Reel Deal: Anglers get the big gear out

Outside there were still a few reports of yellowfin tuna out over the shelf that prompted a lot of anglers to get their big gear out again.

A lot of crews took to the shelf on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday this week and experienced great weather and while locally there were a few tuna caught off Wollongong and Sydney, radio reports suggested there was far too much water between fish and most of the fish that were captured ranged around the 30/50kg mark.

With the 25th Annual Wollongong Game Fishing Tournament on this weekend there hopefully should be some good fish tagged and a few potential line class records brought back to the gantry.

Snapper fishing has been good again this week - with no monster fish but plenty of tasty two to three kilo fish making for excellent table size.

The afternoon tide changes have fished the best and majority of the better fish are still coming from beyond the 50-metre depth line.

Along with the reds there are plenty of delicious big black spot pigfish and blue mowies spotted in eskys and there has been quite a few undersize rat kingfish being caught and returned as well.

The flathead drifts produced solid results over the weekend with again some big healthy fish being brought back to the table.

Bulli and Scarborough sand fished well as did Wollongong and Port beaches and average size was well over the 50cm mark and it didn’t take long for most to fill their bags.

Rocks have continued to fish well for bream and drummer with some brute pigs coming in over the weekend and also in the washes there were some solid trevally and some big groper getting about.

Beaches also continued to fish well with quite a few school jews hitting the sand before being tagged and released to be caught again another day.

Still plenty of bream and whiting about as well as the odd big flathead.