This has been one of the better southern bluefin tuna season for the past few years.

Over one fine weekend there were over 350 boats launched on the Saturday with many anglers chasing the mighty SBT and albacore. The heaviest SBT caught to date came in at a whopping 138.8kg caught by Warren Micallet and crew of Andrew Saliba and Angelo Micallet from Melbourne while fishing out over the continental shelf in 1500m of water.

Alex Saisanas, Alex Matic and Mario Quadara also landed a barrel SBT weighing in at 131kg while fishing in the 700m water. Peter and David Hall while fishing with Off the Hook Fishing Charters hooked onto a barrel and landed a 125kg SBT, local Bob McPherson fishing with Bruce Wallace and James Thackeray weighed in a SBT at 105kg, Jason Verberg and crew came back with a 98kg SBT and brothers Ben and Andrew Donegal landed a nice 80kg SBT for their first time out fishing from Portland.

Along with these bigger barrels coming in the cleaning tables have been overloaded with boating parties coming back with plenty of SBT ranging from 15-35kg along with heaps of albacore ranging from 10-25kg.

The main fishing areas at the moment are east and west of the horseshoe with depths varying from 200-2000m of water but as the season progresses into June this may vary and hopefully the fish will eventually come in closer as they have done from year to year.

As we head into June make sure you keep an eye on the weather as the Southern Ocean can turn very nasty very quickly, so keep a good eye on the weather forecasts and hopefully the weather gods will be kind to us throughout June.

For those not chasing SBT or albacore, boating parties heading around the back targeting flathead and gummy sharks off Cape Bridgewater have all had good catches of these fine eating table fish. Fishing in off Cape Grant and off Cape Nelson lighthouse in depths of 40-60m of water have seen a good mixture of fish being caught which have included snapper, morwong, coral perch, nannygai and the odd school shark.

Mako sharks have also been coming in from this area mainly south of Lawrence Rocks in depths of 65-100m for those that like chase these mighty fighting fish. Coming back in around Point Danger and some good catches of whiting ranging from 35-45cm with the odd one up to 55cm. Whiting have also been caught off Blacknose and in front of Pivot Beach with depths varying from 3-13m.

The north shore has seen good catches of snapper, trevally, whiting, salmon, gummy and school sharks between the Fitzroy River mouth through to Snapper Point for boating parties and land-based anglers.

Off the Lee Breakwater there has been good catches of whiting, calamari squid, snapper and the odd gummy shark. Land-based anglers fishing in and around the harbour are also landing whiting, bream, trevally, calamari squid and snapper.

Freshwater fishing has also been going well in both the Fitzroy and Surrey rivers with some good catches of bream for those that like to target the freshwater species.

So if your thinking of heading Portland way, give the boys a call at Portland Bait & Tackle on 0355235213 for all your latest fishing and weather reports, we are open 7 days a week from 7 till 7. We also have a large range of all your tackle and boating requirements so pop in and have a look.