Over the past month the inside fishing has hit a bit of a lull, but the offshore fishing has been nothing short of amazing. The yellowtail kingfish have finally turned up, just for the icing on the cake.

Offshore from Port Albert has been great lately, especially in close. For starters, Whale Bay has been producing stacks of gummy sharks to 10kg and heaps around a metre in length. Most baits work well, such as pilchards and squid. Fresh baits such as couta and slimy mackerel are working well too.

There are also some toothy critters around and some big bronzies have been caught out front of the entrance to Port Albert in around 8-10m of water. There are plenty of small hammerhead sharks around 3ft in length as well when fishing large baits under biodegradable balloons.

There are also plenty of big gummy sharks all the way out to 10m line and plenty around Rabbit Island. Out really wide in 50m, the barracouta are still extremely annoying and stealing everyone’s rigs as quick as it gets to the bottom, making fishing out this far very tough indeed. The ovals are chockers full of good-sized pinkies ranging from 30-45cm. Pilchards, fresh slimy mackerel or couta work a treat as bait. For a feed of pinkies, use smaller hooks from 1/0 to 3/0.

As for the kingfish, there are huge schools out around the islands. There’s a lot smaller fish here this year with stacks of the undersized kingies. If you persist through the small ones, you will get big ones to 75cm. The best methods to find the kingies have been to troll small skirted lures. Knife jigs have been by far the most successful method to catch a king and blue or green jigs ranging between 150g and 200g have been the best.

The best way to catch the kings has been to troll skirts until you find the kings, and then drop the jigs down once you find them. There are huge schools of slimy mackerel around offshore from Port Albert and Welshpool, so don’t be surprised if we see some of those bluefin tuna turn up that have been caught on the western side of the prom.

• For more information, contact Will at Allways Angling in Traralgon on 5174 8544. You will get expert advice and great deals on fishing bait and tackle.