How I fished 'The Basin'

[Steve Morgan]

Breamers,

There was plenty of good feedback from the Albany techniques report, so if you're interested, here's how I approached 'The Basin' event.

I hadn't done much research about the place and I'd never fished there before, so for me this ABT round was going to be quite a learning curve. From Google Earth, it looked to be quite sandy on most edges and it has a few flats and creeks to check out.

And looking at previous tournament results, it was obvious that there was some decent fish in there and plenty of them.

For those who haven't been there before, it's like a mini Lake Macquarie, but with an much smaller entrance to the ocean. In fact, there's bugger all run in the channel that leads to the sea.

I purposely avoid listening to too much about new places. The last thing I ever want to get into is a tournament against a field of anglers where I'm doing the same thing as them and they are much better than me at doing it.

So, after picking up a non-boater who said he was going to walk the banks in the channel for the Friday, we headed out onto the waterway.

First thing I did was head for the most obvious point - straight across the Basin from the channel mouth - and drift across it. The water clarity was extreme - nearly 10 feet and I quickly worked out that there was bare sand on the shallow edges and then a carpet of three types of weed from around 2 to 10 feet down. I fished shallow outwards alternating between a deep crankbait and a lightly weighted Ecogearaqua.

When the boat was in 8ft, I hooked and landed a 35cm class fish on the Aqua - rolling it just above the bottom just where the weed dropped off. I could confirm this with the Side Image. 8ft - solid weed. 9ft - broken weed. 10ft - sand. I dropped in a waypoint and went to run some more points, shallows and weed edges.

In short, after covering around 1/2 of the basin and one of the run-in creeks thoroughly (that, incidentally, was loaded with jelly prawns, wall to wall for at least a kilometre), we'd caught nothing in water less than 10 feet. When the breeze came up a little in the afternoon, I did run a couple of shallow banks that had the occasional keeper on them in 2' of water. Trouble was that there was 30 undersized fish swarming with each legal.

Drifting off another edge, Trent caught a 27cm fish on a little gold vibe near the two islands. I added another GPS mark and that was it for the day - 8 hours on the water for two keeper bites and two keeper fish.

The good thing about a one-fish practice day is that there's no doubt about where you're going to start. I headed straight to the point across from the entrance with Rod Thorpe.

We both rigged plastics - Rod some Gulp Shrimp with a stinger hook and I used the Ecogearaqua on a 1/16 jighead only. But instead of fishing out from the bank, I just put the boat in 9' of water an paralleled it as slowly as I could.

30 minutes later we each had a 30cm class fish in the well. Already a better result then the practice day. So we chugged over to the other side of the point and fished the same contour. With the morning slight breeze dying, we managed another 5 legal fish off that 500m edge before the bite died off at around 9.30am. One of mine was a 34cm, but apart from that, we were catching the same amounts and sizes.

Figuring that the fish had just slipped a little deeper, so did we. With the breeze down to zero I set the electric on 20% max and crept across a 16ft ridge around 300m further out than we were fishing. Rod alternated between his Gulp and a small, heavy plastic vibe while I took the opportunity to break out the 2lb and rotate through my collection of stick-minnow style baits (Tiemco, Austackle and Semi-Hardz).

Frequently, this would involve casting, leaving the bail arm open, putting the rod down, having a few bites of a sandwich and a drink and then picking up the rig when I thought it was on the bottom.

Sometimes - as happens with stickbaits - the fish would be on as I wound up the slack. Others would bite it as I twitched it off the bottom and floated it back down.

The fishing never got hard and fast - the best bite time out deep was probably between 11am and 12 noon - but we both amassed 3kg+ bags with 7 or 8 legal fish each and both started Day 2 in second place. Ridiculously good fortune for having a pretty weak plan at 7am!

With 7 legal fish coming from the point on Day One, John S from ACT and I thought we'd do equally well on Day 2 in the same vicinity. Two hours and a single, skinny, legal fish later, and with the wind up a little, it was time to check out the deeper water. Another hour for no bites and too much breeze to fish a stickbait.

So, I did what all hardened crankbaiters do. Headed for the bank that the wind was beating on. There happened to be one only a kilometre away from the point. Nothing apart from two stitch-ups on sand patches on stickbaits that were most likely flathead.

At 11am we decided to try the deeper water again. Firstly, we fished the cluster of GPS marks from the first day. Right at the start of the drift John got a legal fish on a metal vibe - which was the sensible choice in the windy conditions. Then nothing.

The next drift we started 100m further upwind and bagged another two legal fish before the bite stopped.

Looking at the GPS, it seemed as though the fish had moved a few hundred metres south.

Next drift, double hookup on light coloured Vibes. By this stage, I'd lost my light coloured VX40 and was up to a 45mm model. The bream didn't mind this bigger, heavier bait at all. In fact, it cast a mile on straight through FC and usually got eaten on the drop.

Two more drifts and a couple of small upgrades and the bite was over.

I spent the last hour chasing down some jumper leads for a fellow competitor.

The fish averaged maybe a centimetre or two shorter in the deeper water, but they all seemed to be quite skinny - the bag eventually went around 700gm lighter than the day before.

But, with the one-fish-prefish, I was stoked with 10/10 for the new venue!

Like most arenas, I suppose it pays to be versatile and to let the fish tell you what they want (and not the other way around).

I weighed fish on Aqua, stickbaits and metal blades, depending on the conditions.

Hope that gives you a few ideas for when you next hit an arena you've never been to before!

Cheers,

SM

[bonscottfan]

Great insight there steve,always enjoy the read and cheers for sharing,1 day I'll head over and do the basin

[__MATT__]

"The last thing I ever want to get into is a tournament against a field of anglers where I'm doing the same thing as them and they are much better than me at doing it."

Such a good way to look at things! Sick write up, lots of points to get ya thinking...

[Piscateur]

Great Stuff Steve, awesome effort in sharing information here that most will find helpful.

[youngfisherman]

Good report morgo

[tchoklat]

which 'basin'?

[TonyS]

Hi Steve,

Good report and good sharing...

" Who shares wins"


Keep Catching!

Tony

[silvertreva]

Originally Posted by tchoklat

which 'basin'?

St Georges Basin I think

[tchoklat]

Originally Posted by silvertreva

St Georges Basin I think

Thats what I thought. My in-laws have a water front there with a jetty!

[forsterfisho]

Thanks steve! some great information put forward there.

[pyrorico]

Great write up Steve...

Thanks for sharing...

[basscada]

some great info there steve, thanks for sharing

[troyboy]

Awesome report Steve it was certainly a differant type of fishery. The boat I was in on the second day had to have a jump pack on board, it came in very handy so gilly found out.
Troy