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Unable to stay away from the tremendous South Coast fishing on offer at present, I headed back to Depot Beach again early Saturday morning, and was greeted by flat seas - once I paddled out from the shelter of the headland it became apparent that there was a fairly stiff breeze blowing.
With the drift as strong as it was I used 3/8oz jigheads, and was still struggling to keep the plastics down deep enough. After giving the 14-20m area a good going over and catching just about every variety of rubbish fish there is, I paddled in to start a drift in 9m, and immediately hooked something that felt a bit more susbtantial - the fish was taking line, but different to a snapper and with few head shakes, after a few minutes I was surprised and delighted when my first ever blue morwong surfaced. A gorgeous fish, I hope it tastes as good as it looks.
Shortly after I hooked what felt like a good snapper, but the hook pulled after the first run. I free spooled the plastic back down and hooked up again immediately to a smaller fish. This was the first fish I've caught on the 'Satay chicken' coloured 5" jerk shad, which has to be the ugliest coloured plastic ever (pumkinseed/chartreuse).
A couple more drifts and I'd had enough, and managed to convince Craig to take me to some of his secret drummer spots. A quick trip to the tackle shop was in order first, to buy an 8 foot rod for fishing lightly weighted bread and cabbage baits, my choice to go for the 6kg instead of 8kg version was foolish, as the rod snapped a couple of hours later on a big drummer when we were both pulling in opposite directions with all our might. Prior to the snap, we managed a good mixed bag off the rocks with leatherjackets, bream, drummer and 'cockies'.
As the shadows drew long I was keen for a quick session on the squid with some new jigs I just bought, so dropped Craig home and raced to Spot X, where I managed 4 nice shallow water inkers (and dropped 5) just as darkness fell.
The problem I now face is cooking a meal of morwong fillets and squid, which is so delicious that my girlfriend goes easy on me about the ink stains all over her previously pristine kayak (which I had borrowed for the day. The south coast is definately the place to be this time of year, with many species biting well.
