Hey guys,
This is a report from last week fishing out in gippsland. Won't be a video from this trip just a few little clips and pics on instagram. Last week my plan was to head out west to target trout in lake purrumbete and bullen merri but the night before I was set to leave the forecast completely flipped and suddenly I was looking at 40+km/h winds and 30-50mm of rain over the days I was meant to be there. A quick change of plans and a frantic repack and I was now set to head to gippsland for bream.
My first day down in gippsland started with beautiful weather but it didn't take long for the wind to pick up. I made my way downstream flicking hard bodies at the snags and it wasn't long before I got a solid hit off an isolated log in 1m of water and a healthy flathead popped its head up. Not what I was here to target but a welcome catch and a nice way to christen my rod.
The rest of the day was a little on the slow side but there was enough action to keep me going with some nice bream feeding tight to the edges. Ended up landing 6 of them and missing a couple of others but never really found what I was looking for so decided to try somewhere different in the morning.
Day 2 I started nice and early working a bent over some edges that had mullet schools moving around, this didn't muster up even a swirl and after pedaling around sounding for a couple of hours without finding any bream I made the call to head in and move to a new spot while it was still early. After moving I found myself in a very different system and back to fishing edges in a river, this time I decided to predominantly fish soft plastics. I was seeing a few large marks along the edge but nothing really stood out as the spot I should be targeting so I decided to slowly work my way along the whole bank and see if I could make anything happen. It didn't take too long for my first hit, a subtle tap on the drop next to a snag and after setting the hook all hell broke loose. This fish was determined to get me back into its home and took plenty of line in the process. After playing the fish for a few minutes I finally got my first glimpse and it was a giant bream, after a few runs at the kayak and some tense moments when it went under the yak I got the fish in the net and couldn't believe how big it was.
I thought for sure this fish would knock off my PB but ended up equaling it at 47cm. This gave me confidence to keep working my way along the bank and try and find some more of these giants shallow and after an hour of hopping plastics out from the edge in the snags I had my second hit of the day. I immediately knew this was another big bream from the signature headshakes and after muscling it out from the edge let it go on some scorching runs out in the middle and slid it into the net.
At first glance I thought this was an even bigger bream but my eyes were decieving me and it came in at 45cm on the mat. Just up the bank from where I got this one I hooked into another. This fish clearly wasn't as big and while it still put up an admirable fight it wasn't long before I slid it into the net.
Only a little tacker at 41cm
After this things went pretty quiet and I had been fishing for a few hours before I got another hit and this one caught me off guard, a subtle take had me doubting whether it was a fish or not and a timid hookset lead to the bream going nuts before I had even started to get it out of the snags and it took no time at all before my leader rubbed through on the timber. I kept working my way along the bank and went back through the areas I had pulled the previous fish from but this proved to be the last action for the day. Quantity was definitely on the low side but with bream that size it doesn't matter.
Cheers Alex
