Thread: Snapper rig and advice for Kenepuru area

Originally Posted by R93

As I said I have no idea how to catch piper as they have small gobs. It would be great fun for my daughter to catch them so I will strip a few old flys I have and give it a go.
Are they active all day as I have only seen them at night or on dark?

All day affair piper. The will be more cautious than mackerel/koheru herrings etc but will be sucked in by a nice small floating bait. bread burley will bring them in. I would sit all evening on the old jetty under the mount after work getting a few dozen piper if a trip was on the next day. They often had a curious parasite louse that would attach to their tongues. It would look hideous but did not stop them from there day to day life. Would be good fun for the kids too. I used to almost like it as much as the bigger stuff.

Catch many squid at the mount at night?

Originally Posted by Toby

Catch many squid at the mount at night?

Nah, never really got the hang of that, plus I knew a fair few commercial guys so fresh calamari was easy. No dirty ink either.

Did you ever score any decent trevally off the whafs or rocks around the mount or baby snapper?

Originally Posted by R93

How do you rig that munsey?

I was hoping you were'nt going to ask that one , to be completely honest I've not done it for quite a few years . Pretty sure hooked through middle of bait , running sinker as you have described in first post .

Originally Posted by kiwijames

All day affair piper. The will be more cautious than mackerel/koheru herrings etc but will be sucked in by a nice small floating bait. bread burley will bring them in. I would sit all evening on the old jetty under the mount after work getting a few dozen piper if a trip was on the next day. They often had a curious parasite louse that would attach to their tongues. It would look hideous but did not stop them from there day to day life. Would be good fun for the kids too. I used to almost like it as much as the bigger stuff.

Cheer James I will give it a go. I dont remember them in any great numbers though but I am sure we can manage to find some.

Originally Posted by Toby

Did you ever score any decent trevally off the whafs or rocks around the mount or baby snapper?

I had a boat so did not really focus on fishing for keepers under the Mount. There definitely were some decent Trevs around, as were rat kings. Baby snapper were well off the menu as we knew where their old man normally hung out. Fucking big bronzies at the right time of year as well as a few Orca to put the shits up you if you were going for a dive in the harbor.

Originally Posted by R93

Cheer James I will give it a go. I dont remember them in any great numbers though but I am sure we can manage to find some.

Hopefully the SI ones are as common as they were up north. Head and fin em, scale then roll a milk bottle over em and chuck em straight in the pan with a bit of butter. Really good eating.

Originally Posted by kiwijames

Hopefully the SI ones are as common as they were up north. Head and fin em, scale then roll a milk bottle over em and chuck em straight in the pan with a bit of butter. Really good eating.

True? If my usual luck with fishing continues I might have to eat some

If they weren't so fiddly Id rate them one of the best eating fish you have never eaten. Flying fish sammies too. Nom nom

My 7.5 cents if you wana crank some soft baits at all on your fishing trip ,5 to 6 inch shads......find a bombie an hr before high tide ancher 30 to 40 mtrs of it burly it give it ten to twenty minutes then start casting down the trail try to get right to the bombie and let it sink as low as you can get it with out snagging in the rock's....work the bait back any way you like then boom! hoook up.If you cant find a bombie find some nice wash of a steep rock face do the same, or if your told were there is good structure at spot x do it there. or you can just get stinky bait all over your hands! and your kids will love flicking soft baits aswell.hope you have a good time any way you fish.

Originally Posted by Neckshot

My 7.5 cents if you wana crank some soft baits at all on your fishing trip ,5 to 6 inch shads......find a bombie an hr before high tide ancher 30 to 40 mtrs of it burly it give it ten to twenty minutes then start casting down the trail try to get right to the bombie and let it sink as low as you can get it with out snagging in the rock's....work the bait back any way you like then boom! hoook up.If you cant find a bombie find some nice wash of a steep rock face do the same, or if your told were there is good structure at spot x do it there. or you can just get stinky bait all over your hands! and your kids will love flicking soft baits aswell.hope you have a good time any way you fish.

Whats a bombie and a shad?

If you want piper for bait they shit easy to catch on a string of Sabiki fly's ,just add a little bit of bait to each.Pull them in 2 or 3 at a time. I cut them in half get 2 good size baits out of them ,bigger ones 3 baits.But for the bigger snapper Herring probably a better bait ,steak those into good size baits .Big snapper won't give small baits a second look.Piper I find better bait for Blue backs (big Kahawai)
Normally I only use fresh Bonito ,rig similar to your 2 hook set up. I have a Wide gape hook snelled as a main hook with a straight shank slider & a green lumo bead down on top of that. Both 5/0 minimum on 80lb supple trace 1 -1.2m & running sinker .I'm catching fish up to 8lb with that rig regular ,surf casting.Stick rod in holder & back the drag off ,they hook them selves with that rig.Kick back have a beer n wait for the rod to load up.Few wraps of cotton round any soft bait with make the fish work a little harder to pinch it.
My 2 cents hope its of use R93 .Piper (Garfish) a very good eating.

While I have to say most pre rigged gear lures etc is designed to catch fishermen not fish I AM a sucker for flasher rigs.
Always catch more than Dad if im running one and he is not.
Use berly, Salmon ones are awesome but dont last long,pilli ones good too.
Plain old ledger rig for us 2 hooks(flashers) sinker on bottom. Will also run a strayline out the back with a decent sized hook and big chunk of Kawai or barracuda.
Kawai and cuda are excellent bait.
Pillies are great to but you only get one bite per bait(which is fine if they are big and hungry).
We usually fish the edge of a structure where rock meets sand. You may have to fish the sand to get away from the cod Dave? Pay to check up on the cod regs.
Burly burly burly.

Im gonna have a fish with you one day chris I like the way you go about it.