As we wrote about in last week’s report, here is the picture of Ross Italiano’s permit on fly, which was caught inside the reef at Tantabiddi.

The Exmouth Game Fishing Club was to hold its annual Tantabiddi camp out last weekend, but strong winds postponed the event to this coming weekend, the 19^th and 20^th. This is a fun social weekend with over $500 worth of prizes. You don’t have to be a member of the EGFC and it costs just $20 per person (children U16 $10) which includes your Saturday night bbq and Sunday morning breakfast. 

The EGFC has permission for participants to camp out at Tantabiddi, but numbers are limited, so make sure you book early.  If you can’t make the days out fishing, then you’re welcome to join us all for the bbq and camp out, but bookings are essential for catering. There will be prizes awarded for the following categories: heaviest red emperor, longest mackerel, longest spangled emperor, most tagged marlin by a team and most tagged sailfish by a team. If you don’t have a boat you can fish from the shore and there is also the longest whiting section. 

The club would like to thank Dave Hall from Exmouth Dive Centre for the support of this annual event. Of course, if the strong winds persist, it will be postponed again 'til February. For updates, contact Jeni at Bluewater Tackle World Exmouth.

Brad Williams from Perth was fishing from the shore around near Yardie Creek Caravan Park using mullet strips and caught spangled emperor and a few reef sharks. Brad’s two sons Jayden and Kyle also got in on the action, landing emperors and queenfish during their school holiday break. Meanwhile squid have been prevalent in the waters off the marina according to Melanie Sinclair and Jason Richards from Perth. The pair were also having success on black-spotted tusk fish at dusk, while the queenfish have still been hammering the bait schools near the entrance to the marina on the high tide.

The reef fishing scene has been productive lately with catches of red emperor, rankin cod, spangled emperor and scarlet sea perch on a few dinner tables. The local squid bait has been reported as the most effective. Mackerel at the back of the reef at Tantabiddi have been hungry according to many anglers, with most of them attacking slowly trolled lures.