An Albany-based West Australian salmon mission that started with two fish dropped on the rocks at Conto's almost ended empty-handed before a thick school finally rolled into the wash at Salmon Holes, handing the Northern Addicts crew a chaotic, last-cast multi-fish session.
The host and his partner Chloe spent three days walking beaches around the Albany coast, throwing 60 g Halco Twisties (modified with a single hook) into the wind without converting a salmon. The herring, however, were thick. "We've already got a herring," the host noted on the first cast. "I've put a single hook on it and we'll put that fish back in. Hopefully that's a sign of things to come. The salmon do love eating herring."
A walk to the far end of the beach turned up nothing. A relocation to Salmon Holes — a notorious WA land-based platform that is also a known fatality site — finally produced. "I just spotted a huge school of salmon," he said, watching the wave turn black with feeding fish in the wash.
What followed was a textbook West Australian salmon shore session: the entire school appeared at once, every cast hooked up, and the pair were doubling up within minutes. "Whole school came in. I'll get mine up then get yours," he said. "They're hard fish to deal with." The herring was used dual-purpose — slung as a slab on a paternoster rig and chunked into the wash to keep fish in range. The bite came in pulses, not a continuous run. "They don't do it in drips and drabs," Chloe said afterwards. "They all come through or nothing."
The episode also doubled as a safety brief. The host stopped to call out the rocks at Salmon Holes — the precinct that has claimed multiple fishing deaths over the years — and the WA government's $1,000 fine for fishing the rocks without a life jacket. "Even on a relatively calm day, the waves do creep up and it does take people by surprise," he said. "People down the south, there's a lot of lives that have been lost. People just don't expect it."
For anyone chasing the WA salmon run, the takeaway is simple: persistence pays, the fish move in waves, and a Halco Twisty in the right weight handles the wind. The pair released fish back into the wash before packing up — leaving with the kind of session that justified three days of walking.