October heralds the start of the bass season in the Tathra area and with a little effort, you can be on some pretty interesting sweetwater locations which harbour these majestic fish.

One such area is Jellat Jellat, about halfway between Tathra and Bega.

Here the Bega River meets the salt and after the past few seasons of heavy flooding, many new deeper holes with new structure have been formed.

This is a good location for kayak fishing and with a prearranged pick-up, it is quite possible to put in at Bega and be picked up further downstream towards, or at, Tathra.

This allows anglers to target bass and other species like bream, estuary perch, whiting and flathead as they venture further into the salt.

The junction of the Brogo and Bega rivers is at Bega.

In the Brogo system there is also some very nice water to host bass moving back up the system after their spawning migration.

Where anglers can gain access along the river right up to the wall of Brogo Dam, most holes will be home to a few if not many fish.

Brogo Dam itself, although not fully fired up yet, should improve as the days warm.

Most of the estuaries are starting to fire. The shallow upper margins are well worth a look because this is where the prawns lurk and the fish follow.

This is a good time to cast one of the many prawn imitation lures available for flathead, trevally, jewfish and bream.

This month is arguably the best offshore to target tasty tiger flathead. They generally move into the waters off Tathra now, especially the area out from Bournda.

It is quite possible to obtain a decent bag in a very short time from 40m-60m depths.

Once you have acquired your bag of flatties try moving to the reefs for snapper, morwong, nannygai or pigfish.

On reefs in very deep water out towards the continental shelf, at this time of year Tassie trumpeters are lurking. These taste sensations are more easily accessible with electric reels and then you can go farther afield to drop into depths where ling, blue-eye trevalla, hapuku and gemfish are likely to make up the bulk of the captures.

The deeper water this month often has small to mid-range yellowfin tuna, albacore, bluefin and stripies taken on the troll.

And if you have tuna you will have makos, and some very big ones, so have some big gear handy.

Don’t forget, the annual Brogo Bass Bash, now in its 15th year, will be held on Brogo Dam on December 6-8. Anyone wishing to join this great fun weekend should call me on 0427 934 688 or visit www.fscbsa.weebly.com to download an entry form. Also check out the FSCBSA Facebook page.