Autumn is Spanish mackerel time on the NSW north coast! And if any proof was needed, just check out the pics that clients and friends send me on Facebook. Here’s Derek Dixon with a good one off our downrigger last week:
Here’s Tyla Fear:
James Braund:
I’ve mentioned this story on the web page but it’s worth retelling here. Way back when, I used to fish for barramundi at Bathurst Island, north of Darwin. In the half light of dawn my guide and I used to head off shore, chasing Spaniards. At that time of the morning they were often on the hunt, jumping high out of the water. Once the sun got way clear of the horizon my guide used to say, ‘let’s go back in for breakfast.’ I asked him why the mack bite was so hot at dawn, but tapered as the sun got up. His dad ran a pro mackerel boat out of northern WA and Brett had spent countless hours aboard helping his father. He explained to me that top water bait fish had a dark back, and a white or silver belly. The dark back was to camouflage them from attack by seabirds above. The light coloured belly was to camouflage them from predators below, looking up into the light. But in the early morning, when the sun is at an acute angle to the sea surface, it reflects off the sides of the baitfish. Making it easier for ocean hunters to see them. That all makes sense.
How does this affect mackerel fishing? As the sun rises, your window of opportunity closes. They are still there but deeper in the water column, either travelling or holding over structure. If you know where the structure is, or if you can mark them on your sounder, you can still target them with a downrigger:
Mackerel are alpha predators who won’t tolerate a bait fish slow trolled past their nose. One time, I was invited to fish for mackerel on the mid-north coast of NSW. The top bloke who invited me said he’d told me to be at the ramp at dawn. Got a shock when I arrived to see his boat was basically an old style fibreglass ski boat, with a giant fish box taking up most of the deck space. That didn’t worry me because I knew he was an expert - but I did wonder where all my gear was going to go. I had heaps of rods, a downrigger, Head Starts, frozen garfish etc. ‘You don’t need all that crap, Andy! We catch plenty of mackerel just slow trolling slimies.’ I started to take half the gear back to the car but he said, ‘Don’t bother.’ Scored some nice live baits on the sabikis and raced down to the mackerel grounds.
It was a dead flat Saturday morning and there were already 20 plus boats there. Mostly anchored up, and fishing live baits or whole pilchards into a burley trail. My skipper ran out a big live slimy and started slow trolling (under 2 knots) around the reef. I rigged up a garfish on a Head Start and fed it back in the wake to see how it would swim. It wouldn’t! Just flopped from side to side, instead of the irresistible tight wriggle they get at 4 knots or more.
For maybe 10 minutes we trolled around the outside of the fleet. Nothing was happening, and no-one was hooking up. But just then I got a strike. Using stupidly light gear so it took about 15 minutes but we had a nice Spaniard in the fish box. ‘Gotta admit those things work’ he said, pointing to the downrigger. I rigged up another garfish and put it back down and set it at 15 metres. Ten minutes later, BANG. A nice spotted mackerel went on ice, this time. Skipper: ‘How much are those things anyway?’ Here’s fishing machine Sammy Hitzke using Head Starts to deadly effect:
Downriggers are deadly on mackerel. They extend your fishing time and they get the bait down where the fish are waiting. Mackerel love garfish, maybe more than live baits:
Give our combination a try? Downrigging with Head Starts. Heading up north myself at the end of this week and that’s what I’ll be doing. Will let you know how we go
Andrew Hestelow