By Chris Pitman
With more favourable weather last week, anglers jumped at the chance to get out on the water.
The Geelong waterfront saw some of the region’s best piscatorial action, with anglers casting soft plastics to land pinkie snapper to 50cm along with Australian salmon to 1.5kg.
The action for land-based ‘Fishos’ picked up at sunset, with anglers having no trouble in finding good numbers.
Peri Stavropoulos and I fished Saturday afternoon, casting Megabass Hazedong Shads which snared Australian salmon to 1.5kg along the wall of the Geelong Yacht Club.
At times, we found schools of fish just slightly hitting the surface, and casting into the commotion resulted in almost certain hook ups.
Further round the bay from Clifton Springs to St Leonards fishers boated numerous whiting and squid. Whiting came to those along the Curlewis Bank in five to six metres of water.
Indented Heads became the go to location for squid with reef sections with anglers reeling in on artificial jigs in size 3.
If its 2kg big squid you’re after, then Queenscliff is the place. Over the past week numerous anglers landed bag-limit of captures with baited jigs fished deep over kelp beds the most effective approach.
The grass beds to the east of the harbour were also another squid producing location.
Offshore from Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads, gummy sharks have made themselves known to anglers.
Reports of five to six gummy sharks being boated in a session has been almost common over the last few weeks.
Peri and Michael Stavropoulos along with myself, set out Sunday morning making the most of a welcomed break in the weather.
After setting anchor, it was not long before Peri boated a Gummy shark of about 8kg that snapped up a pilchard.
Fishing on, we boated snapper to just over 2kg along with an impressive-sized cuttlefish.
Heading west, anglers found Southern bluefin tuna from Portland to Port Mac on the Victoria-South Australian Boarder.
In the estuaries, bream kept those casting vibe style lures busy with the bream schooled up in deeper sections of the river.
Freshwater anglers found it hard to stay away from Wurdee Boluc with the chance of hooking a trophy fish too tempting.
Michael Evans managed to land redfin to over 40cm casting soft plastics.
Stony Creek was another location where anglers banked redfin casting lures and like Wurdee Boluc, they were of a good size.
Up the road from Stony Creek, Moorabool Reservoir was ideal for lure casters after trout with rainbow trout to 1.5kg on offer.
Shallow diving lures like the Strike Pro Bonin spoon got the job done.
Next week venture out offshore weather permitting and chase a gummy shark.
Freshwater anglers keep casting away at Stony Creek and Wurdee Boluc.