South West Pondering

By John Cahill

Big baits!

Its been pretty interesting to watch the trends in Victorian recreational tuna fishing over the last few years. One that emerged with a vengeance was the move towards micro lures as the go-to option. The late season run of whitebait into shallow waters over the last few years certainly justified a need to 'match the hatch' as fish locked in on tiny food sources can be hard to swing away, but this is not the only bait out there on all occasions.....adapt and overcome! This season for example is shaping us as one 'a little different' from the small lure paradigm at least at this point in time (its a long season)!

Adhek Maxx

Reports from recent months have shown that the fish have been gorging on a variety of food sources - from tiny crustaceans, red bait, pilchards, sauries and a barrel sized bluefin full of large arrow squid - there is certainly a lot more to temping tuna than just popular colors, and lures that worked 'last year'. In my opinion size of lures is a critical factor especially if fish are tuned into a particular food source however big or small that may be. Having my first hit out of the season, this last weekend I was fishing Portland with Andrew Smith, Jason Unsworth and Randol Tucker on alternate days. The inshore fishery was hard work around Bridgewater. Tons of bait (not sure exactly what it was) and uncountable number of dolphins suggested that there should have been tuna (and there were) however we failed to get a sniff, a pretty tough day was reported by most crews. The following day fishing wide over the 400meter line it was a different story with 10 bites. It was very interesting to have no problems getting hits from pretty modest sized tuna on lures up to 10 inches. The 12 to 15 or so inch sauries in their bellies probably tells the story though, I know people always say that elephants eat peanuts, but in the quest for better sized (jumbo) fish I beleve it always pays to have a bigger lure out there as well, that's just my opinion though!