This month has been much like the last, monster salmon! With any luck these huge fighters will be around all winter.

It’s hard to predict whether or not the big salmon will stick around for long but lucky for anglers there’s no signs that the big salmon will disappear any time soon.

All along Ninety Mile Beach was good; the biggest salmon for the month that I saw a photo of was caught at Loch Sport. The fish measured 80cm in length and wasn’t weighed but it had to be 11-12lbs in the old scale. I guess the average sized salmon have been around 60cm or 3kg but there are still plenty of 70cm specimens around and they can weigh anywhere up to 4.5kg depending on how fat they are.

There have been two main methods of targeting these fish, one method being the humble paternoster rig with bait. However you would be silly not to use a surf popper on the top dropper of the rig. Blue/white poppers and green/white poppers have been working the best. Bluebait has been the most successful bait to use on the bottom dropper.

The second method has been to spin the beaches. This is what I prefer to do, I think you catch more fish, but it’s much more proactive as well. Use metal lures ranging from 25-40g, there is no need to go any bigger. A surf rod isn’t the best option when spinning either, which is normally what anglers resort to; throwing 70g plus lures around. If you use a nice graphite rod with a bit of length and a 6kg line class rating you will cast a mile with light lures.

A little trick when using lures for these big salmon is to take off those horrible trebles! You will struggle to land any big salmon off the surf with heavy lures and treble hooks. There is so much weight at the head of the fish that they just shake their heads until the lure comes out.

What you need to do is buy a packet of circle hooks: Gamakatsu or Owner hooks, whatever you prefer.

We have been using 2/0-4/0 circles on 40g lures and they are fine despite looking a little big. We have found that once the circle hook is in, you don’t loose any fish at all. Even with standard single hooks, you still lose heaps of these big salmon for some reason, but they can’t just shake out a circle hook.

To get the hook to drag straight, use an extra split ring, this will keep the hook inline with the lure.

For more information contact Will at Allways Angling in Traralgon on 51748544. You will get expert advice and great deals on fishing tackle.