This Winter looks like developing into one of the best bream seasons in the past few years.

Over the Past four or five years there have been big numbers of small bream in the system and now some of these are large enough to make the legal length of 25cm.

There are also some big traveling bream in the estuary and they are poking up the river, not staying down around the mouth.

The best of the bream being taken are well over a kilo and are very solid fish.

The weather has been perfect for bream fishing, although typically cold.

The bream can be caught from the walls at the mouth of the river, from the spur wall at Manning Point, upstream around Chinamens Point and further up around the mouth of Cattai Creek and the buoy near Jones Island.

They are taking soft plastics, mullet strips and yabbies.

Luderick are also on the bite, from Chinamens Point up-river. Green weed floated along just outside the weeds will soon get a down on the float.

Over recent weeks good catches of flathead have been made on soft plastics upstream from Harrington.

The fish have not been big, with the best going 50cm, but they have been plentiful.

Whiting have been taking worms fished over the sand flats at the mouth of the river. The end of the seawall has produced school jew to 6kg on squid at dawn and dusk.

Fishing has been much quieter on the beaches, with the headlands producing the best fish from the surf.

On the beaches the tailor have been only 700g-800g. The tailor caught from the rocks have been 1kg-1.5kg and keen to hit lures and slowly retrieved garfish and pilchards.

A few drummer have been caught from the south side of Crowdy Head before sunrise on cunjevoi.

Some school jew to 5kg have been taken from the beach just north of the sea wall.

Fishing has been relatively poor offshore for the past few weeks with no boats making really big catches. Some pan-sized snapper and a few flathead make up most of the catches.

Those willing to troll a lure along the tide lines and around any baitfish that can be found have been picking up small bonito. These make excellent bait for most species of fish.

July is the middle month of Winter according to the calendar but the cold conditions have been carrying on into September over the past few years. Usually the first couple of weeks of September can be very cold.

If no freshes come down the river then July will be a great time for bream fishing from the walls and from boats near the rocks and weed beds.

Mullet strips, yabbies, prawns and small pieces of octopus leg are all great baits for bream in the Winter.

Darryl Collison with a pair of blue groper. The little one was 56cm and the other weighed 8kg. Pic courtesy of Ritchies Bait and Tackle