TR by DeeCee
Wind: None - light NNW
Launch point: Beach adjacent car park, Ewan Maddock Dam
Participants: DeeCee
Arrived at EMD just before 5.00am and was on the water soon after, beaten by 1 to be first on the water this morning...
Decided today to stop persevering with the Beetle Jigs I'd been using (with mixed results and no decent fish) the past couple of visits today and go back to Old Faithful, a $5.00 lure I bought from Ebay a couple of years ago.
Headed out past the swimming area and threw Old Faithful out the back for a troll straight across from the beach to my usual starting spot and about halfway there got my first fish, a type of perch, small but a fish nonetheless. I headed to the left, eastern end of the dam for a quick flick before hitting Spot X. No hits flicking through the weed and after 15 mins headed towards Spot X, just before I turned into the bay I was hit again, this time a 20cm Bass, had the 1kg rod bending nicely...he was released and I spent the next 30 mins flicking through the bay before meeting up with kayaker No.1 who was having a slow morning, trying to persevere with a spinner bait but having no luck. I left him to his frustration and headed out towards the point of the bay where I hooked onto a decent fish, it even took some line! This one darted into the weed and was a real b!tch to get out.
He was released after a quick pick and I headed over to the western side of the dam, just as I got to the other side I had another perch hooked up, I did a quick loop of the bay and hooked another Bass in the middle and a real hard hitter as I rounded the southern end of the bay, this one peeled off a heap of line and had me going for 30 - 40 seconds before I sighted a nice Bass, even had to use the net for this one...what a ripper fight!
I continued on my journey south and landed a couple more small (15cm) Bass which were still hitting surprisingly hard for little fellas before I decided to troll back to the north and back to the beach. I turned around and headed north across the small bay I had caught 3 fish a few minutes earlier. I got to the northern corner of the bay and was hit again, another small perch which again was released and continued north towards the exclusion area, about halfway there I got hit by another fish, a 25cm Bass which was good fun. I released him and threw the lure out the back but before I even got a stroke in I was hit by something huge...grabbed the rod and line was peeling off fast and then right in front of me a fish jumped clean out of the water, immediate thought was Barra but how would it have got in there? Then I remembered the Dam had a good stock of Saratoga, the fish jumped again and again, the 1kg rod was doubled over and line was coming and going, I was on to my first Saratoga! After a minute or so and having been towed around a bit I had the Toga alongside the yak, netted after a couple of goes and onto the yak..or so I thought, the Toga did its best Eel impersonation and was out of the net and back in the water, thankfully the lure was still hooked, a short time later Toga was back in the net and then the yak to do exactly the same thing again but this time the lure let go and the Toga was gone....my adrenaline was still running high an hour or so later when I arrived home...what a great day.
Toga was estimated about 65cm, measuring how much he stuck out the landing net, Biggest Bass were 35cm & 38cm. Total 11 fish caught. Best day on the dam yet.... :)
Still buzzing as I write this...
Cheers
Deecee
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