Looks awesome!! Good to hear you can try before you buy, I have heard about this deal at capacity sports before, it's a good idea. We bought my girlfriend's Venturer from capacity sports, they don't know much about fishing from kayaks, but they do know their kayaks and they looked after us well. The range of PFDs (personal floatation devices - lifejackets) Capacity had weren't really to our liking, we ended up buying Perception PFDs from Anaconda in Bayswater, and are very happy with them. My model has pockets at the front for fishing gear and a pouch in the back for a hydration bladder, very useful.
Michelle and I went out in the kayaks briefly last Saturday morning, we were hoping for squid but they weren't hungry, we ended up taking home about a dozen flathead from 30-47cm caught on 4" Berkely GULP! minnows in Smelt with 1/8th #2/0 Gamskatsu Darter jigheads. No pinkies, and it was damn cold!!! Time for me to start heading out in the wetsuit I reckon (I was in shorts <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ohmy.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':thumbsup2:' /> )
yeah capacity do have a fairly good range but dont have much in way of specifically designed fishing kayaks. i went out last saturday too ( i think it was last saturday at least <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':thumbsup2:' /> ) on one of those little allnut hire boats and i was very comfortable temperature-wise as i was wearing like 4 layers, except for my hands were freeeezing. it seems you catch a decent feed of fish every time you go out! we got about 30 undersized pinkies between the three of us (all released) and one flathead about 32cm or so.
in some of the pictures you first posted on this thread what hard bodied lures did you use for trolling? i remember you saying something about it how you troll for snook and salmon and it sounds like a great idea.
I don't troll that often, so when I do I like to use quality (ie/ fairly expensive) lures - but they generally outfish cheaper lures so I reckon the expense is justified.
Around Black Rock I have had best success dragging around shallow diving lures like a Princess Maria or Ecogear bibbed minnow of 7-9cm in a blue pilchard style colour - both of these lures are made in Japan, and at about $20 each are not cheap, but they work.
The two shallower diving lures I mentioned only get down to around 1 metre, maybe 1.5. I have a deeper running 9cm Team Daiwa minnow which gets down to 3-3.5m, I use this for trolling over the sand flats further down the bay (Rye, Dromana), and have caught flathead and barracouta on it. The key is to choose a lure which swims at the right depth for the type of fish you're chasing, or for the wate depth you're in: for example you'll get snagged if you troll a 3m diver in only 2m of water, likewise if you want to target flathead it's a waste of time trolling a surface lure in 7-8m of water . So use shallower lures for surface feeders like salmon, mid depth for snook and pike, and deeper runners for bottom dwellers like pinkies and flathead. I am very much a novice troller (I generally only troll on the way to the spot I want to fish with SPs), but a friend trolls exclusively from his kayak using a wide range of lures, and has pulled some very impressive fish from the eastern side of PPB, including the 55cm snapper I mentioned, many other pinkies from 30-45cm, and a few snook of almost 1m in length <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ohmy.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':thumbsup2:' /> He also trolls freshwater a lot and has caught many of trout and salmon in the western districts of Vic.
Yep, he has caught a few big snook in PPB, in close off black rock and also off seaford. The Anonyma Shoals (a few km off Black Rock) are reputed to hold some monster snook. I'm not too fussed about snook personally, they don't fight much and are pretty average on the table (in my opinion)......but it's always good to catch a fish that's 1m long <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':thumbsup2:' />
how dare you steal my name jazman. i insist you give it back <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':thumbsup2:' />
good luck in broome. dont forget to take photos of the huge queenfish and tuna you're gonna catch off the port.
poodge, good choice on the kayak. looks good, and the price seems pretty good too. i'd love to get one, but i dont think the finances will cover it. i'm sure you'll have a great time on the bay catching some great fish
wow im still amazed that we have 1m snook here in ppb!
good luck in broome when you go! <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/thumbsup2.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':thumbsup2:' />
GOOD NEWS! just won a kayak on ebay. we ended up getting the toyboy cayman. the reason for getting this one was dad went to capacity today to have a look at the escapade but it ended up being a VERY different model from the one on the website. it only had the storage hatch up the front and was about $800 with no extras ( seat, rod holders, paddle, life jacket, etc). also we found the toyboy is a bit longer and wider than the escapade. so we bought the kayak for $800 plus freight costs ( about $100) whereas if we had of bought the one from capacity with all the extras it would have been $1000+
That's great news Poodge, you'll be on the water in no time. Although it's not the best time for fishing PPB right now.....my girlfriend and I spent all day yesterday fishing in our yaks off Black Rock, then we drove down to Shoreham and fished there, and only caught a few small wrasse (throwbacks). Most suprising that there were no squid about, we had jigs out the whole time for nothing. <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/mad.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':th' />
Here is a picture a friend took of me and my girlfriend fishing in our kayaks off Black Rock last Sunday morning. The conditions were glorious.....it's a shame there were no fish!
i've only seen the bay that flat a few times personally, though i'm not out on the water as often as Jazman.
i'm hoping it looks a little like that tonight so i can go floundering again, though the forecasts aren't completely filling me with joy at the moment.
so when you you get the kayak Poodge?
i saw some pics of it. that front portal looks like it would be useless while you are out on the water. unless you have amazing felxibility.
Looks a little bit windy tonight Steeny, but if you try and pick a part of the bay where the shoreline comes up high you can sometimes find up to 100m of water from the shoreline that is in a wind shadow. I've done this at Blairgowrie before and taken fish when it was blowing 20 knots Sth Westerly - it's still not easy though...I guess it depends on how hungry you are for fish!
you proabably got it right... ME! <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':woot:' />
its pretty awesome i reckon. its the toyboy cayman, or cayman toyboy or whatever. i probably wont be allowed to use it though until my birthday which seems like a lifetime away now. (17th august).
jazman i do have a question. where do you go squidding off a kayak in the bay? how deep is the water?
im keen to go for a squid again as i havent been in ages but i might have to invest on some good quality squid jigs as i only have the cheap and nasty ones.
That's very exciting!! I bet you can't wait to get it wet! About 6 weeks ago we were doing really well on the squid right along the eastern side of the bay, but recently we're struggling to catch anything and I don't really know why. Right now it might be worth a crack somewhere around mornington or mount martha, or even further down the bay towards portsea where there are more weed beds and reef. We had previously done best around black rock, but seemed to catch them anywhere we tried. I find that from around easter time, the squid are really easy to catch for about a month or 2, then they get trickier <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />
just wanted to say, thanks for getting me hooked on soft plastics AND kayak fishing.
on the annual greencape trip this year i cleaned up <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />
something like 23 fish and 1 squid in two days. the majory of these fish were caught on soft plastics off the kayak (squidgy wrigglers or fish mostly) i found that they didnt respond well to the berkley powerbaits. i did try them though. i think it may have had something to do with the extremely shallow water they were in.
the fish included.
- many flathead up to 42cm and over a kilo (pb)
- 3 or 4 tailor around 35-38cm close to a kilo.
- several slimy mackeral approx. 20-25cms.
- 1 calamari approx. 20cms
- several mullet up to 35cms
- 1 sweep
- several yakkas or jakkas or whatever the locals call them..
i also speared two with my sling one of which took the end off my sling lol.
it was a ripper. 52cm over 2kg. <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tongue.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />
the other a red morwong nothing special about 30-35 im guessing.
anyway, ill post a pic of the big one and see if anyone can guess what it is.
id like to see how many people actually know it!
the majority of the people who see it say bream lol. ill post it when i can as i dont known how to scan with the new all-in-one printer..
Good to hear that your kayak is getting some good use Poodge! <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' /> I'm still fishing out of mine a lot, but in the lakes around Canberra and along the NSW south coast (I'm based in Canberra for the next year for work - see the 'Fishing in Canberra' thread).
I haven't been using the Powerbaits much - I've been using Gulp 3" minnows and 3" fry in pumpkinseed for 90% of my SP fishing recently, and have been doing pretty well - I think the extra scent makes a difference <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />
finally worked out how to use the new printer <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/rolleyes.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':th' />
anyway heres my fish... the one that nearly got away with the end of my spear.
it was such a surprise to see these type of fish in the area we were in because in three years of going there that was the first time i saw one.
anyway try and guess what it is <img src='http://www.squidfish.net/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/tongue.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':woot:' />
' />