Phil Stanley and Hal Harvey

SQUID are teeming along the metropolitan beaches this week while chopper tailor, bream and flathead are biting in the Swan River.

Metropolitan

Squid have remained popular, with good hauls from Cockburn Sound and Hillarys, where bags have improved significantly. Grant St Reef has yielded decent tailor, with better catches available from northern metro beaches. The Swan has also fished well for choppers, with trolled lures worked along the edges of channels likely to bring a result. You need to watch the legal size of the river tailor (300mm), with low tides best to catch them. Yellowfin whiting have moved into the lower Swan, but the general size for them is smaller than in a normal season. Black bream are widespread in the Swan, with some saying they are spread from the Causeway right up to Maylands and Ashfield. Try the Burswood area for flathead, and also the Fremantle bridges to Point Roe. Gummy sharks have turned up at Quinns Beach and the Five Fathom Bank has produced pink snapper. Excellent sand whiting catches have been taken between Rottnest and Fremantle, with skippy found 6-10km off Mindarie and big king george whiting around 25km off the coast.

Moore River

The Three Mile Reef has fished well for tailor, with black bream better pursued towards the river mouth as algae has made things harder upstream.

Mandurah

An amazing run of jewfish has surprised some. John Klaus, a rod builder at Totally Wild, was among those who could not get away from them. Initially fishing out wide from Mandurah, his party caught and released jewies, keeping some from 12-15kg. When they moved closer to shore to try for skippy and whiting, they still hooked jewies. Dawesville Cut juvenile salmon have provided fun and been a good size, while herring have bitten better on an ingoing tide. On the beaches, tailor have been bigger south of the Cut, including some of 50-55cm, with those north of town generally smaller. Most of the crabs around have been undersize. Bream fishing in the Serpentine and Murray rivers continues to improve as the salt water moves upstream.

Steep Point

Coastal Angling Club members on their annual Steep Point trip found water temperatures lower than normal for this time of the year, consequently spanish mackerel activity was limited, as were tuna numbers. Pink snapper, baldchin groper and tailor made up the bulk of the moderate catch, with Paul Fathers bagging the best of the pinkies. A combination of high winds and ever-present sharks further hindered their cause.

Source : PerthNow