Welcome to the Fishing Finatic Blog!
Each year, the average Australian employee works roughly 20-34 or 35-44 hours per week[1], equating to the average Australian working 49,920 to 109,824 hours over the course of their lifetime. When you add that employers expect their employees to do roughly six unpaid weeks (38-hour weeks) of overtime each year,[2] this only exacerbates the issue of being tied to your job all the while daydreaming of your next PB or dream fish.
If you are like me, most of your working hours will be spent daydreaming about the upcoming weekend where you dream of having one of those fishing sessions where you cannot seem to do much wrong, and the fish keep finding the hooks time and time again, or alternatively, about how best to convince the fish to eat on those tough days.
What chance do you have at any real and meaningful work-life balance when we work ourselves into the ground? The answer is, it will always be a struggle, but like many other struggles in life, they can be overcome with a little determination, planning, and fortitude. The 9 to 5 anglers out there need some tips and tricks on how best to maximise the time they spend fishing, so they can all catch a fish of a lifetime, or in this instance; the fish of their working lifetime.
The average Australian spends 49,920 to 109,824 hours working over the course of their lifetime, which equates to a hell of a lot of time spent NOT FISHING!.
[1] Australian Bureau of Statistics. https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/insights-hours-worked [2] The Australia Institute’s Centre for Future Work. https://futurework.org.au/post/australians-working-6-weeks-unpaid-overtime-costing-economy-over-92-billion-go-home-on-time-day-report/#:~:text=This%20equates%20to%20224.3%20hours,unsatisfied%20with%20their%20working%20hours
How To Prepare For Success On The Water
We as fishos, spend countless hours cleaning reels, re-spooling reels, changing trebles, sharpening treble hook points, and tying the infamous FG knot, all in an attempt to prepare for the next outing so when we do get out on the water, we can catch the fish of a lifetime.
The following are some tips and tricks to best prepare for fishing success on the water:
1. Clean your reels, rods and gear after every use. Clean your rods and reels either by taking them into the shower with you, or get a damp cloth and wipe over them to get rid of any salt.
2. Take the time to tie good knots. Do not succumb to the adage – if you cannot tie knots, tie lots! Take the time to learn one good quality knot, and get fast and competent in tying it, so you can tie it under pressure when it is windy, or when you just got smoked by a dream fish and time is of the essence to get your lure back in the water.
3. Service your reels often to ensure when you hook the fish of a lifetime, and your drag starts peeling off in a manic fashion, there are no system failures. If you do not know how to service your own reels, get a service technician to do this (the big brands, such as Daiwa and Shimano, can service your reels for you).
"Take the time to tie good knots. Do not succumb to the adage - if you cannot tie knots, tie lots!"
4. The night before your fishing day: tie on your leaders using the knot you know well; tie on your favourite lure, or jig head (do not rig the soft plastic until you are on the water or else the scent may wear off); organise your fishing tackle in a logical system/manner so you know where things are and so they can be found quickly; and make sure you have safety gear (such as, a headlamp with charged batteries, plyers for hook removal from fingers, a snake bandage, or snake gators for snake protection).
5. Keep your partner happy. I personally, find this step is the most important step, or else you will be forced to stay at home to do chores and odd repair jobs. Even worse yet, be forced to spend quality date-night time with your partner which does not involve a trip to your local fish waterway. There are some simple ways to keep your partner happy. For example, take them on a date after work during the week, do the washing up, make sure the laundry basket is not piling up to the roof (we all know where the washing machine is, so get to it, and put a load on and hang it out). If all those fail, invite your partner fishing – you will be shocked to see how quickly they learn with a little bit of tutelage, and they may learn to enjoy spending quality time flicking lures or drowning baits with you.
"Keep your partner happy, ... or else you will be forced to stay at home to do chores and odd repair jobs."
How To Maximise Your Time While Fishing
With all the time spent working and being a slave to your desk or tools, the following tips and tricks can see you maximise your time when you are out on the water soaking a bait or casting a lure:
- Take advantage of daylight savings. Daylight savings affords the 9 to 5 angler time in their day to get out and fish after work. You will be shocked to see how much time you really do have if you leave from work, head home, pack the car, and head off to your local system to start casting.
- Fish the conditions you have. Do not wait for the ‘perfect’ conditions. When we spend so much time shackled to a desk, we are bound to get weekends where the tides are no good, it blows a gale, rains, or the barometric pressure is unfavourable. Regardless of the conditions, you will simply not catch fish sitting at home on the couch when the weather is bad, so buy yourself a good wet weather jacket (which doubles as a good wind breaker) and get out and fish in the rain when the conditions are not ‘perfect’. The rain will not hurt you, so get out and convince the fish to eat. We also suggest you take a well-earned break from work, and check the conditions before you head out; your employer should support you keeping mentally healthy right, so just do it and spend 10-20 minutes of your workday planning the tides/weather (do not do this if you are a brain surgeon).
- Come up with a fishing GAME PLAN. My year 10 and 11 mathematics teacher (I hated maths) always used to bang on about the 5 P’s: Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance. I hated the saying at the time because he used the saying to motivate us students to study for maths tests, but hey, he was onto something. To prevent piss poor performance on the water, we recommend having a fishing spot, and then two more back up fishing spots to hit if the first and second spots do not produce fish/quality fish. Covering ground to find the bite is important, so have pre-prepared spots you can move to if the fish are shut down in one spot. GOOGLE MAPS IS LYFE – hot tip: if you zoom in and out in satellite mode, you can see deeper holes in river systems (the water will be a deeper green/blue).
Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance on the water!
- Your GAME PLAN should be geared towards the conditions. You want to be fishing the good pressure points when the tide has flow in it, so make sure you have walked/driven to the spot you want to fish, when the tide is good. If the tide is not good because it is one of those days where you must fish the conditions you have, we encourage you to cover ground fast; fish from structure to structure, from hole to hole, and from pressure edge to pressure edge, until something decides to eat.
- Target the conditions. If you are on the water an hour either side of the high tide, flathead will be ambushing baitfish so put on a three-to-four-inch curly tail grub, or three-to-four-inch paddle tail. If the wind is blowing a gale, fish the windblown banks in the direction the wind is blowing because the bait fish will be pushed up against the banks. If it is noon, shaded pockets under trees and along the bank may be hard to find, so focus your time on deeper holes where water temperatures will be cooler.
Have a fishing GAME PLAN - fish the conditions you have and then adjust your fishing techniques for those conditions.
Land-Based Species To Target After Work
Australian Bass are a species which can really fire, especially on dusk. You can either catch cricket scores of Australian Bass, or they can be really shut down and you can find it difficult to convince even one to eat, but they are a species which are excellent to target for those after work fishing missions.
Australian Bass waters stretch along coastal rivers from Victoria up to Queensland and are a very fun and exhilarating fish to target on lures. If you live in one of these areas, my bet is that you have good Australian Bass waterways on your doorstep, and you just might not know it yet, so get out and start exploring after work.
Some tips and tricks on how to catch more land based Australian Bass are:
1. Find skinny stretches of water which you can cast from one side of the bank to the other. This is important because the bass hold up in the structure, and if you are not landing your lure close to the underlying vegetation against the bank, often the fish will not be convinced to eat. Again, GOOGLE MAPS is your friend here.
2. A medium light 2-6kg rod paired with a 2500 spinning reel, and spooled with 15lb or 20lb braid provides the relevant stopping power required to pull these fish out of tight structure. Some fishermen prefer to fish lighter than this, but sometimes you need a bit more back-bone in your rod and reel, or else you will get bricked in tight structure.
3. Use varied sizes of leader ranging from 10lb to 20lb. Start out using as light a leader as you can, and if you get smoked into a snag, or start losing too many lures to trees, upgrade to heavier leader. Remember, go light to get the bite!
"Remember, go light to get the bite!”.
4. Surface lures account for the most fun method of fishing for Australian Bass which love to eat cicadas and other insects off the roof, so if you imitate the bass’ food source, then you will catch fish. Most surface eats come on the pause, so pause your retrieve within the strike-zone of the bank (up to three metres from the structure) for up to 5 to 10 seconds. When surface fishing, remember to target the low light periods of dawn and dusk.
5. Surface lure tips. Jollip Lures, Arancini Fizzer 55mm, is a standout surface lure because it packs the weight to cast long distances if required, and it has the ability to be fished quickly or slowly. We recommend fast sharp jabs of the rod tip to get the Arrancini Fizzer 55mm to swim erratically. Jackall’s Micro Pompadour is another stand out surface lure which accounts for many fish in my local system, which can be fished with a slow steady retrieve with pauses mixed in. Remember to let your surface lure settle on the water after you cast it before commencing your retrieve.
6. If the bite is shut down, football jigs with a freshwater yabby trailer, or other similar creature bait trailer, fish amazingly well to produce bites from tentative fish. With the football jig, slow lifts and drags across the bottom of the river will get the job done. Likewise, a three inch, or four-inch, black curly tailed Berkley Gulp Alive Minnow Grub rigged on a 1/8oz jig head will account for lots of fish on those quite days. Hop your Berkley Minnow Grub erratically with up to three quick and sharp twitches, or one long swooping lift of the rod tip, and you will get the bite. Bites on the Berkley Minnow Grub will feel like ticks in the line and require hard hooksets to drive the hooks once the fish has been given time to eat the plastic.
"Most surface eats come on the pause, so pause your retrieve within the strike-zone of the bank (up to three metres from the structure) for up to 5 to 10 seconds"
Closing Message
Now we have inspired you to get out fishing while having a job and being a 9 to 5 angler, we hope you can catch that fish of your ‘working lifetime’. Unshackle yourself from your desk, or, put your tools down, and get out there FISHING! Tight lines.
The Finatic Blogger...
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