The weather has been superb for the majority of the school holidays, with light easterly winds and minimal swell. With the near perfect boating conditions, most boats have been fishing out from Tantabiddi, where the fishing has been excellent. Dolphin fish are prolific under the big patches of floating weed, and small black marlin are being hooked and caught every day with most fish being reported in depths between 60-100m of water.

Spanish mackerel are still a little quiet with only a handful being reported.  We did however weigh a big mackerel caught out from Tantabiddi in a small dinghy during the week, which weighed 28kg. We will hopefully have the photo of that mackerel for next week’s report.

The Michaels family from Mandurah had an amazing half-day's fishing out at Tantabiddi in their boat Satisfaction. The plan was for mum Lisa to catch a marlin on her brand new hot pink Bluewater custom 24kg outfits, and it took less than a couple of hours trolling for that plan to come to fruition, with a feisty little black marlin nailing the pink soft head Richter lure trolled right in close behind the teaser.

Think pink!

Lisa played the marlin out perfectly bringing it in close enough for the tag to go in and for a couple of quick pictures beside the boat, before being released. It was then five-year-old Hayden’s turn, so Lisa was dropped back on the shore in exchange for Hayden. Hayden was keen on catching a couple of bottom fish and that didn’t prove too hard. Fishing in 30m of water Hayden landed a 76cm coral trout and 77cm rankin cod in successive drops.

Bluewater Exmouth's Ant Simper helps Hayden Michaels show off his catch.

That was enough bottom fish, so the marlin lures were put back out, a quick troll resulted in a brief marlin hook up and a couple of big dolphin fish which topped off what was a great day.

Fishing inside the reef at Tantabiddi has been worthwhile for the ever reliable spangled emperor and squid which have been picking up in recent weeks. Learmonth jetty has been quiet although there are few school mackerel being caught at high tide.

Text and pics © Bluewater Tackle World