At this time of year, as the weather cools down and the days get shorter, a strange thing happens to the tidal flats around Wellington Point and Ormiston. The parts of these very shallow areas that manage to stay submerged on the low tide suddenly bloom into life with masses of thick weed. This weed lays on its side during low water and reaches for the surface on the full tide. Masses of baitfish, mostly hardiheads and herring, take shelter in the weed from the ever present predators. In few special areas deeper channels skirt the weedbeds, making natural access and ambush points for the hunters who don't like to venture too far into the shallows too often.
After messing around at home on Saturday morning I checked the bay conditions to discover it was a glass out and with only gentle winds expected for the rest of the day. On the spur of the moment I grabbed a couple of light rods, hooked up the boat and headed to the Wello Point ramp. Conditions were outrageously good and surprisingly only half a dozen trailers were parked at the ramp. I quickly launched and motored to a favoured spot, only about 800m from the launch point...
Last year Kyle and I discovered a great technique to fish these weedbeds, which often only had 10cm or so of clear water above them. Using 4lb braid and 15lb fluorocarbon leader on light rods, we would throw Storm 70mm fluttersticks (no longer made of course!) as far as we could and then work them back to the boat slowly with a twitch and pause retrieve. These slow sinking stickbaits are irresistible to hungry predators and can easily be worked in this skinny water. They will catch bream, flathead and pike but I was after another target - the hard fighting tailor...
A couple of early pike graced the boat before I heard the sound of rain behind me. Skies were sunny so I looked around and saw thousands of baitfish clearing the surface in a frantic attempt to avoid a school of tailor that was hitting them from below in around 1.4m of water. Tailor started to clear the surface as well as they fed and my flutterstick was engulfed as soon as it hit the water. A good fight saw me slide the net under a 40cm tailor. The bust-ups were still happening, so I threw back into the melee and immediately hooked up again to a similar sized fish. He pulled the hooks (I went too hard) so I was a bit more gentle on the next hook-up 30 seconds later. Another 40cm fish...
This pattern continued on and off for another hour. Me chasing the many bust-ups in the shallows under electric power, hooking and losing most fish but landing the odd tailor to 44cm. One small bream and about 10 pike also hit the deck. Then the tailor just disappeared as quickly as they came. The light was fading into the early evening at a time when I expected the bite to improve rather than stop! Anyway, I hunted around for awhile before deciding to try one last waypoint a bit further south.
The tide was full now and there was plenty of clear water above the weeds, allowing me to slow the retrieve and have much longer pauses. On one of these pauses I was smashed! The first run told me it was a better fish and, quickly running out of line, I decided to give chase. After a solid five minute fight and about a 200m chase on the leccy, I managed to get the net under a 52cm tailor. A PB for me in the bay...
Soon after I headed home in the early evening darkness, content with four or five tailor and the single bream. All fish released to catch again. Sorry about the boring pics, but I was on my own and more interested in casting than snapping!
A fun arvo on the bay.
Cheers
Pete
