Northeast Hoodlums

Bumper year on yellowtail kingfish

Damon Sherriff

Yellowtail kingfish are a fantastic sports fish and are highly sought after by anglers all over Tasmania and the rest of the nation. In Tasmania, they have been very hit and miss the last three decades. Back in the eighties, just before I started fishing for kings, Tasmania received some bumper seasons on big kings. Fish over nine kilograms were reasonably common at Low Head, which is at the mouth of the Tamar estuary where I started fishing for kings. The biggest I have seen was caught by local Launceston school teacher Richard Gregory who caught a massive Tamar King of 20kg, he has a mount of it on his wall at Low Head.

Unfortunately, I didn’t start targeting kings until the early nineties in the Tamar and the red hot run of big kings had died off and fishing for them became very hit and miss. Only juvenile fish were turning up each season and you were lucky to catch a fish 65cm in length. Some seasons the kings were very light on the ground and you could count the number of fish caught on both hands for the season taken from the Tamar mouth.

Although the fish were small, I did have quite a bit of success with kings throughout the 1990s. The highlight was probably winning the fishing competition called the Tamar River King Fish Classic in 2000. This competition at the time was Tasmania’s biggest fishing competition with over 500 anglers entering. I was lucky to take out the major prize of $1000 which was a lot back then, with the heaviest king, which only weighed 2.5 kg. These rats have been turning up each season and not getting any bigger. I spoke to several others about this and they suggested it was because of overfishing the Kingfish on the mainland? I lost interest in Kings in the early 2000s and just concentrated on my Snapper Fishing.

The return of the king

I moved from the banks of the Tamar 7 years ago and moved to Bridport. I’ve mainly been concentrating on my snapper fishing until this summer when I ran into a school of rats while catching snapper bait. They were only smaller fish up to 65 cm but I had a ball catching them on a light rod and a Nomad stick bait. This was the first experience I have had catching kings on lures as all my experience with kings was with slow trolling dead baits, such as squid and garfish. I was surprised by how well they responded to the surface lure. I ended up catching about twenty small fish. I hooked a nice one in about six metres of water and it was a decent rat. My small four-metre tinny drifted out into deeper water while I was fighting the king. When I grabbed my landing net and got sight of the fish, I saw that swimming right behind my king, was two massive dark shadows. The shadows swam right up to the side of my boat and eyeballed me, they were two of the biggest kings I had ever seen alive. My eyes were popping out of my head! They slowly swam back into the depths. I estimated them to be around 105 to 110 cm.

After experiencing this I started getting keen again. I went home and told my sons and my cousin Andrew Hart of Hook line and Sinker TV show. Andrew has had a lot of experience with bigger kings up in NSW. He was happy to share some tips with me on how to target the larger fish. I returned a few days later on an early predawn session, I planned to catch some live squid and drift over the area where the kings had been. After catching some calamari on first light I headed over to fish. After letting the first one out, it got smashed instantly by a small king. This happened three times over until I was out of live bait. So I just started catching them on the stick bait again. Unfortunately nothing big amongst them.

The next trip was with my youngest son Sam, and we headed out pre-dawn again. We trolled some big hardbodies around for a while, it was a bit quiet until Sam’s rod buckled over and screamed off at a blistering rate, we both knew straight away it was no rat, it did a couple of dogged blistering runs for the pins on the bottom but Sam put the hurt on him and turned his head. 10 minutes went by and we finally got colour. I netted him and it was all over. Sam was absolutely ecstatic. He had landed a beautiful 90 cm northeastern Tasmanian kingfish. We put the fish on ice and decided that the fish would look fantastic on Sammy’s wall. I plan to mount it for him at a later date.

After this, I was really keen to catch one on live bait. Andrew had razed me up with his mainland techniques, so a few days later I got up early before daylight and was on the water bright and early. I headed out and pulled up in a spot where I catch good numbers of slimy mackerel. I threw in my little burley pot, which was full of chicken pellets and tuna oil. I dropped in my sabiki rig spiced up with small pieces of calamari. After a while, the burley trail had started to work, and I noticed a mackerel school under the boat. I started getting bites. I was on! Over the side came three nice slimy’s. I filled my ice box up with fresh salt water and headed straight to the kingfish grounds for the low tide change.

I hooked a fresh Slimy in the back and threw him over the side. I was very excited with anticipation, I knew there was big fish about and was hoping one would respond to the kicking slimy. After a short wait, I saw my rod tip bounce and my line tighten. I flicked the Shimano TLD 15 out of gear and let whatever was attacking the bait take a bit of line. The line started to peel off the reel at a speedy rate, so I whacked the reel in gear and let the rod load up. I was on! After a first blistering run of nearly 60 metres, the big king started to arch out into deeper water. He started to head into a danger zone where a lot of nasty bommies were on the bottom. I was getting very nervous and was waiting for my line to part from the king. Lucky for me the king started to swim back the other way towards the shallows again. I was out of trouble. He swam down deep and started fighting closer to the bottom. But fortunately, the bottom was clear of the reef so I was safe. I finally played the big king up to the side of the boat. Another beautiful northeast king. Not the size of the ones I saw a few days earlier but still a pretty respectable fish anywhere. I got out my landing net and scooped him up. I had finally caught a big kingfish, after all these years, and on a live bait (thanks to Andrew Hart). I laid him on the brag mate and he measured 87 cm. Not quite as long as Sammy’s but still a P.B for me! Well, that’s not the end of the story, over the next month we landed a lot of good Kings on live bait, dead bait and big hardbody lures. They were all between 80 to 95 cm but unfortunately we never came across any like those first two kings I saw, they were next level!

Best live bait

Definitely, the best live baits were calamari and slimy mackerel. The size did not seem to put the kings off too much. Some of the slimies I used were huge so don’t worry too much about the size.

The rig

I was mainly using a snapper-style running sinker rig with the live baits and used two 7/0 Reedy’s 187 suicide hooks. One snelled to the line which was pinned to the back of the mackerel and the other hook acted like a stinger hook that was not pinned in the bait. The calamari rig I was using was the same except both hooks were pinned in the bait. The snelled hook was pinned through the top of the hood and the other lightly pinned in the head. A three-ounce sinker on the rig was perfect for getting the bait where it needed to be.

The lures

The best lures for the big kings were big hard bodies such as Halco Laser Pro 190s and also 220 Bluewater Deep Divers. The kings surprised me as my trolling speed was not fast. Only about 6kph. I was always told faster was better for kings with lures? Slow seemed to work for us (editors note; the big shallow water kings in South Australia are regularly caught slow trolling live baits and lures)

The outfits

At the start of all this, I was just using my snapper rods spooled up with 10kg monofilament. I ended up losing a couple of decent ones on the bottom so I started using two outfits and that worked really well. Both the rods I was using were Uglystick Bluewater 1.7metre overhead jigging rods rated at 24 kg. The two reels I had matched up to rods were great old reels I used to use for snapper in the Tamar. A Shimano Triton Lever Drag 15 and a Shimano Charter Special 2000. Both reels are bulletproof and can easily handle big yellowtail. I had both reels spooled up with 10kg Berkeley Fireline. The leader line I was using was Platypus Hard Armour Supple Trace in 24 kg.

Tides

Definitely, low tide and the start of the run-in was the go in the location I was in, but it can vary from spot to spot. You are best not to worry too much about the tide when you are searching for them. Then the next trip just go on the same tide you caught them.

Plan your trip early

The early morning was very good for us, so try to set your alarm clock before daylight. The early bird catches the worm or fish!

Donate your frames for research.

Lastly, make sure you help the Tassie Fish Frame Collection, IMAS at the University of Tasmania is researching Tasmanian kingfish, snapper, King George whiting, striped trumpeter and silver trevally. They need your frames to make a secure future for your favourite species. Frames can be dropped off at participating shops or contact IMAS.

A memorable capture for Dylan Weber and crew while on charter (2018).