Marlin still off Northland coast

Fishers wait for the big one to bite on 90 Mile Beach.

An interesting week on the fishing front this week, with rumours of marlin still in close in our waters.

The outer waters are still reasonably warm, though, so really no surprise they are still lurking around.

I guess a lot of it at this time of year comes down to expense v reward.

Fishing up the coast has been remarkably good for most who have ventured out. The rock fishermen have been doing well from Kauri Mountain right up to Cape Reinga.

There have been reports of 90 Mile Beach fishing well on the west coast and the Kaipara for big gurnard and snapper. The secret to the rock fishermen's success is berley, berley, berley.

The local Whangarei area has also had its moments with 3 Mile Reef producing the goods for a few winter fisher folk.

Kingfish, trevally, snapper and gurnard are all being caught in reasonable numbers. Waipu has also had its moments with the river mouth and beach along towards Langs Beach holding some good-sized snapper. Rumours of some large kingfish showing on occasion have also tempted me to go and have a look myself; in past years stick baits have produced really well at this time of the year. Along the front of the oil refinery (keep an eye out for tankers and note the restrictions) has been producing some very nice trevally to small, well presented baits.

The Old Woman and the Chicks has started to fire up for tarakihi with some nice kingis and snapper thrown in the mix. Kahawai are also still around in great numbers, meaning people's smokers have been working overtime. I'm finding larger baits for the winter snapper to be effective with the likes of bullet tuna, blue mackerel and silver mackerel (one of my new favourites) doing the damage on those bigger fish. The barracuda are starting to become a little annoying and the appearance of decent numbers of thresher sharks chasing the anchovy schools around can make for awesome fun on a light line.

Bland Bay, Rawhiti, Bay of Islands, and the Cavallis up to Stephenson Island have all been fishing well. In close along the reefs and ledges has been producing good kingfish and snapper. Rock fishermen, kayaks and boats have all been yielding some very nice bag limits of good fish.

We are finding bait selection to be reasonably critical depending on the areas being fished. Softbaits have been working well in the deeper waters but shallow areas are producing well on stray-lined baits. We're finding the inshore fish around the Whangarei area are still turned on to things like bullet tuna, pilchard and silver mackerel, and although the odd fish is falling to squid they still seem very switched on to the protein-packed morsels.

Be safe out on the water over the coming week and make the most of the windows as they present.