided to go up the wall and my buddy wana go down so we split.Thought of try toasting plastic for jew so i prep my heavy outfit.  Few cast and felt a little touch ,and than on my 4th cast on plastic.  I am "On" couples of big head shake than  heading out .than arc to right and i applied more drag.fish slow down and took off again.  I tried to hold the rod in one arm and other try to reach the phone in my pocket and ring my mate.  Told him to bring the gaff.few min later my mate came in but without gaff.And look at me and said he forgot to bring the gaff from home.and he said he will go down if the fish comes up.the fish stop so i start pumping the rod and try to gain the line back, while I try to guide the fish where we could land and the fish start to run again to the left.  So i started to jump from one rock to another. And i then i looked back and there were like 20 people watching me. Some have even taking their best seat on the rock.

I start to get tired trying to fight on nearly 10ft rod.the fight is nearly already 30min.while i was moving from one rock to another suddenly my line gone slack.I yelled'f**K'.  i thought i lost it . And as i winding back my slack ,the line get tight and fish is still on.  With my hope is back on i run down the rock close to water ,And i pumped and wind. As i was lifting the rod i can feel the massive weigth at the end of the rod.And i know it was big fish.After few painful rod work the fish surfaced. Everyone on the rock screem. And i was in shock. Massive jew. My buddy call it 20kg at least. I try to guide the fish close to the rock and suddenly my line goes "pop".The fish was floating on top for few sec and swam away.I was disbelieved.  My body was shaking.It would have been my biggest jewie ever.I just say nothing but all i did was smile with disspointment.My mate comfort me and others said "its ok and go and get one more".And i looked up and say thanks.After i looked at my 60lb leader its been through hard time rubbing against the rock. It was solid fight for about 45 min.Never fought for jewie that long.  Any how i have to go back and try again one more time another day.  As old say "Dont brag it if you cant prove it". So till the next time" tide line"

Into the seaway at 1am, I started off as usual by looking for Tarpon.   Took a while to find them but find them I did, not big numbers and needed a quite a few casts for each fish but landed 5 and lost 3 all between 55 and 60cm.  Was trying some new plastics today, Zman 3" streakz and 4" curly tails.  The 3" streakz worked okay but they weren't interested in the curly tails.  The ecogear grass minnow is still worked better though.  Anyway after an hour of that they went off the bite which was odd, usually when that happens there's a reason such as a tide change or sunrise.  This time there didn't seem to be a reason for it.  Anyway I left the seaway and headed into the broadwater to see if I could get some pike for dawn, I dropped a couple but all I could land were small tailor.

Back to the seaway for dawn I fished around the north wall with twisties, poppers, minnows and plastics but that yielded nothing which was surpising as the water looked very good.  I moved down to the pipeline and tried dropping plastics and twisties down along it.  A school of about 20 small yellowtail kingfish followed up a plastic and swam around the boat for 5 minutes and I managed to hook the runt of the litter on a pearl gulp which after a feisty fight went 53cm.  His mates hung around for most of the fight then disappeared as I brought him on board.  I couldn't find them again and spent some more time fishing around the pipeline but got nothing.

Decided to give up on the lures and headed off to get a few pike, I managed 3 fairly quickly and as it was the runout tide I didn't want to spend hours catching heaps only to have no interest so I headed back to the seaway with those.  I had some new heavier traces this time with 100lb black magic mono, 60lb wire & 8/0 hooks, there's some big fish down there and I'm sick of losing them so I've decided to beef up all my livebaiting gear.   The first one only lasted a few minutes and the heavy gear knocked it over in about 30 seconds, a jewie of 79cm.   The next pike was down for the next half hour in various spots, pipeline, south wall and nothing even looked at it.  It died.  Back to the deep hole with my last livie, it got munched and all I was left with was the tail.  I only had the one dead one left so I butterflied it and sent it back down, it got hit within minutes and I hooked up on another good fish.     This was a tailor and a good one at that coming in at 69cm, bit of a skinny fish though and he had a recent wound near the tail, looks like a spear wound to me.  That was it for there, I spent a bit of time trolling around wavebreak and caught some more small tailor and flathead and was back at the ramp by 9am.

Not heaps of fish today and some interesting behaviour there, could be the small tidal flow was having an effect.  Good to see the yellowtail kings there in numbers even if they are small.  Water temps are still around 20 degrees, water visibility was high almost 5 metres at the top of the tide though it reduced quickly once the tide started to run out.

On the water at 3am, I moved into the seaway to look for Tarpon.  With the bottom end of run in tide weed was again a problem but thankfully not as thick as the previous trip.  Casting around with a pearl ecogear grass minnow on a 3/8 oz head it wasn't long before the first Tarpon hit and promptly jumped off.  The next half hour only had a few half hearted hits but once I changed position and got a different angle I finally managed to land 2 Tarpon in the high 50's, one of them had a deformed mouth which was interesting.

Dawn arrived and I changed tack to a 1/2oz pearl 7" gulp jerk shad.  With the tide just starting to run in I dropped it to the bottom and let it drift around with only the occasional drop to keep it close to the bottom.  After a couple of drifts I felt a thud and I set the hook, the fish powered off and headed into the middle of the seaway.  After a solid 10 minute fight the fish surfaced and was promptly netted.  It was a quality mulloway of 90cm, my second biggest for the year.  A few more drifts yielded zip so I moved and changed tack again.

I moved over to the north wall flats, and switched to a 20g twistie.  First cast right to the edge of the surf and I hooked up solid on a good fish.  A big salmon that looked every bit of 70cm launched itself out other water and after a torrid fight, I had him next to the boat ready for the net, unfortunately the hooks pulled..... easy release.  The next cast yielded one more salmon at 58cm and 1 more tailor at 35cm.   No more hits there so I tried around the pipeline for zip.  With the tide in full swing I decided to move on to the next part of the plan which was livebaiting the top of the tide.  So off to get livebaits, while they weren't thick I managed 10 or so pike in a couple of hours, also caught a lancer, flathead, tailor and a whiting as bycatch.

At around 9am I moved back to the seaway but before starting  to livebait, I threw some raiders around the front end of the eddy and pulled 3 more tailor in mid 40's.  That was it so as the tide starting to slow I began livebaiting  the first few livies got cut in half and mangled.  I then landed a slew of jewies...55cm, 63cm, 58cm and  a 78cm jewie.  I did hook one good fish which made a beeline for the rockwall and buried itself in the rock, couldn't stop it on 30lb gear.  Pulled the hooks on a couple of other big fish as well.  That was it for the livies so called it a day around 11am.

So a pretty good day overall and a classic example of the variety of quality species available in the seaway.  Good to see some tailor showing up at last, could be the start of the summer run of big fish.  Also good to see the north wall flats yielding some good fish in the last few trips.  It doesn't always yield fish but its an area worth keeping an eye on.    There's plenty of bait holding just offshore so hopefully we'll see some enter the seaway soon.  If that happens the action will be thick and fast.