Well what a year it has been, where 2011 was characterised by an excellent run of salmon 2012 was unquestionably the year of the GT.  I have never seen so many big GT's around for so long.  Lets hope they continue to show well into 2013.  Actually it has been a good year for trevally all round with some catches of Goldens, silvers, Cale Cale, Diamond, longnose and the ever present Bigeye Trevally. Oddball catches of the year included cobia and saddletail snapper.




Early in the year we saw schools off striped, yellowfin and mack tuna just offshore, the seaway itself held plenty of school size GT's, small jewies, bigeyes and tailor.  By late march the schools of Big GT's had arrived and were all over the place, from outside the seaway walls right through to crab island.  Timing was critical to catch them feeding though.  Tarpon also showed up in the seaway from March to May then headed back into the broadwater where they were only sporadically caught.  Yellowtail kingfish made an appearance as well but few were caught, the bait they were feeding on was quite small and they refused most lures.  By mid year the GT run was in full swing and some memorable sessions were had using a number of techniques trolling, jigging and casting at bustups.  A few hairtail showed up but most were small. Mack tuna were still around but mainly small fish.  Bigeyes, and jewies also were around but mostly small fish with the occasional larger fish.  By september we were seeing some decent schools of tailor but mostly chopper size, few were above 40cm.  Schools of bonito also showed up around the north wall and stayed for weeks, the seaway stagnated for a bit.  Late October saw the arrival of some bigger tailor and some of the larger bigeyes but not much in numbers.   December saw the return of the big GT's as well as some decent tailor and lots of small bigeyes.

So not a bad year overall, plenty of fish though not much in size except for the GT's which were very big fish on average, I upgraded my PB(now stands at 73cm) on GT's at least 3 times this year.  Lets hope in 2013 we get some kingfish that actually want to eat lures. Thanks for all your input this year, 2013 will see some big changes here but it should only make it an even better resource for all seaway fisho's.  More info on that later.

I'm thinking of making some changes to the site this year, but before I do I would like to know what aspects you like the most about seawayfishing.info.  Is it the indepth articles?  The up to date reports? Anything else?  What keeps you coming back to check the site?  If you don't comment I won't know so don't complain if I change something you like.  Also what aspects don't you like?  (too hard to navigate, not enough reports, not enough detail etc).

I want honest feedback so feel free to say what you want.

Into the seaway at around 3am, wind was light SW, swell 1.5m SE-NE. Had a look around, found a big school of fish sitting around the end of the north wall, looked liked bigeyes but they weren't feeding and disappeared as the sun rose.  Started off with 9cm Rapala Skitter pop and worked the edges, had a few hits that missed hookup but managed to land 1 tailor at 45cm and 1 GT at 55cm.  Quite unusual to get a GT on a surface lure around the north wall, its only happened once before.  He struck the lure about 1m away from the face of the wall, so he was probably cruising the edges.

Tried minnows and twisties but got nothing on them, pretty quiet.  No fish feeding on surface in the seaway.  Anyway by 5.30am boating traffic was building and the jetskis seemed to delight in roaring right along the edge of the wall so I headed into the broadwater and had a look around.  Plenty of bait sitting just south of crab island but no fish into them.  Headed offshore to look for tuna, went down as far as mermaid, saw a few scattered tuna but nothing I could get a cast into.  Came back, dropped some plastics around the north wall at the top of the tide but got zip, had another look in the broadwater but still nothing so called it a day around 7.30am.

Not exactly a stellar catch but the heavy boat traffic around may have made the fish a bit sketchy.  Need a decent SE blow to refresh things a bit, looks like we may get that next week.

Some good action this morning, on the water at 3.00am started off with some decent tailor on poppers around the north wall, landed 7 best going 63cm. Then had a look offshore but not much out there. Came back in and had a look in the broadwater and found some big GT's feeding south of crab island during the last hour of the run out tide, first time I've seen them feeding during a run out tide. The water was dirty but the fish were there and were smashing the twisties if you could get it in the right spot. Spent alot of time watching the birds movements to predict when the GT's would come up and if you got it in there on time you'd get a strike. Landed 3, 60cm, 71cm and I landed the biggest at 73cm, lost about 5, hooks pulled on 4 of them had one straighten a st56 treble. Not much bait around which is probably why the GT's weren't fussy. We stayed until the top of the run in but they didnt come up in numbers just a few strays.

Monday 10th

Well got out for a fish on monday down to the seaway from 4am til 8am, swell was small around a metre from the NE, got a few small (<40cm)tailor on poppers around the north wall on dawn, plus a couple of bonito on slugs. Not much bait or fish in the seaway itself, but tons of bait holding between wavebreak and crab. Didnt see any fish into them though and no big fish on the sounder. Dad pulled a 58cm tailor and 65cm jewie on 7" gulps at the top of the tide around the north wall, lost a bigger fish too.




Thursday 13th

Strong SE winds this time of year can bring in decent schools of tailor along with a few greenback tailor which tend to hug the north seaway wall during run in tides. I was watching the wind closely and decided it would be worth a shot on Thursday.  The wind was forecast to be 20-25kts but it dropped down to a moderate 10-15kts but the swell was 2m+, big dangerous conditions.  We arrived just on dawn and pulled a few tailor up to 50cm on poppers first then chased some surface busting bigeyes around the pipeline got 5 of those all around 40cm, once they went down we went back to the wall with minnows and prospected until we found a big school of tailor sitting in close to the rocks. While it wasnt a fish a cast, every drift yielded a couple of fish and there were some big fish amongst them, best tailor went 65cm, plus we got another couple around 60 and quite a few in the mid 50's. Dad took the honours of all the big fish(again) best I managed was 55cm. We also had a shark(1.5m) hunting the hooked tailor, lost a few and landed one chomped fish. Best lure was a white rapala xr10 which dad was using, I tried many other lures but all I got were small to medium fish. Heaps of bait around seems to be mostly white pilchards around 5-8cm long, tons of bait from the seaway all the way up to northern end of sovereign.

Friday 14th

Only had a few hours to fish today so we got there just on dawn, the swell had moderated and the wall was much calmer. Pulled one tailor(45cm) on a popper then 1 bigeye casting at surface bustups around the pipe.  Pulled a couple more medium size tailor on minnows along the edge but the big school from yesterday had gone.  Went into the broadwater and spotted some sporadic surface bustups but casting into the proved fruitless until dad hooked another good fish landing a GT around 65cm.  Saw some kingies come up a few times but unsurprisingly no hits out of them.   We cast into multiple schools of GT's as well but all our casts came back without a hit.  Had to go at 6.45am.  The seaway was thick with bait as was the channel all the way up to crab island.

So what we have right now is an interesting mix of fish all feeding on the abundant schools of white pilchards, interesting that they are whites as usually the majority of bait this time of year is usually frogmouths.  Tailor, Bigeyes, GT's, Kingfish, bonito are all feeding on this ample food at the moment but you need to be in the right place at the right time to have a shot at the larger fish.  Tomorrow should fish well for GT's in the channel between Crab and wavebreak about an hour after the tide turns to run in.  Still a chance for a greenback tailor around the walls, don't ingore the inner sections of the walls either, the school we found was well inside the seaway mouth.  Kudos to dad for catching all the decent fish this week, I caught plenty but nothing over 55cm.

Ok guys so I have now returned and am ready for some seaway action.  Thanks to all of you who have posted reports in my absence, I'm sure it has been appreciated by others as well.  Going by the reports it sounds like the froggies are in, and there are plenty of tailor and bigeyes around with the occasional kingie to make things interesting.   I'm surprised there hasn't been much poppers use so far though, the bigger fish this time of year nearly always fall to poppers at dawn or during a run in tide.  I'll be out there sometime in the next week to have a look around and see whats going on.

New registrations on the discussion board are still closed and will remain so for the time being as I'm still dealing with some other stuff, if you are really keen you can message me at the following link with your seawayfishing user id and I'll manually add you.

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I found a couple of new lures on my trip that should go well in the seaway, the first is the Bolt Omega, a 10cm trolling lure that dives to around 4.5 metres and consistently outfished the rapala XRD10, should be a good lure for trolling around the north wall, in current lines, near wavebreak and in the deeper sections of the broadwater. Its priced between $10 and $15, a decent colour range and stock hardware is good.  Next is the Ecooda Jerkbait, superb finish and nice action should be a winner edge fishing the north wall and when fish are chasing a larger bait such as hardyheads or whiting.  Price was around $15.00, very realistic colour range, stock hooks need changing though.