Email: lasue@wn.com.au http://www.murchisonboathire.com.au/
A very quiet month, mainly due to the demersal closure, I fear, but then again I am getting a lot of
maintenance done, new brochures printed, website tweaking, and basically getting everything right
for the coming season that is gearing up to be very busy. Bookings for next year’s northern haunts
are already fairly well booked, with only a week here and there, so if you were thinking of going north
during the best weather autumn/winter months, get it booked now!
The cray season started on the 15th of November and being a Sunday, was a bonus. The professionals can’t fish
Sundays so us amateurs had it all to ourselves! Usually at the beginning of the season there are a lot of crays to catch
but drops away quite quickly as they shed their shells and bury themselves deep in the reef holes and sand to
avoid predators getting an easy soft meal! Jason and I got 9 and then 10 crays the first couple of days, then I
had to go to Perth for a week or so.
On returning, my oldest son “Movember” Ben above and his girlfriend,
Laura, came up for 3 days and asked to go cray fishing. Well over the three days we got one cray, 2 occies and an eel!
The pots are now on the lawn waiting until after the full moon in December when the cray shells have hardened and
the crays come out starving and begin a mini migration out to deeper water. Easy to catch then with most days
getting our boat limit of 12.
Mid Week Getaway.
Justin De Mello is a keen angler. I first met him 7 years ago when he came up with a group and caught
his first tuna. It was a good one at that, landed during a double hook-up with another first timer.
Unfortunately Justin is plagued by the dreaded seasickness and likes to keep his feet on dry land.
He has been back and forth to Kalbarri a few times with a burning desire to catch a big tailor which has eluded him so far,
but there were plenty of small ones around for him and his group to have fun with.
Jason picked up an unusual small cobia one evening, 
while the rest of the gang caught a few in
the morning from Wittecarra Creek.
They stayed in my holiday accommodation, perfect for their requirements, with filleting table, bait freezer,
plenty of space, and enclosed back yard protected from the wind, which can be troublesome this time of year.
Their catches on the filleting table and brick paving. The thong and beer bottle must be there for scale!
Outriggers
I have bought a pair of outriggers, kind of been looking around for a while. We needed them on my last marlin trip
but made do with a couple of beach rod halves with a clip on the end. They were not long enough!
The stainless steel brackets will be fixed to my 7.8m boat and will be offered as an optional extra to hire for those
who want to chase marlin and sails up north.
Optional extras?
Small rate rise next year
It had to happen, but we are putting our hire rates up by a small percentage as from 1/1/10. We last had a small
rate increase at the beginning of 2008 and due to the so called recession kept them the same for 2009.
As last time, for those who have already paid their deposit/bond and who pays their deposit/bond before 1/1/10
will still get the old price quoted to you at the time of your booking. Some of you have bookings right up to July
next year and will be getting the old price!
New prices will be posted on my website early January
I will have to be strict on this, so get your deposit/bonds in before you miss out!
Boat for sale
Don Stander’s boat is for sale, the one he won the Under 6m Boat game in the last Classic.
It’s a Selva DD 5.5m 2007 model.
100hp 4-stroke Yamaha. $39,990.
For more details contact me on 9937 2043
Latest info is he has bought a Wellcraft 232, over 7m powered by a 250 4-stroke Yamaha!
He won’t be in the same category as me in the Classic again, luckily!
Kalbarri Offshore & Angling Club Monthly Comp 28th November 2009.
Due to the demersal ban still on, few boats went out. I had a troll with son Jared, hoping for an early mackerel.
We got one alright, but it was a small spotted mackerel, bit of a surprise as they usually only seem to turn up around February for a short time.
The beach anglers did well with mulloway and tailor
The river section fished well again and most of the regulars have it well sussed out.
They nearly always catch their bag limit and by keeping them live can upgrade
if they get a bigger one. 
This one of Brett’s had a tag in it.
Of the 503 fish tagged over the last 5 years or so, we have only recaptured 3.
We are not sure if the tags are being nipped off by other fish, naturally lost, do the fish die,
or are there so many fish in the river that we just don’t catch them?
Popular Northern Destinations
Thevenard Island
There are new managers at the Onslow Mackerel Motel, Colin and Rosa will now look after you on the mainland.
Rosa will take your accommodation booking if you would like to visit. Phone her on 9184 6586
Colin will sort you out with a lock up storage area for trailers and your vehicle when you are at the island.
Drew is still the Island manager: 9184 6444.
This year the 6.1m and 7.8m boats are already booked for Thevenard Island but there are still spaces available for adventures in this great place.
bookings@mackerelislands.com.au
Check out the website: http://www.mackerelislands.com.au/
Gnaraloo Station
Gnaraloo contacts for accommodation:
Barbara: 9315 4809
Email: bookings@gnaraloo.com.au
Website: Gnaraloo.com.au
Game, Bottom and Beach Fishing Action
These links will take you to Youtube showing some great action video clips taken from
my boats and also a very good mulloway from the beach.
Triple tuna hook-up
Dhuie and snapper
Beach mulloway
Noel and Robyn are willing to accept bookings for my boats at Port Gregory
I will deliver the boat down there for 2 or more days hire for free.
& return it to Kalbarri for you.
Remember if you rent our accommodation in Kalbarri you get big discounts on our boats.
Have a look on my website for the details, and check out the savings.
5-day weather forecasts, http://www.buoyweather.com/ go to virtual buoys, pick the location you want.
This is the one I go by!
Big bait – big fish
Laurie
Email: 
Low tide early morning, pick the easy ones first.
Spot them first, wait for the right opportunity, sometimes this means waiting a few sets before making your move.
Its reef ledges like this that they are on, right in the holes. Some spots you just can’t get to!
Best to go with another person who also has a licence, that way you can watch each other’s backs, call out
When you find a spot with lots of big ones, it is hard to pass up. This was a good day!
Make sure you only get 20 per license holder per day; 
most of the ones we pick are well over size.
Wash the sand off them, 
cut them out of their shells 
and pound them with a tenderiser.
Kalbarri Offshore & Angling Club Monthly Comp 24th October 2009.
Sue won the senior section with her sambo and a skippy. She released a big baldchin, 
the stingray and a few pink snapper.
Nic Bramwell landed 2 nice mulloway from the beach to win the land based section.
One of them is currently in Shark Bay. Weather looking good, Steven should have a good trip!
They are going to take a lot of work to get them up to Murchison Boat Hire standard, but are going to be really nice when finished.
Due for survey on the 17th September, I am going to have to pull my finger out to get them ready!
Double hook-up of yellow-fin tuna! You can see the differences in the two photos.
We headed further out to deeper water and fished a couple of spots on my GPS resulting in this 9kg dhuie for me as well as a size red emperor, baldchin and big snapper. Jason and Daniel got a couple of smaller dhuies, snapper and red-throat emperor.
Not a lot of information was forthcoming but these photos sent from Christian De Ran shows that they got into some fish.
The conditions throughout the week were very testing, as the northerly winds churned things up a bit. The 7.8 definitely saved our week.
It was a very unusual week for us. We like to do a lot of trolling for Mackerel,
The only tuna around where some good sized Mack tuna (great bait) which provided us with a lot of entertainment. With the cooler temps, we were forced to do a bit more bottom bouncing than usual. To our surprise we found that the saddle tail perch and red
It was good to see that the station owners had began to do a bit of work around the place. Paul seems to be a lot more motivated to enhance
The bay is a beautiful place and this year was no exception. Our virgin for 2009 was a guy named Dave Stanley, soon to be renamed shark man.
We were really hoping to get a chance to chase some sail fish. Laurie had given us a fair idea where to look and we certainly had all of the gear.
We arrived in Onslow on Saturday evening and spent the night at the Onslow Mackerel Motel setting up our rods and reels in anticipation of the next day’s fishing (we did not wish to miss a single moment). We awoke to a magnificent day with light breezes (which continued for the next three days) and the excitement of getting into the water spurred us to quickly load the boat, launch and head for the island. By 11.30am we had arrived and
Our plan for the week was “catch and release” only keeping one or two quality fish for the evening meal.
Over the next seven days we fished Airlie and Rosily Island, Rosily Shoals, Penguin Bank (including a long stint of trolling for sail fish in 60 to 70m) and drop-offs immediately west of Thevenard Island. All of the most successful way-points are still on the boat GPS, some were more successful than others and those lucky enough to hire Laurie’s boat next will certainly have a head start.
The fish caught were many and varied both in size and species but some of the more memorable ones included
Unfortunately our island adventure all too soon came to an end and needless to say it was a grim group of guys making their way back to Onslow against a very stiff south east wind. The trip back to Perth was made more bearable with the many stories of the week’s events and certainly the memories of some of the superb catches will remain with us for a long time. We have already commenced planning for the next adventure.
Kalbarri Offshore & Angling Club Monthly Comp 22nd August 2009.
Son Jared teasing a skua with a mulie. The skua eventually took the mulie from his hand.
Sambo for Nik from his dinghy 
and junior Beau’s snapper from the same dinghy.
Land based sambo for Daniel 
and son Jared with his catch.