Ben Caddaye's Gone Fishing: Take the bait and take full toll on salmon and tailor

When you are smack-bang in the middle of the toughest period of the year to find fish, you need all the helpful pointers you can get.

Bait is a like a flashing neon sign that screams 'fish are here!'.

If you spot a ball of bait in an estuary, you can almost always assume the 'usual suspects' will be in vicinity.

There are enormous schools of small, snack-sized mullet sheltering in a number of far South Coast estuaries.

Unsurprisingly, salmon and tailor are taking full toll, filling their stomachs while the going is good.

Fishers can take full toll, too. Armed with metal slugs, surface lures, soft plastics or flies, anglers are having a field day at times, catching and releasing a dozen fish per session.

They're mostly salmon, including genuine beasts over 5kg - that's about as big as east coast Australian salmon get.

READ MORE:

The tailor are smaller but just as fun and arguably better eating.

The fishing isn't constantly hot. With the water in most southern systems gin-clear and ice-cold, the fish can be a little spooky under bright sunshine or at low tide.

But keep searching and casting, and you'll eventually come across a school. It's worth the wait.

Bank-based trout fishing at Eucumbene and Jindabyne is great - but it's also bitterly cold.

Lure fishers are targeting windy shorelines and catching some lovely brown trout to 2.7kg and a spread of smaller rainbows.

Grey skies and a stiff breeze create the best conditions for this form of fishing, so don't expect a leisurely stroll in short sleeves!