What a great season we have been enjoying over in the South East of SA.

There has been some terrific catches coming in every weekend with some big mulloway, plenty of sharks, no shortage of snapper and awesome whiting. Add to this the excellent numbers of crayfish on offer and things are looking pretty good over this way.

Boat anglers have been having a blast fishing the reef areas out from Robe with good numbers of snapper, gummy shark and school sharks about. Anchoring up and berleying in about 10m of water an hour either side of a tide change has been the way to go here. The odd thresher and bronze whaler shark has also been about so it pays to have a shark line out at all times. The fishing in close in the bay has also been excellent with squid, flathead and heaps of whiting being caught. There are plenty of good whiting spots just out the front of long beach and drifting with cockles has been working well. There has been heaps squid to be found all over the bay.

Surf anglers have been doing well at Long Beach, Back Beach and in the Little Dip park with a lot of school mulloway about along with some nice gummy sharks and the odd snapper. I fished Long beach recently after dark and picked up a few small seven-gill sharks, some small mulloway and some nice flathead on salmon fillet. There were also plenty of large stingrays about as well.

The mulloway had been elusive in the river over the last few weeks but a few nice mulloway have been caught lately, mostly by bait anglers fishing after dark with squid or pilchard around the caves area. Live baits such as mullet if you can get them will also work very well either put under a float or on a running sinker rig.

A few mulloway are also taking plastics and vibes whilst anglers have been chasing the bream and perch.

Bream have been widespread, but the stretch between Donavans and the Caves seems to be the better area for the larger fish which have been up to a whopping 45cm. Good catches of estuary perch has also been coming in from the Dry Creek stretch.

Further upstream, the Pritchards area has been producing some big bream and estuary perch, mostly on hardbodied lures cast at bankside structure. The occasional brown trout has also been caught in this area lately just to spice things up a bit.

The fishing has been great over here with some great catches of very big whiting coming in. Drifting with cockles has been working well in most areas as has fishing any sand holes while on anchor. The reef areas such as the pinnacles, king rock and in Wrights bay have been fishing well for snapper, whiting, flathead and sharks while on anchored up and berleying on a tide change. Good crays are getting caught in the pots mostly out around the north reef area.

The marina area has been fishing well for land-based anglers casting soft plastics around with some nice salmon, tommy ruff and flathead and the odd bream being caught. Some very large mulloway have been sighted in the harbour and off the jetty after dark but have been very hard to tempt. Perhaps live baiting would be the way to go here as these mulloway have been very large and most likely hanging around to feed on the huge numbers of small salmon that have been around this summer.

On the subject of big mulloway, the stretch of beach at Wrights Bay is well known for producing a few big mulloway every season and this is the best time of year to be targeting them along there. It is well worth the effort as last year mulloway in excess of 20 kg were taken along here. The best mulloway tend to get caught on the high tide at night on either a full or new moon.