Snapper season really kicked in over the past week, with anglers catching fish from Corio Bay to Queenscliff.
The bay’s sheltered waters were particularly popular, encouraging Anthony Ghin to set out last week in search of snapper. He anchored up, set out a spread of rods and boated a 2.2kg fish and a 1.1m gummy shark, both on squid in only an hour on the water.
The outer-harbour produced excellent mixed bags of snapper, pike, flathead, squid and whiting in reasonable numbers.
Adrian Cole and Mark Sesar fished for whiting off Mountain View Quarries. They used Mark’s secret burley recipe for a catch of 21 whiting from 35cm to 43cm as well as numerous pinkies, all in 4.5m of water.
Stevie Prior and Nick Panozzo chased snapper again around the mussel beds off Clifton Springs. They boated three snapper, with Nick landing his personal best of 8.5kg.
Steve then set out again with mate Steve Arthy to try replicating the earlier results. They soon had a five-way hook up and landed each fish, the biggest tipping the scales to 7.1kg.
Sam Pitman and Jimmy Syrigos fished similar grounds on Sunday evening. They were about to quit when Jimmy’s rod buckled over with a 5kg snapper, so they stuck around and Sam caught an 8kg fish, with both taking fresh squid strips around the change of tide.
Pike to 1m were taken over the spoil grounds off the Sands Caravan Park on Gulp Turtleback worms in Pumpkin Green. Flathead and pinkies to 45cm were also boated on plastics.
Queenscliff Harbour continued producing small squid on artificial jigs. Yamashita jigs in size 2.5 were best.
Queenscliff Bight held excellent numbers of squid, too. They were also a lot larger, up to 2.5kg.
Up the top end of the bay, Des Fielder and Rob Rizo anchored up in 4m off Point Cook with fresh squid heads. They eventually caught a 7kg snapper at 12.30pm.
The Barwon River estuary produced Australian salmon and King George whiting for anglers fishing form the banks with pippies and prawns. Anglers who went to the extra effort of pumping Bass yabbies caught bream to 40cm and a few mulloway to 65cm.
Offshore from Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads, Charlemont Reef hosted great numbers of pike for anglers trolling deep-diving hard-body lures.
The warmer months should also begin producing kingfish off Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads, where trolling lures or casting into busting schools of fish on the surface is most productive.
Snapper were holding in 40m in this area over the past week, with baits such as squid heads and pilchards accounting for most catches.
On the freshwater scene, redfin became more active, proving great sport for anglers.
The Barwon River around Queen’s Park harboured outstanding numbers of fish. Continually moving until finding a school of feeding fish was the key to success, especially when casting lures such as Atomic Shad 40 Deeps.
The average size redfin out of the river has been around 800g, which makes for great fun on light gear.
Last weekend’s Ron Nelson Memorial Junior Fishing clinic at Deakin University’s Waurn Ponds campus was a great success, with most kids catching rainbow trout to 350g. A redfin of 700grams was also caught with worms on a running sinker rig.
Daniel Furneaux recently fished Lake Eildon where he caught a well-conditioned brown trout of 1.6kg along with a chunky redfin over 1kg. Other anglers caught yellowbelly to 4kg while trolling deep-diving lures and casting Jackal TN-50s.
The next week’s options include fishing for snapper along the edge of the mussel beds off Clifton Springs, especially around the tide changes with fresh squid or pilchards baits. Freshwater enthusiasts could try the Barwon River for redfin on the warmer days.
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