Derwent River Bream

[Doc1978]

Hey all.

I only joined the site yesterday, so i thought i'd share some info from a recent trip to Hobart. Not sure how many Tasmanians are on this site, but hopefully this info will be useful to some of you......

I took the boat down from Sydney to Tassie with my wife in late April this year. The reason for the trip was to visit family down there, but i took the opportunity to get some fishing done while i was there!

I hit the local tackle shop (Spot On Fishing), and armed with some Presso Minnow and SX40 lures i hit the Derwent River with my old man. The Derwent River is HUGE, so it took a while to find some good spots. Using some info from DVD magazine and the tackle shop, we concentrated our efforts on shallow bays and banks with wind blowing straight into them (see map below)

HobartMap.jpg

Using the electric motor, we sat about 20 or so metres from a bank in Prince of Wales Bay, and slowly worked along it. Thanks to the wind, we could cast our lures quite a distance. Almost immediately we started catching Salmon, most were barely legal with some undersize. I was there for Bream, so it started getting frustrating after 10 or so Salmon! I then noticed a dorsal fin exposed in what looked like 4-6 inches of water right next to the bank. I cast next to it, gave it one short sharp twitch, a long pause, and WHACK! My first Bream for the day, coming in at 30cm.

Bream1.jpg

We worked the entire bank for a couple of hours, and figured out that the Bream were holding in very shallow water close to the bank, feeding on mussels etc on the rocks. With this knowledge, we started casting our lures as close to the bank as possible and we managed 3 good size Bream. This technique cost me a couple of lures as it was pretty rocky, but i was happy to be on to some sort of a pattern.

We then moved location to a stretch near the Cadbury Factory. It started to rain, so on went the raincoats. We noticed a drain from the factory pumping water into the river, and i noticed a slight rise in water temp on the sounder. We threw our lures in around that drain for about 10 mins, and i ended up with a very nice sea-running Brown Trout.

Trout.jpg

The rain came and went, and we continued along that stretch of bank, and pulled another nice Bream, followed by my biggest for the trip, at 38cm.

Bream2.jpg

Bream3.jpg

After that day, we managed to get on the water another 3 times. Unfortunately none of the other days lived up to the first one, but still managed a few more legal Bream, a Barracoota, some Flathead, and plenty of Salmon. Everything went back to fight another day, except for one Bream and the Trout.

Trout&Bream.jpg

I can highly recommend the Derwent River. Nobody else was on the water mid-week, and the Black Bream are so much bigger and stronger than their Yellowfin brothers that i was used to.

A special thanks to Spot On Fishing in Hobart, especially Tom Crawford, a very nice bloke and extremely approachable.

Cheers,

Doc.

[ffejsmada]

Nice work Doc,
It seems to be a popular, reliable spot around the choccy factory.
Did you get the trout on a Presso?

Jeff.

[Doc1978]

Hey mate.

The trout was on SX40, a natural green colour. Came in at almost 3lb.

Doc.

[adidaspeteman]

Your bringing back my memory's of fishing the Derwent.
Only last week I was chatting to da-houghsta about getting back there soon.

Some quality bream there Doc, I also used sx40's to get my big mummas there.
That's a beaut trout in the last pic, how long did it measure?

[Doc1978]

Thanks mate.

I spent the first 17 years of my life in Tassie, earliest memory of fishing is off the rocks at Bellerive beach, pulling in about 50 Perch with dad in a solid 2 hour session. Bloody good fun. Our family didn't ever have a boat, so in my 17 years down there i didn't get a single Bream! I remember catching some small Trout, but fishing was never my hobby until later in life. Now i wish i was back in Tassie!

The trout went 55cm.

Bream&Trout.jpg

[adidaspeteman]

Lovely trout mate. Yep, Tassie is a scenic place with top fishin'. My Dad lives there so I have an excuse to travel there all the way from WA.

What kind of perch are you refering too, not familiar with that spot?

[Doc1978]

Not sure exactly on the type of Perch, i was very young. I just remember Mum picking all the bones out before we were allowed to eat it! Some sort of sea running variety, unless Dad had his species mixed up! Whatever they were, he called them Perch!

[Beevor]

Great report Doc...

The Derwent has some stomping fish, although, strangely the average size has dropped over the past few years. A few years ago no-one had even seen an undersized bream leading to speculation that they breed elsewhere and settle in the Derwent to feed, or that maybe conditions had not been suitable for successful spawning? Up until last year, I had not caught a bream under 33cm to fork. Now anglers are finding smaller fish are starting to become a regular occurance rather than a rarity. A good sign of a healthy fishery, and the bigguns are still very common. I've caught some nice bream and sea-runners around cadbury's as you've shown. How many places can you catch bream and trout in the same area!!

My guess is that the perch you speak of are either wrasse or gurnard?

Cheers,
Beevor

[Beevor]

Oh... and check out the new range of Dawia Pressos too, there's a few cracking colours!

[Tropicaltrout]

[QUOTE=Doc1978;48077]Thanks mate.

I spent the first 17 years of my life in Tassie, earliest memory of fishing is off the rocks at Bellerive beach, pulling in about 50 Perch with dad in a solid 2 hour session. Bloody good fun. Our family didn't ever have a boat, so in my 17 years down there i didn't get a single Bream! I remember catching some small Trout, but fishing was never my hobby until later in life. Now i wish i was back in Tassie!



Hey mate just read the post bit slow...

We used to fish cadbury's alot as well a the opposite side at old beach, we used to pull massive beam, elephant fish and the odd sea runner as well some bloody big ones too! most fish was all on bait back then usually half a crab, or mussels.

Great post really brought back so memories

Nath