Offshore at Lakes Entrance

[CannonsJS]

With perfect conditions forcast for last Saturday me and the brother-in-law decided to get out early and see if we could get some decent snapper from the reef. When we headed out wide past the gas rigs a couple of weeks back we noticed what seemed like some decent fishing ground in around 40m of water so we intended to go back and try between 40 and 45m this time.

We launched the boat just before 6:30am and decided to sound up a couple of marks a bit closer in. Neither of them looked very promising so we continued out past 40m where we saw some decent looking ground with some colour above it. There was already one bloke close by so we tried to not get in his way and drifted off the spot for not even a bite. A bit of a re-position and down our lines went and straight away we were on. I landed a Morwong and my bro landed a nice 35cm pinky snapper. For the next 4hrs we did not stop hauling in fish after fish. Plenty went back but we went home with 11 pinky snapper up to 45cms and 10 Morwong.

It ended up being an amazing day on the water and we went back in around 1pm feeling fatigued from hauling in all the fish.

A few others also liked this spot.


Pretty amazing colours on the Southern Mauri Wrasse


Snapper cleaned whole and Morwong filleted.

[Lightningx]

That’s a nice session mate.
A good haul of fish.
Well done.
Cheers

[Bugatti]

Great day out on the water Cannon with the Brother in-law With a great haul of Snaps and Morwongs (have to be careful how to say Morwong )

I for one have hit 7.7 on the Jealous Scale.

Love ya work and a very nice post. Love pics

Cheers, Bugs

[Dr Snapper]

Nice!
What bait do the snapper like down that way, or, as usual, it doesn’t matter if they are hungry. Does the tide also affect fishing that far out?
With Victoria Opening up (a bit) it would be good to get to lakes e for a bit better weather than Melbourne over the winter.
Cheers.

[re-tyred]

Squid and pilchard are the go. You can often catch mackerel on a bait jig too. Tide is rarely a problem out in the deep. Best times are daybreak and dusk, a week either side of the full moon. The deep reefs ,40 - 45 MTR are mostly rugged and the best fishing is on the edge of the drop off.
S38°00.1050' E148°02.2270'
This will put you in the middle of the rocks out there. There is a reef about 1km long running roughly North-south. 45mtr on the edge 41mtr on the top.
Pinky fishing in winter and big fish in summer when the water temp is high 22c+ If the pipeline goes quiet in January- February this is a good spot to look. Plenty of reef here no need to crowd other boats

[denis barden]

Niccccccccccccccce

[CannonsJS]

Thanks guys. I'm still very new to the area and this was by far the best day I've had out there.

Yep, what re-tyred said. We were using mostly pilchard. They also took fresh slimy and couta we had as bycatch.

[Andrews]

Stunning colours on that Southern Maori Wrasse, what a great fishing trip!

[Bugatti]

When we headed out wide past the gas rigs a couple of weeks back we noticed what seemed like some decent fishing ground in around 40m of water so we intended to go back and try between 40 and 45m this time.

We launched the boat just before 6:30am and decided to sound up a couple of marks a bit closer in. Neither of them looked very promising so we continued out past 40m where we saw some decent looking ground with some colour above it.

Squid and pilchard are the go. You can often catch mackerel

Best times are daybreak and dusk, a week either side of the full moon.

The deep reefs ,40 - 45 MTR are mostly rugged and the best fishing is on the edge of the drop off.

S38°00.1050' E148°02.2270'

There is a reef about 1km long running roughly North-south. 45mtr on the edge 41mtr on the top.

Pinky fishing in winter and big fish in summer when the water temp is high 22c+ If the pipeline goes quiet in January- February this is a good spot to look.

Plenty of reef here no need to crowd other boats

Good advice

Very simple really, and the information is transferable to most areas spots (outside of the Co-ords) and just a tweak/adjustment for a specific spot.

Most "grounds" aren't confined to a specific GPS Co-ord , , , , just sound around and BINGO, there it is on the sounder , , , , nice ground with fish (if no fish, just pick a nice structure and they shall come)


And you don't "need" hi tech sounders. mine is an Ol black & white job

And gotta love Slimy as an extra bait, beautifully perfect as a cutlet

As re-tryred said , , , , no need to crowd other boats
Not sure why we keep saying that , , , , those that know that, don't need to be reminded , , , , AND those that , , , , well they don't care, no matter how many times you say it


Cheers, Bugs

[DougieK]

Killing it.