Representatives of the NSW DPI Marine Stocking Program recently visited the Hastings River with 35,600 mulloway fingerlings, which is the largest number of juvenile jewies stocked into the system to date.
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The Marine Stocking Program is another example of our recreational fishing licence fees directly benefitting recreational fishers. This is also part of "Fish for life - Building a healthy fishing future".
In the rivers, bream numbers and quality remain consistent during the morning high-tides. Mullet gut and strip baits are working well but for the fishos targeting bream on lures, soft vibes and plastics have fished well in the deeper parts of each river.
There is still plenty of flathead in each of the rivers, with some nice fish approaching a metre caught during the week. Luderick numbers are also improving with the breakwalls fishing well in the consistent periods of large swell.
Off the rocks, some nice tailor have been on offer with the better results of late coming from around Crescent Head and Hat Head. Fishos throwing small metals have also scored a few bonito and tuna.
Drummer numbers continue to improve with a few nice fish to around three kilos being taken from around Diamond Head and Point Plomer. Still good numbers of bream and luderick on offer, with South West Rocks and Crescent Head both worth a look.
On the beaches, the recent swell has not helped, nor of course the predicted swell for the coming weeks. Best results have been from the more protected corners, with plenty of bream and dart about further north. Tailor numbers are also picking up as long as the swell allows reasonable access to any deeper gutters you can locate.
There has been plenty of school mulloway on most beaches with the odd larger fish hanging around the migrating sea mullet.
Offshore, results have been quite mixed. Last weekend produced fantastic conditions for fishos to head to sea but there was little current which seemed to cause the fish to shut down. Monday and Tuesday before the strong southerly hit the coast a few snapper were caught in close on both bait and plastics. Off South West Rocks there were some nice pearl perch in 50 to 70m, along with the odd kingfish and snapper.
On the inshore pelagic front, still plenty of mac tuna and the odd longtail closer in, although mackerel reports are now few and far between. For the deep drop fishos, last weekend provided ideal conditions but not a lot of fish were caught. The only reports were the odd blue-eye, bass and bar cod caught on Saturday further north off South West Rocks.
With the mixed weather conditions of the past few weeks, May certainly hasn't lived up to its typical sublime climate. With more swell and wind than we would like, the long-term forecast does not provide much relief.
Hopefully as we head into the cooler months, we'll see some great angling conditions.
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