Sunday 1st May 2016

Tackle specials and angling politics

from Downrigger Shop

Autumn always a great time for fishing but this year has been absolute corker. Thanks to our generous readers we’ve got some fantastic pics and reports for you. Let’s get started. My eldest son’s girlfriend tells me her best friend went fishing up north. I asked if she could send through a pic or two. Impressive, in every way:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew! Here are the photos of my friend's mackerel fishing trip in Coffs Harbour.

 

Well done! Especially from a small tinny. Kris Barber’s beast, Friday 29th April:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, here is a pic of yesterday’s best fish. Caught off Seal Rocks in 20m of water. Cobia went just on 20kg

 

So good, Kris! Just like your snapper:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, here is a pic of 1 of the snapper we caught this morning. Sorry didn't take any mackerel pics the other day. If i chase mackerel over the weekend i will take some pics.

 

News from Graeme Henderson. That’s a top achievement on light gear champ, I take my hat off to you:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew fishing Curtain reef off Morton island last week this model went 8.5 kilo caught on 6-14lb outfit. A real arm wrestle in 15 metres. 109cm.

 

Bevan in FNQ confirming Head Starts off the downrigger are a deadly combination for Spaniards:

 

​

 

Hello Andrew, here is our latest capture with the last lot of headstarts you sent us. The Cairns weather has been a bit ordinary of late but we managed to slip out and pick up Hannah's first Spanish Mackerel one morning. It was a good day out and the downrigger and headstarts did not let us down. It was good to see Hannah pick up her fish and it was a good photo op for her new Worlds Greatest Shave hair do. Regards Bevan

 

Go Hannah! Much appreciated, Bevan. Head Starts working for Geoff Selvey too:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, thought I would share a couple of photos from up North of some fish caught on the 'Head Starts’ you supplied. The pictures are of my son Joey with a sample of some of the fish caught at 'Sail City’, South West of Dundee Lodge Northern Territory last weekend. The Macks absolutely smashed the swimming Gars whilst the Bludger Trevally fought each other over the skippers. Unfortunately we didn’t raise any Sails, which were the target, because the the Macks and Trevally were too hungry. We were soon cleaned out of Gars and had to resort to towing lures which seemed to attract Mack Tuna. A fun day on the water even though we couldn’t find the Billies….the kid had an absolute ball!

 

Take a kid fishing! Good on you Geoff and hoping to see more of Joey’s accomplishments in the future. Regular contributor Ethan Montford getting into some great autumn wahoo action:

 

​

 

Caught off Cape Hawk, Forster

 

Markings are amazing, Ethan! Local news, and Matt Cassar is a fisho I’ve always admired. He’s representative of maybe 90% of the blokes on this page. A hard working family man with a trailerboat out in front of the house who gets out on the water nowhere near as often as he wants to – just like all of us. But when he can get out there he goes hard. Last weekend he was fishing on his mate David’s boat and nailed a billfish. I’m extra chuffed because the lads used our bent butt combo and copy Zuker trolling lure to do it. Well done boys that’s fantastic:

 

​

 

Hi Andy just wanted to give a report of our weekend exploits. On Saturday we hit the water early on David Franks cruise craft. Straight out to Browns put the spread out for a blue marlin we fished for 6hrs with no luck we headed for the Shelf and just as we hit the top the shotgun went off with over 200m of line out now in the first run  we thought was a blue ended up being a shortbill spearfish. The first for us

 

​

 

Congratulations to David and yourself Matt! Super grateful for your support. Leo Miller breaking open the Tasmanian broadbill fishery. Keep this gold coming champ –PLEASE!

 

​

 

Hi Andrew,

Tas keeps producing with Swords being taken pretty much every day. We got 2 late week keeping a 177kg and tagging a 90kg.

 

​

 

News of the Weird and I was cleaning up some old tackle boxes this and found this gem. A wooden Bellbrook bass lure, maybe from the Sixties, in original packaging with the instructions page. Super chuffed:

 

​

 

Thanks, Gatesy! I’d forgotten how small they are, but that doesn’t make them any less deadly:

 

​

 

Andy, caught a little prawn and then a blue ring octopus tonight and while I was explaining to my 6 year old daughter how dangerous they are (despite being pretty) and the octopus attacked and ate our only prawn.  Here is a piccy

 

Sean from Shannon Outboards sends a sad story – which is also a good warning:

 

​

 

Hey Andy bit of different info this afternoon To everyone who owns a fiber glass boat .Prevent this from happening to you. Ensure all though hull fittings are sealed. Bungs, skin fittings, well drains, canopy clips, transducer screws and anything thing else. This customer didn't, he had this out on the water with 115HP hanging off the back transom. Its so rotted it fell out so please keep a eye on your boat

 

​

 

Thanks to Dan for this worrying heads up:

 

​

 

Ive mentioned this plenty of times and fisheries also recommend not using them. Woolies, coles, babina do not advertise this warning when they sell these prawns. Plenty of fishos use them. Its unknown what affect the bacteria can do in our waterways.

 

That’s a good heads up, Dan. To tackle, and some kind words from Troy Bell:

 

​

 

Downrigger is the best. Purchased about 4 years ago and it is as tough as. The downrigger shop has even provided several upgrades (star drags etc) long after my purchase. Talk about after sale service. Rods, reels and gear always being tested in the field and kept up to date. Intel on fish is relied upon and much appreciated. Keep up the good work.

 

Will do Troy, especially after your generous encouragement. The aftermarket power knobs feel so great when your fishing involves a lot of winding – like spinning, or jigging. But they look so much better, too. Check Nguyen’s install, before and after:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, thanks I have just received the reel knob and it suits the Penn Fathom 15 Lever Drag perfectly.  Can’t wait to test it out but it already feels better than the standard rubber grip.

 

You’ll be pleased, Nguyen. Here’s a good deal for you, lads. 7/0 straight shank hooks in a 200 pack. These can be ganged without tools so ideal for rock, beach, or mackerel fishing. Good for charter boats, tackle stores, or that trip to the Swains with your mates. Quality saltwater hooks at the great price of $48 for 200 - *including delivery.* Send me an email if you’d like to order?  They’ll never be cheaper and we haven’t many left:

 

​

 

Just a quick heads up to mention I’ll be giving a talk at St George Angling Club here in Sydney next Wednesday. Topic, your first run to Browns: jigging, and deep dropping. They’re a super friendly bunch who get a great roll up at meetings, so please join us if you can? Here’s the details:

 

​

 

Where: The club is on cnr Smith St and Alexander Ave, Taren Point (at the end of a right of way)

When: Wednesday 4th May. Meeting starts at 7:30 and talk usually starts about 8:15-8:30

See you there for what will be a good night. Jay Barker, now a fishing guide on Norfolk Island. I follow this bloke’s adventures the way I used to follow No. 96, back in the Seventies:

 

​

 

Fishing up north was tough to say the least. So much fresh in all the systems from the recent rains shut most of the fishing down but we finally cracked the code on the last few days.

 

​

 

Mate you always come through. Paul Marrum has fished on our boat many times this year. But this action machine can’t get enough on-water time:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, hope all is well and you have been out on the water. After a busy school holidays with the kids, I took some time out last week to flick some lures on the kayak. I'd 'almost' forgotten how enjoyable stealth fishing can be.

 

Good one Paul and grateful for your pic. Andrew Westlake offshore in SW Vic today. Very good of you to send a report after a big day on the water, champ:

 

​

 

9 solid school SBT and got a tag in one too. Many boats had success from Warrnambool to Portland.

 

​

 

Adam working in Nauru with his family, the place is a fishing paradise. Here’s his latest update:

 

​

 

We have been catching some good fish of late, the first is my 10 yr old Elijah with a 14kg yellowfin caught on a red halco max. we had to retire the lure as the front hook mount busted while trying to get the lure out of the fish. split ring was a mangled mess too…lucky not to lose that one :)

 

Not much to report from yours truly, because we’ve been super busy moving house, over the last couple of weeks. With inshore pretty quiet and the 100m kingie reefs dead we’ve been heading wide for deep dropping in 400m +. That’s worked. Here’s Callum with a gemfish from Browns:

 

​

 

We backed up last week and found some good marks where the Mountain slides away on the eastern side:

 

​

 

They produced this solid blue eye, for Dan:

 

​

 

With good weather forecast for the end of this coming week super keen, for another Browns run.

 

 

To politics, and regular readers know how worried I am about the soon-to-be-announced Sydney marine park. We fishos are facing a perfect storm at the moment. The politicians who told us they would stand up to the greenies, are instead selling out to the greenies. And every day brings new revelations as to how bent and selfish these people are. More concerned with feathering their own nest, than they are with doing what they promised us. That’s not good news for the marine parks decision. Check this out - NSW MPs padding their incomes, with well paid do-nothing committee positions. Keep in mind that Duncan Gay is on a salary of around a thousand dollars a day? And has been in the NSW Parliament for 37 years, meaning his superannuation amounts to many millions of dollars. That doesn’t worry me, as long as he gives value for money. He doesn’t:

 

​

 

Here’s what we’re facing. Danny writes:

 

​

 

44 sites the greens want to lock out, most are safe and popular fishing locations and these are wanted as dive sites only even in the recreational fishing haven in Botany Bay and pretty much 90% of Sydney harbour including whole of parra river and middle harbour manly cove north head to the gap

 

What can be done? There’s no easy answers. The submission process is corrupt, as we saw in the bag limits review. The marine reserves themselves have negligible conservation benefits, as we observed at Fish Rock. They’re mostly driven by the unholy alliance of the charter diving industry and the deep green lobby inside both Fisheries, and National Parks. But we do have one arrow left in the quiver. That can be fired on election day, 2nd July 2016. We know that neither Labor nor Liberal governments – in this state, anyway – keep the promises they make to fishos and boaties. One party that has gone into bat for us is Shooters and Fishers, who traded their support on key legislation for a five year moratorium on marine parks in NSW. While South Australian waters were being locked up, that saved us here. If you want to defend the sport we all love make sure your Senate vote (on the big ballot paper) is for a party that doesn’t ask ‘how high?’ when the greenies tell them to jump – like Labor and the Liberals do.  More to follow as the election draws near and thanks to all those who contribute the reports we enjoy,

 

Andrew Hestelow

Managing Director

Autumn always a great time for fishing but this year has been absolute corker. Thanks to our generous readers we’ve got some fantastic pics and reports for you. Let’s get started. My eldest son’s girlfriend tells me her best friend went fishing up north. I asked if she could send through a pic or two. Impressive, in every way:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew! Here are the photos of my friend's mackerel fishing trip in Coffs Harbour.

 

Well done! Especially from a small tinny. Kris Barber’s beast, Friday 29th April:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, here is a pic of yesterday’s best fish. Caught off Seal Rocks in 20m of water. Cobia went just on 20kg

 

So good, Kris! Just like your snapper:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, here is a pic of 1 of the snapper we caught this morning. Sorry didn't take any mackerel pics the other day. If i chase mackerel over the weekend i will take some pics.

 

News from Graeme Henderson. That’s a top achievement on light gear champ, I take my hat off to you:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew fishing Curtain reef off Morton island last week this model went 8.5 kilo caught on 6-14lb outfit. A real arm wrestle in 15 metres. 109cm.

 

Bevan in FNQ confirming Head Starts off the downrigger are a deadly combination for Spaniards:

 

​

 

Hello Andrew, here is our latest capture with the last lot of headstarts you sent us. The Cairns weather has been a bit ordinary of late but we managed to slip out and pick up Hannah's first Spanish Mackerel one morning. It was a good day out and the downrigger and headstarts did not let us down. It was good to see Hannah pick up her fish and it was a good photo op for her new Worlds Greatest Shave hair do. Regards Bevan

 

Go Hannah! Much appreciated, Bevan. Head Starts working for Geoff Selvey too:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, thought I would share a couple of photos from up North of some fish caught on the 'Head Starts’ you supplied. The pictures are of my son Joey with a sample of some of the fish caught at 'Sail City’, South West of Dundee Lodge Northern Territory last weekend. The Macks absolutely smashed the swimming Gars whilst the Bludger Trevally fought each other over the skippers. Unfortunately we didn’t raise any Sails, which were the target, because the the Macks and Trevally were too hungry. We were soon cleaned out of Gars and had to resort to towing lures which seemed to attract Mack Tuna. A fun day on the water even though we couldn’t find the Billies….the kid had an absolute ball!

 

Take a kid fishing! Good on you Geoff and hoping to see more of Joey’s accomplishments in the future. Regular contributor Ethan Montford getting into some great autumn wahoo action:

 

​

 

Caught off Cape Hawk, Forster

 

Markings are amazing, Ethan! Local news, and Matt Cassar is a fisho I’ve always admired. He’s representative of maybe 90% of the blokes on this page. A hard working family man with a trailerboat out in front of the house who gets out on the water nowhere near as often as he wants to – just like all of us. But when he can get out there he goes hard. Last weekend he was fishing on his mate David’s boat and nailed a billfish. I’m extra chuffed because the lads used our bent butt combo and copy Zuker trolling lure to do it. Well done boys that’s fantastic:

 

​

 

Hi Andy just wanted to give a report of our weekend exploits. On Saturday we hit the water early on David Franks cruise craft. Straight out to Browns put the spread out for a blue marlin we fished for 6hrs with no luck we headed for the Shelf and just as we hit the top the shotgun went off with over 200m of line out now in the first run  we thought was a blue ended up being a shortbill spearfish. The first for us

 

​

 

Congratulations to David and yourself Matt! Super grateful for your support. Leo Miller breaking open the Tasmanian broadbill fishery. Keep this gold coming champ –PLEASE!

 

​

 

Hi Andrew,

Tas keeps producing with Swords being taken pretty much every day. We got 2 late week keeping a 177kg and tagging a 90kg.

 

​

 

News of the Weird and I was cleaning up some old tackle boxes this and found this gem. A wooden Bellbrook bass lure, maybe from the Sixties, in original packaging with the instructions page. Super chuffed:

 

​

 

Thanks, Gatesy! I’d forgotten how small they are, but that doesn’t make them any less deadly:

 

​

 

Andy, caught a little prawn and then a blue ring octopus tonight and while I was explaining to my 6 year old daughter how dangerous they are (despite being pretty) and the octopus attacked and ate our only prawn.  Here is a piccy

 

Sean from Shannon Outboards sends a sad story – which is also a good warning:

 

​

 

Hey Andy bit of different info this afternoon To everyone who owns a fiber glass boat .Prevent this from happening to you. Ensure all though hull fittings are sealed. Bungs, skin fittings, well drains, canopy clips, transducer screws and anything thing else. This customer didn't, he had this out on the water with 115HP hanging off the back transom. Its so rotted it fell out so please keep a eye on your boat

 

​

 

Thanks to Dan for this worrying heads up:

 

​

 

Ive mentioned this plenty of times and fisheries also recommend not using them. Woolies, coles, babina do not advertise this warning when they sell these prawns. Plenty of fishos use them. Its unknown what affect the bacteria can do in our waterways.

 

That’s a good heads up, Dan. To tackle, and some kind words from Troy Bell:

 

​

 

Downrigger is the best. Purchased about 4 years ago and it is as tough as. The downrigger shop has even provided several upgrades (star drags etc) long after my purchase. Talk about after sale service. Rods, reels and gear always being tested in the field and kept up to date. Intel on fish is relied upon and much appreciated. Keep up the good work.

 

Will do Troy, especially after your generous encouragement. The aftermarket power knobs feel so great when your fishing involves a lot of winding – like spinning, or jigging. But they look so much better, too. Check Nguyen’s install, before and after:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, thanks I have just received the reel knob and it suits the Penn Fathom 15 Lever Drag perfectly.  Can’t wait to test it out but it already feels better than the standard rubber grip.

 

You’ll be pleased, Nguyen. Here’s a good deal for you, lads. 7/0 straight shank hooks in a 200 pack. These can be ganged without tools so ideal for rock, beach, or mackerel fishing. Good for charter boats, tackle stores, or that trip to the Swains with your mates. Quality saltwater hooks at the great price of $48 for 200 - *including delivery.* Send me an email if you’d like to order?  They’ll never be cheaper and we haven’t many left:

 

​

 

Just a quick heads up to mention I’ll be giving a talk at St George Angling Club here in Sydney next Wednesday. Topic, your first run to Browns: jigging, and deep dropping. They’re a super friendly bunch who get a great roll up at meetings, so please join us if you can? Here’s the details:

 

​

 

Where: The club is on cnr Smith St and Alexander Ave, Taren Point (at the end of a right of way)

When: Wednesday 4th May. Meeting starts at 7:30 and talk usually starts about 8:15-8:30

See you there for what will be a good night. Jay Barker, now a fishing guide on Norfolk Island. I follow this bloke’s adventures the way I used to follow No. 96, back in the Seventies:

 

​

 

Fishing up north was tough to say the least. So much fresh in all the systems from the recent rains shut most of the fishing down but we finally cracked the code on the last few days.

 

​

 

Mate you always come through. Paul Marrum has fished on our boat many times this year. But this action machine can’t get enough on-water time:

 

​

 

Hi Andrew, hope all is well and you have been out on the water. After a busy school holidays with the kids, I took some time out last week to flick some lures on the kayak. I'd 'almost' forgotten how enjoyable stealth fishing can be.

 

Good one Paul and grateful for your pic. Andrew Westlake offshore in SW Vic today. Very good of you to send a report after a big day on the water, champ:

 

​

 

9 solid school SBT and got a tag in one too. Many boats had success from Warrnambool to Portland.

 

​

 

Adam working in Nauru with his family, the place is a fishing paradise. Here’s his latest update:

 

​

 

We have been catching some good fish of late, the first is my 10 yr old Elijah with a 14kg yellowfin caught on a red halco max. we had to retire the lure as the front hook mount busted while trying to get the lure out of the fish. split ring was a mangled mess too…lucky not to lose that one :)

 

Not much to report from yours truly, because we’ve been super busy moving house, over the last couple of weeks. With inshore pretty quiet and the 100m kingie reefs dead we’ve been heading wide for deep dropping in 400m +. That’s worked. Here’s Callum with a gemfish from Browns:

 

​

 

We backed up last week and found some good marks where the Mountain slides away on the eastern side:

 

​

 

They produced this solid blue eye, for Dan:

 

​

 

With good weather forecast for the end of this coming week super keen, for another Browns run.

 

 

To politics, and regular readers know how worried I am about the soon-to-be-announced Sydney marine park. We fishos are facing a perfect storm at the moment. The politicians who told us they would stand up to the greenies, are instead selling out to the greenies. And every day brings new revelations as to how bent and selfish these people are. More concerned with feathering their own nest, than they are with doing what they promised us. That’s not good news for the marine parks decision. Check this out - NSW MPs padding their incomes, with well paid do-nothing committee positions. Keep in mind that Duncan Gay is on a salary of around a thousand dollars a day? And has been in the NSW Parliament for 37 years, meaning his superannuation amounts to many millions of dollars. That doesn’t worry me, as long as he gives value for money. He doesn’t:

 

​

 

Here’s what we’re facing. Danny writes:

 

​

 

44 sites the greens want to lock out, most are safe and popular fishing locations and these are wanted as dive sites only even in the recreational fishing haven in Botany Bay and pretty much 90% of Sydney harbour including whole of parra river and middle harbour manly cove north head to the gap

 

What can be done? There’s no easy answers. The submission process is corrupt, as we saw in the bag limits review. The marine reserves themselves have negligible conservation benefits, as we observed at Fish Rock. They’re mostly driven by the unholy alliance of the charter diving industry and the deep green lobby inside both Fisheries, and National Parks. But we do have one arrow left in the quiver. That can be fired on election day, 2nd July 2016. We know that neither Labor nor Liberal governments – in this state, anyway – keep the promises they make to fishos and boaties. One party that has gone into bat for us is Shooters and Fishers, who traded their support on key legislation for a five year moratorium on marine parks in NSW. While South Australian waters were being locked up, that saved us here. If you want to defend the sport we all love make sure your Senate vote (on the big ballot paper) is for a party that doesn’t ask ‘how high?’ when the greenies tell them to jump – like Labor and the Liberals do.  More to follow as the election draws near and thanks to all those who contribute the reports we enjoy,

 

Andrew Hestelow

Managing Director