Marlin season ending on high in Northland waters

Marlin, marlin everywhere. Or so the fishing over the weekend would indicate with billfish landed from the Poor Knights north. We are coming towards the end of the season now and a late bite is apparent.

Snapper are still being caught in the Whangarei Harbour, with reports of fish up to 16lb (7.25kg).

It is true that more punters will experience more miss than hit, though, so you need to fish with your eyes open and the old brain engaged to find the spots where the fish are collecting and figure out what they're up to.

Happily the fish aren't too choosy about what to eat now and, as long as they are feeding, you should do well on most baits. Berley remains a key ingredient to success when anchored up.

Many fish have begun to move, however, and there are clear depths where activity is increasing at sea.

Search the banks and contour edges, steep drop-offs and current lines in all depths to find activity and you could be on.

I found good fish in 21m two weeks back and in 28m and 38m this past week.

Others did well off the Waipu river mouth last week but not so well over the weekend, so they are moving about and dead areas pop up as hot spots the next day. Stay awake out there.

Kahawai are very much in evidence with some big fish about. I took a couple in the 3kg-4kg range and dropped one I estimated at over 7kg. There are large numbers in the harbours and the big boys - which have the best snapper under them - are a little further out.

They are taking anything that moves including a whole 600g baby blue mackerel, bait, flies, pillies and softbaits.

There are plenty of gurnard a little deeper among the snapper but they sometimes struggle to get to the baits in time, while trevally are also about and can be in plague proportions.

Kingfish are plentiful but many are on the smaller side so if you are on a known spot, persevere a bit and the big boys should turn up for you. Using a bigger live bait can do the trick.

A little trick picked up last week out deep was to treat the bait a bit more like a softbait if you get a couple of pecks. Lifting or winding in on the pecks often induced a bite from snapper and the odd small kingfish.

Placing a small squid on a softbait jighead also works here.

It's still exciting, so see you out there.