The Curdies River has been producing some good bream and the odd estuary perch. Most fish have been taken above the ramp at Boggy Creek. Greybacks, podworms and shrimps have been working well for bait anglers whereas lure casters have found hard bodies more effective than plastics.

The opposite has been true in the Hopkins recently where the majority of bream have been taking plastics. The Berkley Sandworm has been all the rage recently. There have been lots of fish in the 24 to 28cm range, which is encouraging and indicates natural recruitment several years ago.

A few bigger bream have been taken with the largest a 48cm thumper. The lack of super hot weather recently has kept the bream biting. Usually they would be pretty quiet given that the mouth was blocked so often over summer. Hopefully a bit of April rain and some big Easter tides will see the mouth open naturally.

Yellowtail kingfish remain scarce locally. The unseasonably poor weather didn’t help matters there. It’s also made chasing the more prolific shark species difficult. Even in a good season April kings are normally pretty sparse but pelagic sharks are still an option, weather permitting.

Good catches of King George whiting have been taken along the coast. The Killarney area in particular has been productive, possibly because bigger fish, such as yellowtail kingfish, haven’t been around to hassle them.

Pinkies continue to be prolific with some good captures coming from boats fishing Lady Bay at Warrnambool and off the back of the Lighthouse at Port Fairy.

The Warrnambool breakwater has also been producing the odd bag of pinkie snapper for shore-based anglers, along with a few salmon. Pinkies should be a viable inshore target at the beginning of April but by the end of the month most snapper captures will be further offshore.

In late February the section of the Merri River, near the boat ramp, was closed because of a blue green algae infestation. Come April we should have cooler temperatures and sufficient rainfall to solve this problem. Pre-spawning aggressiveness should see the trout biting well as they did at this time last year. Soft plastics, such as Berkley Bass Minnows and Ecogear Grass Minnows, usually work well on the trout.