Mackeral Baits?

[Hfisho77]

Gday all,

im heading up north in a couple days out to the reef, spanish mackeral will be one of the target species, got all the gear, but what are the best baits to put under a balloon for them?? I know wolf herring, slimies and gar work well but are often very hard to find. So I was thinking mac tuna fillets, iodine bream, stripies etc. could be the go. What do you think?

cheers

Hugo

[fishing_teen]

r u hitting up north west??? if you are good luck. any of the baits you said should work.

[Hfisho77]

yeh i am haha, 2 weeks of heaven, have u been before?

[fishing_teen]

yer just 2 times (with joel) its good fishing

[tiotony]

Going by your post I am assuming you will be anchored and want to drift a bait out the back, I have done a LOT of mackeral fishing this way off the back of vessels from the Torres Strait to Cairns, and have found if you can't get livies what has worked for me on both spaniards and schoolies is just pillies or gar drifted back with the current with enough lead to keep the bait about mid depth, then slowly retrieved back to the boat then drift back again and retrieve etc etc, just like if you were fishing for tailor. I have caught my biggest mackeral at around 40kg on a dead gar using this method, anchored at Snapper Island off Daintree. Sadly due to a computer crash have lost the photographic evidence of this fish . Have found if you keep it stationary under a balloon you just get too many nuiscance sharks and barracuda and very few mackeral.

Also have found if you are anchored in the same spot for a few days with lights on the water at night, on the first night you get bugger all, but by the second or third night the boat becomes a bit of a FAD and you get schools of herring, squid etc congregating under the lights. Fishing these live at night about 5-10m under the hull (and hence under the bait school) is deadly and have caught heaps of 20kg+ mackeral this way, also heaps of cobia. Also if you are anchored on a bit of reef and not just sand, these livies get smashed on the bottom by red bass, nannygai, emperor etc etc. Have also got a few big black jew off a sandy bottom when reasonably close to reef too.

If you bring a castnet, have found any flying fish that come under the lights are easy to net and always get smashed immediately, fish seem to love them.

[Hfisho77]

cheers for that info mate will give it a try

[Hfisho77]

yer just 2 times (with joel) its good fishing

yeh this will be my third time now, i usually fish with plastics and will continue to do so, but i wanna mix it up a bit and go for something BIG

[fishing_teen]

yer just 2 times (with joel) its good fishing

yeh this will be my third time now, i usually fish with plastics and will continue to do so, but i wanna mix it up a bit and go for something BIG

if you are keen get some mid size whiting as bait (making sure they are legal) a good size rod and reel and shark traces and go up to the coffee rocks. there are plenty of sharks around 1m to 2m arounded the rock and if you hook on its good fun. there are also so good size gt around the coffee rocks

[Hfisho77]

yer just 2 times (with joel) its good fishing

yeh this will be my third time now, i usually fish with plastics and will continue to do so, but i wanna mix it up a bit and go for something BIG

if you are keen get some mid size whiting as bait (making sure they are legal) a good size rod and reel and shark traces and go up to the coffee rocks. there are plenty of sharks around 1m to 2m arounded the rock and if you hook on its good fun. there are also so good size gt around the coffee rocks

yeah i rekon aye, some absolute monster GT's, ive seen one there about 40kg no joke smashing up the mullet.. the plan was to have a shark sesh or two at night maybe. Early in the morning on the high tide i usually go round to the rock groin there and often get decent sized golden trevally on little slugs which are awesome fun, or go just a bit further out still in the shallows in the boat and fish the bait schools and get gt's, goldens and mac tuna - but thats only if its a quick sesh haha