Outgunned and Outclassed - 16/9 Fishing at Coffs

Ben · Post by **Ben** » Sat Sep 16, 2006 7:01 pm

What a beautiful day to be on the water, low 20's, less than a metre of seas and 1.5 swell.

Ran up to the Park Beach Bommie for some bait, managed a scrawny yakka, couple of pike and some other fish that looked like it'd make a good livey

Baited up I went to Split Solitary, as usual I was swarmed by silver trevally and sweep the first drop of berley, I perserved and eskied a couple of nice trevally, and boated two 30cm kingies. There was a school of 60cm+ kingies but nothing I could throw at them resulted in a hit, they looked at everything I threw overboard though...

Moved a bit further around the island and threw plastics for a while and got some more good silvers, and a bluefin trevally. Hooked something that ran hard for about 30 metres before throwing the jig... prob a rat king?

Headed back to the harbour and thought I'd drop some squid onto the Park Beach Bommie and see if anything interesting showed up, when I got there I could see some fish busting up the surface just out of casting range, I figured they were choppers or salmon so tied a 10g raider onto my 2-4kg Bream Raider with 4lb braid (trevors are soo much fun on this combo) motored into casting distance and let fly, then I saw what it was busting up - it was a school of tuna in the 8-10kg range - oh Nuts!!!

Naturally, first cast and I hook up, it took a second for the tuna to realise what was going on, a couple of headshakes and then it just took off. I may as well have hooked a passing humpback. 600 grams of drag was nothing in the face of a not happy tuna. Fortunately the motor was still running so I chased off after it, it had gone deep and I wanted to avoid running over the line. Watching the 150m of 4lb braid tear off the little 30 size spinning reel brought both excitment and fear, I knew I only had about 30m of backing after the braid and with about 10 turns of braid left on the spool it was time to start palming the spool - pretty much straight away that busted me off.....

Not sure what sort of tuna it was, I thought Mack at first, but I couldn't see the squiggly lines on its back so maybe it was a longtail.

Anyway, enough trevors for a feed for a couple of days, what a great day on the water!

stinky · Post by **stinky** » Sat Sep 16, 2006 7:33 pm

Sounds kick ass! I fished the Pimpama river last weekend in a mate's boat, a few bream and a good 68cm flathead was the best we got ( also got two stingrays, and an eel, but through them back ).

I'm always surprised how tasty flathead is despite the fact it's a ground-dweller. I bbq'd one half, and beer battered the other. The Bream got smoked in my Cobb and were absolutely mouth watering brilliant!

vincentvega · Post by **vincentvega** » Sun Sep 17, 2006 10:34 am

i swear im moving to coffs some day, or somewhere very similar

your a bastard ben. i really need ot move back to the coast

Ben · Post by **Ben** » Sun Sep 17, 2006 9:00 pm

vincentvega wrote:i swear im moving to coffs some day, or somewhere very similar

your a bastard ben. i really need ot move back to the coast

Hey, at least you have been fortunate enough to visit the island above

I bought up on the good gear today and headed out, but alas no tuna to be found.....

julian · Post by **julian** » Mon Sep 18, 2006 1:34 pm

stinky wrote: I'm always surprised how tasty flathead is despite the fact it's a ground-dweller.

Is there a trick to filleting them? I just cant seem to do it properly.

stinky · Post by **stinky** » Mon Sep 18, 2006 2:27 pm

Yeah there is ... I haven't done it, but I've watched it done. From memory you cut the sides off right at the spine, then cut a V into the side either side of the bones to get the bones out. You end up with two fillets.

Ben · Post by **Ben** » Mon Sep 18, 2006 7:21 pm

Here's a nice Fish Curry Recipe to top it off..

2 tbspn Massaman Curry Paste
1 onion diced
2 tbspn peanut oil (or vege oil)

Fry til it separates

Add a can of coconut cream (400ml)

bring back to boil and add

cubed medium sweet potato
1 tbspn or so Palm or Brown sugar
3 tbspn Fish Sauce (or less if ya don't like it)
couple of chopped Kaffir lime leaves

Simmer until the spuds are soft and then throw enough fish chunks in - in my case 5 fillets from Silver treva's went in chopped up of course. Throw half a sliced capsicum in and cook until the fish is white.

Serve up with Jasmine Rice or noodles and a brew, enjoy!

D3V1L · Post by **D3V1L** » Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:30 pm

that was a nice touch...im gonna try it seing i happen to have a few fish fillets from the weekend....

dave

vincentvega · Post by **vincentvega** » Mon Sep 18, 2006 11:00 pm

i hate you ben.