Reel Life | Set the clock, set the hook

And when it’s time to reverse time, it goes to the season of autumn when the leaves fall and you ‘fall back’. Well, it works for me. Fish don’t tell the time anyway, so it doesn’t affect them. In their case it’s either light or dark.

In fact, the only things that are affected by daylight saving are people, the commerce industry and the curtains, or so they say. So for the next six months, when you think it is 5am, it is really 4am and so the answer to feeling sleepy is to go to bed an hour earlier. You might need to pull the blinds to keep the late afternoon sunlight out.

Well, we hung on as long as we could, but the winter games finished Sunday night when the Melbourne Storm played Penrith Panthers in the NRL grand final. Now it’s on to cricket and, of course, fishing, with the cod season reopening in just over a month and a half.

Speaking of the Storm, I noticed the forecast for the south-west coast of Western Australia is for some rough weather. I say that because it may reach us within a week or so, better keep an eye on it, just in case.

Now down to the tin tacks. The fishing in our region has not been too bad, despite the windy and sometimes wet weather. With the cod season closed, most action has been yellowbelly, redfin and trout.

The latter is confined to the rivers and streams in the north-east as well as late-season fish in Eildon, the Hume and Dartmouth. The number of redfin being taken has been patchy. At Eildon, redfin have been among the tree lines at Bonnie Doon and also around Peppin Point and Jamieson.

Mainly small fish are on the bite in Waranga Basin, with some in Greens Lake and Lake Nillahcootie, but by far the best results are still in the Hume. Yellowbelly have been taken on worms, small yabbies and shrimp, as well as on lures with a rattle.

Just about any of the waterways can and do prove productive for yellowbelly. One of the top spots in the irrigation channel between Waranga Basin at Rushworth and Colbinabbin is the usual haunt of Mick, the demon yellowbelly angler.

Time to head south for some saltwater action.

Rod Lawn from Adamas Fishing Charters at Queenscliff reports plenty of action in the bay and off the heads at Point Lonsdale, Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads.

Rod said snapper, mainly pinky size, were on the bite, with an occasional big fish among the catch. And most fish were caught on fresh bait such as squid, salmon or couta. He said that while some anglers were keen to use soft plastics, it was too early in the season to try using them with any hope of real success. He said salted pilchards were also worth trying, but the snapper were able to clear a hook because the pilchards were soft and easy for snapper to clean a hook with their first bite.

Because snapper have a parted mouth, it pays for the point of the hook to be clear of the bait so that anglers can get a good hook up when they strike.

Rod said he was also bagging other fish, including flathead, calamari, salmon, whiting and couta, and while offshore he was catching blue-eye trevalla and an occasional tuna and there were signs of gummy shark and kingfish around the dive wrecks off Barwon Heads.

In Western Port Bay the fishing is about the same, snapper along the edges of the shipping lane, whiting in the grass beds and gummy shark in the deep off Cowes and San Remo.

North of the NSW border at Eden, John Liddell reported snapper and morwong along the reefs as far south as Green Cape, with gummy shark and kingfish.

Further north at Narooma, Graham Cowley reported plenty of flathead along the sandy bottom and in front of Montague Island. And in the inshore reefs, you can find snapper, morwong and kingfish as well.

Still no action at Flinders Island according to James Luddington.

That’s all folks, stay safe until next week.