With September drawing to a close, local anglers are shaking off the winter cobwebs and gearing up for the warmer months ahead. Rods and reels are being dusted off, tackle boxes restocked, and boats rolled out of the shed. Once October arrives and water temperatures rise, fishing will only improve — but in the meantime, recent weeks have already delivered some excellent action.
With a windy few weeks, most fishing action has been concentrated in the estuarine and freshwater lakes and rivers locally. The Hopkins, Curdies and Glenelg Rivers are all producing good springtime estuary perch fishing, with most fish having now spawned and beginning to disperse and feed up hard. In the Hopkins, the best area has been the ski run, in the Curdies it's been the section between the lake and Boggy Creek, around the reefs. The Glenelg has been best just above Taylor's Strait. Anna and Andy Cumming had a sensational trip over to Nelson recently aboard their Quintrex 450 Hornet Pro. The pair reported that the schools of fish were sitting in Taylor’s Strait, with freshwater pushing the fish down. Lots of fish over 40cm were landed, casting a range of lures such as the Nomad Live Ops and Daiwa Bait Junkie soft plastics. They also put some new rods and reels such as the Daiwa TD Sol to the test, after scoring some deals at our Expo at the end of last month. If you're heading out for an estuary fish soon, you'll be best to arm yourself with a 1/12th oz #1 jighead (most are fishing between 2-4m depth) and a range of soft plastics. The hottest have been the Daiwa Bait Junkie Wave Minnows, Nomad Live Ops Radiax Grubs and Spectre Minnows, Z-Man Slim Swimz, Berkley Gulp 2.5" Grubs, and Rapala Crush City Creeper grubs. It's also essential to use a bit of scent; not only to help the fish find the lures but also to hold onto them for longer after the bite. Deep diving, suspending jerkbaits such as the Daiwa Double Clutch and Infeet Spikes can be deadly in a spring bite; as Mason Walpole found out on the estuary perch in the Moyne River recently. Another species which has been fishing well and keeping drags running hot is the silver trevally. These fish often fire up hard after a big sea and onshore wind, over in the Moyne River. We had a good opportunity for these fish last week, and lots of local anglers got amongst the action with dozens of solid silvers landed. Max Fry and Scott Gray were among those on the fish, both reporting good catches using worm style soft plastics on the bottom. Scotty was running the brand new Z-Man Finesse Wormz on the TT Y-Ting jigheads; a brand new soft plastic system designed specifically for targeting King George Whiting, but also mightily effective on the trevally it seems!
In the freshwater, trout catches have been a little quiet this week but the fish don't go anywhere! As the water begins to clear over spring (unless we get more rain), you'll need to downsize leaders, quieten your approach, and fish the deeper pools of the Hopkins, Merri and Mount Emu for best success. Soft plastics are perfect lures for spring trout, as the fish can be a little shy towards larger, noisy lures which have been cast at them all winter. The recently restocked Fish Arrow Flash J Shads are perfect, but the Nomad Spectre Minnow and Berkley Powerbait T Tail are also good lures, rigged on a 1/0 1/12th oz head. The Mount Emu Creek has become home to some very large carp since the 2022 floods, and while these fish haven't yet exploded in number thankfully, they're very large. Mick and Fergus Mahney went down for a fish early in the week in the Mount Emu to try for a carp; and Fergus ended up on the fight of his life with a massive 82cm, 11kg giant! These are one seriously strong fish and for an angler of Fergus' age to knock one over is a serious effort! Rocklands Reservoir is beginning to be the talk of the town; this lake always fires up during spring. Tim Vincent headed up during the week to break in his brand new Quintrex 420 Renegade, and after putting in many long hours of casting and trolling, he scored an 86cm Murray Cod on the last morning of the trip, taken on a Balista Hunchback surface paddler near Glendinning. The water temperature is still cold, around 12.2 degrees, and the yellowbelly are still very quiet. In another couple of weeks once that temperature hits around 14 degrees these fish should begin to bite hard. Currently the yellowbelly are still very sluggish and inactive after the winter, most fish caught (in low numbers) have been on bait. If you're heading up to Rocklands for a native fix, or a relaxing camping trip on the lakeshore; don't forget we stock a constantly growing range of native lures from all the big brands, as well as live scrubworms for some bait fishing.
This weekend doesn't look great for fishing, but since it's a long weekend and many will have extra time up their sleeves; I'm sure we will see some nice fish caught! Don't forget to send in your photos if you do, for a chance to score in our Golden Fish Award (supported by Daiwa Australia) - and tight lines!