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Can I get some views on the best method of fishing relating to offshore fishing in between 20mts to 50mts as I've alwaly been a drifter but I've heard the old saying that anchoring and burley is the way to go offshore.
And if you do think anchoring is the way to go how vital is your position close to the structure below! (close I know, but how close?)
Shane,
There are too many varirables for either method to be the best on any given day. Drifting is good when the current is ripping or the fish are spread out over a wide area.
If the fish are balled up tight, it's best to anchor right in front of them and drop lines back on to them with the current. I have found fish to bite longer and harder while on the anchor due to , can turn sounder off(personal but i rekcon it makes a difference), arn't spooking the fish when you contiually turn the engine on and off for each drift, can burly more effectively from a sationary position, and with drifting as you hook up and play the fish up as you drift away from the structure/fish school you spread/thin the origanal school out as the hooked-up fishes mates follow it and don't regroup.
With regards to position, at anchor it depends on current/fishing methods to be used. If using traditional paternosters in 50m of water you line could go straight down with no current or out at say a 45degree angle in strong current, or alternativly be floating baits back letting out hundreds of meters of line. Its most important to be landing your baits on top of the fish, eg. If im fishing in 50m of water with a strong current(but not too strong to anchor) i could be 30-50mtrs up-current of where the fish are, with no fish showing on the sounder but getting fish on the lines, becuase the baits are ending up were the fish are. My ideal situation is to be anchored up-current of a bombie with the paternosters coming down on the front edge/bottem of the bommie, and burling and floating down baits over the top of the bombie and out into the gravel/flat ground where the snapper genarally are. This enable all sorts of species to be pulled and more lines in the water without tangleing, maximizing fishing effort.
5mtrs away and u sometimes can't get a bite. I've had people on one side of the boat consistantly pulling fish and those on the other side getting nothing.
anchor will give the most consistant results by far, usually people drift because they are too lazy to anchor (but not always) and not too sure about people on one side getting fish, but those on the other not getting any, if that happened to me, I would swap sides to prove they were doing something wrong! unless you have a boat with about 200 foot beam!
As the guys said there are variables. Yesterday morning I found that the current was still heading Southish at 1.5knots+ and anchoring up was just fighting the current and the lines were needing too much lead to get in the zone.
I pulled the pick and drifted with the current thus fishing lighter but still getting down to the right spot and came home with a feed. If it was wind against current you'd almost have to back into the wind instead.
Its a lot less work in my eyes to be able to anchor in the right spot if the wind and current are playing ball, burley and fish a few lines out the back.
I fish on my own regularly and find when I drift I constantly make the mistake of fishing more than one rod and thus rather than pulling up the gear and going back over the drift pattern I just lazily keep drifting, very unscientific when we have such great gear to locate the fish in the first place...! At the same time anchoring on the spot is an artform and even if you're right on the spot initially the wind will soon shift or the current change enough to move you out of the exact spot you were hoping for. So like I said at the start ... I need that electric winch.
Drifting vs Anchoring
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