Winter Tailor Choppers and Snapper Schools: WA Coastal Bite Report

Name’s Artificial Lure, checking in with your arvo coastal report for Western Australia. Along most of the west coast today it’s classic winter pattern: a firm high sitting inland and a weak front brushing the lower coast. Expect cool temps, a fresh southwest to southerly sea breeze on the exposed beaches, and lighter winds tucked in behind headlands. Skies are partly cloudy with the odd shower south of Mandurah through Busselton and down to Albany. Swell is running solid on the open coast, with a chunky west–southwest pulse making many outer reefs stand up but leaving some cleaner gutters and inside edges for land-based fishos. According to the Bureau of Meteorology, sunrise around Perth was just after 7am with sunset about 5:15pm, a touch earlier as you head down toward the Capes and the south coast. That shorter daylight window has pushed the better bite times right onto dawn, dusk, and the first couple of hours of the night, especially for tailor, mulloway, and pink snapper. Local tackle shops from Hillarys to Two Rocks report good numbers of **tailor** off the metro beaches in the low light, with choppers to 45 cm common and the odd bigger greenback mixed in. Around Fremantle moles and the rock walls, anglers have picked up **herring**, **skippy**, and a few school **mulloway**, plus **squid** in the harbour on the clearer tides. Down Mandurah way, the Dawesville Cut and nearby beaches have produced solid **herring**, **whiting**, and a few pinkies on the inshore reefs when the swell backs off. Offshore reports out of Mindarie, Two Rocks, Jurien, and north toward Lancelin talk of **pink snapper**, **dhufish**, and **Baldchin groper** on the 30–60 m lumps, with boats picking up mixed bags when they can sneak out between fronts. South through Busselton and Geographe Bay, boaties have been finding **King George whiting**, squid, and a few early winter **salmon** schools still dragging their heels along the capes. Tides along the metro coast today are in the neap-to-mid range with a modest high mid-morning and again in the evening, giving enough movement to fire up the gutters without ripping your gear down the beach. The softer tidal run suits finesse bait presentations for whiting and herring, and lets your soft plastics hang in the strike zone over the inshore reef. For lures, tailor have been loving 20–40 g metal slices, 90–120 mm stickbaits, and slim diving minnows in pilchard and white baitfish colours. Flat seas inside the reefs call for lightly weighted soft plastics—3–5 inch jerk shads in nuclear chicken, pearl white, and motor oil are doing damage on snapper and skippy. Squid are best on 2.5–3.0 size jigs in natural prawn and khaki patterns during the day, switching to brighter pinks and oranges as the light fades. Best baits right now are fresh **mulies**, bonito strips, and whole herring or tailor fillets for snapper and mulloway off the stones. For the bread-and-butter species, you can’t beat a small long-shank hook carrying coral prawn, squid strip, or worm baits, either drifted unweighted or on a tiny running sinker. If you’re soaking baits at night, step up to a heavier trace and a glow bead above the hook to get noticed in the wash. A couple of hot spots to circle for this week: - **North Mole and South Mole, Fremantle** – Great for herring, tailor, skippy, squid and the chance of a mulloway after dark on a rising tide. Work metal slugs and stickbaits around the bait schools at first light, then switch to bait and squid jigs as the sun lifts. - **Mindarie to Two Rocks inshore reefs** – The broken ground and reef edges in 8–20 m have been holding pink snapper, skippy, and the odd dhu. Fish the change of light with lightly weighted plastics or fresh mulies floated back in a berley trail. If you’re heading out, keep an eye on the latest marine forecast and swell, rock-fishing conditions can change fast this time of year. Fish with a mate, wear a PFD on the ledges, and don’t turn your back on the sea. Thanks for tuning in, and don’t forget to subscribe so you don’t miss the next report. This has been a quiet please production, for more check out quiet please dot ai. Great deals on fishing gear https://amzn.to/44gt1Pn