Dream catch calls for celebration

Local chippy Josh Edwards took advantage of the small tides and good visibility recently and went on a diving expedition to the Muiron Islands.

He was diving a nice bombie in 25m of water when a beauty of a red emperor showed up.

This fish was what Josh always dreamed of seeing and he even had a small picture on the dashboard of his car.

He took aim with his 1200 Rob Allen tuna railgun and nailed it with a good holding shot.

He had to shoulder off a few reef sharks and came up hooting so loud his boatie could hear from 50m away. Needless to say, his stoke factor was huge and a dream fish was boated.

Now he has a green jobfish sitting on his car dashboard to remind him of his next target.

The sensational weather has continued and allowed many locals to get out and about on the water. The festive season is upon us and locals are keen to get a few squid, rock lobster, crabs, fillets of fish and whatever else we are lucky enough to have in our waters for a traditional Exmouth Christmas lunch.

I try really hard not to write about billfish every week, but sometimes the news is just too good and I must share it.

This weekend local angler Ben Knaggs couldn’t find a crew to join him, so he decided to go alone and target blue marlin. He had two blues before 7.30am, and the day just got better. He then managed to get a double hookup and had to call a nearby crew over to help.

They jumped aboard and helped him to tag both fish. Ben got everything sorted, settled again and put the gear in only to get another blue straight away.

He ended up with five fish raised, five fish hooked and five fish tagged — all before midday, which is awesome.

Ben set off to help a boat in trouble and didn’t fish for the rest of the day.

Johnno Wroth, his wife Casey and his son Thomas made a fleeting weekend trip from Perth and managed to get out on the water in dream conditions.

They teamed up with friends and caught red emperor, cobia and plenty of sun rays. Red emperor have been showing up in many photos lately, and are mainly found in depths of 25m-60m. Single paternoster rigs made up with a circle hook have worked well.

In the shallower waters, try switching to a running sinker and have the sinker as light as possible so that the bait slowly enters the fish zone.

The tidal flow and current will determine how heavy the lead should be, so it is good to have a range on board.