Thorbjorn Hale

I recently picked up a penn spinfisher 6500ll and 4500ll. They were both on clearance in anaconda for 60 and 75 dollars. I already owned the 8500ll and its a great reel, super durable and a good drag and I have caught some of my biggest fish on it. you can pickup a 4500 for around 150 dollars and matched with 30lb braid would be a great livebaiting reel.

Yeah exactly that

sure is

As some of you may know i am mainly a land based fisho. except for an old SIB that isn’t really that fishable. My dad and I recently acquired a 4.3m brooker tinny it needs some paint and some new flooring but structurally it’s sound. It’s a fairly flat hull, so it’s stable but is only stable inshore. It came with an old Johnson trolling motor and a Lowrance hook reveal which we already have on the SIB. It should be a fishing weapon when we get a side scan transducer from whitworths - hopefully today. We have already taken it out to the port to try get a threadie on vibes with no success, but the boat performed well. I hope you enjoy the pictures Cheers Thorbjörn.

Dogtooth catfish?

My dad and I have recently purchased a 4.3m 2005 Brooker tinny- which I will do a full post about soon. It needs a lick of paint and some new flooring but structurally its sound. The boat was sold with an old johnson trolling motor from around 1997 I believe. it is entirely cable operated which is quite cool but it would be nice to have a remote or spotlock. Would it be much of an improvement to get a watersnake or minn kota? but it would most likely be a watersnake because the tinny cost 4500 dollars so a 3000 dollar motor sounds a bit silly. Cheers Thorbjorn Not my motor but the same one

I heard that they are good for toadfish.

No worries, the reel in the photo is only a 4500 and it sits really well and is a very balanced combo. I also have a penn prevail but the 12ft model and its more suited for bait fishing, but ive seen people use the 9ft model and they are really nice rods.

I have heard good things about the daiwa over there, it was an option when I was buying my rock fishing setup but I went with the saltist hyper m/over because I wanted something 8ft lightweight but can handle big fish. it might be worth looking at an 8 or 9 foot rod because I find casting and working lures on a 10ft rod a bit tedious after a couple of hours.

Last winter i spent a lot of time tailor fishing at fingal with my slammer 3 and spinfisher 6 5500lc and 8500ll. All these reels held up perfectly well with no corrosion or grinding. All I did was give it a quick rinse under the garden tap when I got home, and they were fine. I think buying something like the spinfisher 5 or 6 would be worthwhile especially because they seem to be on sale almost every time I look at them.

To be fair it didn’t do the usual run for the jetty so it was a surprisingly clean fight

I’ve caught a small one there before and have netted a metre plus one last year.

Yeah I had to take an electric scooter to the servo to get ice quickly

Yeah I will look into getting one because all my fish seem to have barotrauma; even the bream

I started off the session yesterday arvo by packing my shark fishing gear and a selection of shark bait with the intent of catching …whiting. I Walked down to the jetty and set out my shark rod first And began cast netting. It wasn’t long before I could see big schools of herring splashing around the end of the jetty, I cast my net and caught about twenty. I cast out my spare old rod with a herring just to keep me from being bored. I started tidying my cart up when I heard the slow tick of my herring rod, I turned around and my reel started to scream . I hooked into it and whatever it was took a big run. Halfway through the fight it managed to wrap me around something but I managed to get it out, it started to tire and after one last dash for the jetty i got it to the surface and I saw the huge silver bat they call a mulloway. After a tense moment trying to get him in the dilly he was safe on the jetty Sadly he had the usual barotrauma and also swallowed the hook. So I quickly dispatched him and took it home for quite a few dinners. Cheers Thorbjörn

Since this is peek time to get stuck into some sharks I thought it would be a good idea to write a small guide of how to catch freshwater eels. I start off by saying that eel fishing is very simple, one key message is to not overthink it. Eel fishing is very easy and requires no specialised gear or tackle. They can be found in pretty much any freshwater creek or pond in Australia (I've even caught them in 5cm of water in a drain). My rig of choice is to tie roughly 3 metres of 80lb mono to my mainline with an fg knot then run a either a small ball sinker or no weight at all, then to a size 3/0 to 5/0 circle hook( i've tried using j hooks but I find just a cheap circle with get a better hookup) As for baits, the world is your oyster... if it contains meat or fish the eels will love it. Whether it be a pilchard, kangaroo, beef or even bits of spare ham, anything will work. As locations go, somewhere quiet and not too snakey would be great. Personal experience tells me that a snag or a deep pool would tend to hold more so I would target casting towards those areas. But don't stress if your chosen spot is vacant of this criteria because as I said above, if it has freshwater it will hold eels. Feel free to leave any of your tips below Cheers Thorbjorn : btw as I was writing this I caught a nice 1.5 bull on the eel I caught earlier today

I must admit, i have been struggling to catch some of the bigger models recently, I go out to target a larger model of shark using a big chunk of eel or even a whole mullet and the smaller ones seem to get to the bait first. Do you have any tips for eliminating the smaller fish? I've tried using 300lb wire and a 2 16/0 hooks but they don't seem to be put off by it.

I used the head of a large freshwater eel for that shark but pike eel and mullet still produce

What bait? I haven’t been having any success recently. They keep eating my baits but not pulling drag.

Thanks, if i do look into buying a senator i would certainly be interested in using one for a few weeks.

https://www.tacklewarehouse.com.au/mustad-sun-gloves.html these are pretty decent, i used all the time until i lost them.

Thanks for answering, I am looking to catch sharks in the 2.5m plus category and I am land based. My budget is around 300 bucks but I would rather spend less to be honest. My biggest shark is 207 which I caught on a 8500 spinfiser but i would like an overhead reel for the peace of mind about getting spooled by something big. I see your point about the senator I just think that its quite a cool reel and fairly budget friendly. Cheers, Thorbjörn

Hi, I was looking into purchasing a Penn senator for targeting larger sharks and was wondering if anybody on here had any experience with them. thanks Thorbjörn

Luckily, i have a close up shot

I am trying to pull my weight for the Southside