How many times have we heard that 90% of the fish are caught by 10% of the fishermen, or that there are anglers and danglers? It would be fair to say that applies in Inverloch at the moment where it is not just a matter of dropping a line in the water to catch a fish.

Outside the entrance there have been quite a few garfish being caught around the rocks, along with silver trevally and whiting. Fish are being caught by both boaters and land-based fishermen.

Alan Jordan spends a lot of time fishing from the shore and after one of his outings he phoned me to explain that his mate had caught a strange looking fish. He asked me if I could help identify it.

As it turned out his catch was a butterfish of just on 60cm, which I photographed for the bemused fisherman. These fish look similar to a freshwater European carp without the whiskers, and have fins similar to a snapper but slightly shorter. They are seldom caught in this part of the world and are mainly a weed eater - but this fellow was caught on whitebait!

There have been spasmodic reports of good bags of salmon being taken through out the inlet on a variety of baits and lures but they haven’t yet arrived in the big numbers that they are famous for. When they do show up the word quickly spreads and the fishermen will come from near and far.

Stevies Gutter is one of those places that is usually good for a fish. It has been giving up reasonable numbers of whiting to 35cm, along with a sprinkling of salmon, silver trevally and small flathead that have all been taking Bass yabbies and pipis.

Mahers Landing is still producing good numbers of whiting but it would be fair to say that they have not been as thick as in previous months. Land-based anglers have been doing fairly well on the run-in tide with gummy sharks and silver trevally being caught in fairly good numbers.

The Tarwin River has been very popular especially with anglers who have been taking advantage of the newly constructed fishing platforms. Estuary perch have been caught from the rock wall to the highway bridge in good numbers on the run-out tide and first of the run-in. Mixed in with them have been silver trevally that have been taking Bass yabbies and sand worms, with the occasional mullet making an appearance too.