How to Catch Squid (Southern Calamari): A Beginner's Guide for Australian Anglers

Southern Calamari are the best first species in Australia. Cheap to get into. Easy to find. Caught off rocks and jetties and small boats. And when you cook them an hour after you land them, they are sweeter than anything you will ever buy at the fish shop. If you have never caught anything in your life, this is where to start.

Calamari are not technically a fish. They are cephalopods, which means they are related to octopus and cuttlefish. Anglers call them squid because that is what they look like in the bucket. The species we are talking about is Sepioteuthis australis, the Southern Reef Squid, and it covers the bottom half of Australia from southern New South Wales right around to southern Western Australia.

Where they live

Southern Calamari sit over weedbeds with sand patches running through them, in clean coastal water two to five metres deep. The sand patches matter. Pure weed holds them, but the edges where weed meets sand are where they hunt. Squid sit on the weed, drop on small fish that cross the sand, and disappear back into the structure. Find those weed-and-sand mosaics and you will find squid.

The easiest places to start are:

• Jetties over weed beds. Mornington and St Kilda in Victoria. Cleveland and Triabunna in Tasmania. Glenelg and Brighton in South Australia. Almost every small town pier on the south coast.
• Rock walls and breakwaters next to seagrass. The harbour entrances in most southern towns.
• Shallow weedy bays from a small boat or kayak. Cast at the edges of weed patches.

You do not need a boat. You do not need expensive gear. You need a jetty and a jig.

When to target them

The books all say dawn and dusk. The honest truth, after years of chasing these things, is that time of day stops mattering once you find a patch. I have caught squid at lunchtime, mid-afternoon, on the way home at sunset, in the middle of a forty-degree summer day. Sitting over the right ground is the variable that matters. Time of day is a distant second.

Seasonally, southern Australia has good squid year round, but autumn and early winter is peak in most spots. Tasmania and Victoria fish exceptionally well from March through to July. South Australia runs hot for most of the year.

The one exception to the time-of-day thing is jetty fishing. If you only have shore access, dusk and into dark really does fish better, because lit jetties pull baitfish in and squid follow. But that is a constraint of the shore-based angler, not the squid.

Gear that catches squid

This is light tackle. The whole rig should cost you under two hundred dollars and last for years.

• Rod: 7'6" to 8'6" squid rod (sometimes called an egi rod), light and fast. A Daiwa Emeraldas X, Shimano Sephia BB, or Pflueger Trion are all good entry-level options under one fifty.
• Reel: 2500 size spinning reel. Daiwa BG, Shimano Sahara, or similar. Smooth drag matters more than brand.
• Line: 10 to 15 pound braid. White or fluoro green so you can see it move.
• Leader: 6 to 12 pound fluorocarbon, about a rod length, joined to the braid with a double uni or FG knot.
• Jigs: Egi jigs in sizes 2.5 and 3.0 cover most situations. Carry a few sizes and a few colours.

The jig brands worth knowing are Yamashita Egi-Oh, Daiwa Emeraldas, and Shimano Sephia. The cheap unbranded jigs work too. The hooks tend to bend out and the fabric tears, so they last one or two seasons rather than five.

Colour and sizing

The two questions every new squid angler asks are which colour and which size. The honest answer is that you will catch squid on most colours most days. But the rules of thumb that actually work are:

• Bright sunny day, clear water: natural patterns, pink, light brown.
• Overcast or low light: orange, red back, lumo green.
• Dirty or stained water: orange, glow, purple and black.
• Night under jetty lights: lumo green or pure white. Charge the glow jigs on your phone torch before each cast.

For size, a 2.5 is the workhorse. Step up to 3.0 in deeper water or if you are getting big calamari. Drop to 2.0 in really shallow weed.

The technique that actually works

Drift the patches (the boat or kayak method)

This is the method I have caught every single squid on, and the one most guides skip. You are not casting. You are not jigging hard. You are letting the boat do the work for you.

Find water 2 to 5 metres deep over weed beds with sand patches. Put two or three jigs out the back of the boat on rods sitting in the rod holders, different sizes and colours on each rod (a 2.5 natural, a 3.0 orange, a 2.5 lumo). Let the jigs sink. Set the boat to drift with the wind and current.

That is it. The motion of the boat over chop is often enough to flutter the jigs the way they need to flutter. On glass-calm days, give a rod a slow lift every minute or so to twitch them. Otherwise, watch the rod tips. When one loads up heavy, lift slowly and wind steady. Do not pump, do not give slack.

Find one, find ten, and remember the spot forever

This is the most important thing nobody tells beginners. Squid live in tight territories. If you catch one, there are almost always more right there, in a patch the size of a small swimming pool. Stay on the patch. Drift the same line back over it. You will often pick up half a dozen squid out of the same fifty metres of water.

The bigger lesson sits underneath that. The patch belongs to that family of squid. Their offspring tend to hold the same ground. I have caught squid out of the exact same GPS marks year after year. Mark the spot on your sounder. Note the depth and the bottom type. Go back. A productive patch is generally productive forever.

Whip and pause from the rocks or jetty

If you do not have a boat, casting from shore still works. Cast the jig out. Let it sink. Count it down so you know what depth you are working. A 2.5 size jig sinks roughly one metre every three seconds.

Then do the whip and pause. Two or three sharp upward flicks of the rod tip, ripping the jig up off the bottom. Drop the rod and let the jig flutter back down. Wind in the slack. Repeat. The bite almost always happens on the drop, when the jig is fluttering. You will feel a sudden heavy weight on the line, like you are stuck on weed. Lift, do not strike. The jig holds the squid by the tentacles.

Wind steady. Do not pump the rod. Do not give slack. Squid will work tentacle by tentacle and pop off if you let the tension go. Slide it onto the jetty deck.

The ink

The squid will ink. Always. Hold it pointed away from you when you lift it out of the water. If you are on a boat, a wet towel and a hose nearby is normal kit. If you are on a jetty, just stand back from your other tackle. The ink stains clothes and concrete.

Rules

Bag and possession limits for Southern Calamari vary by state and they have moved around in recent years. New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia and Western Australia all set their own. Check your state fisheries app before you go. The limits are reasonable for any honest angler. Keep what you will eat in the next few days.

There is no closed season anywhere I know of. There is no minimum size in most states, but the practical minimum is anything over about 15 centimetres in body length. Smaller than that is not worth cleaning.

Eating

This is the reward.

Kill the squid quickly by pushing a knife behind the eyes, between them and the body. Pull the head and tentacles out. The guts will come with them. Strip the spine (a clear plastic-like rod inside). Pull the wings off. Peel the skin if you want a whiter result. Rinse.

Slice the body into rings or score and cube it. Pan-fry hot and fast in olive oil with garlic and chilli, ninety seconds a side. Salt and a squeeze of lemon. That is the entire recipe. Anything longer than two minutes total and you have made rubber.

If it is your first time

Buy a single 2.5 jig in natural pattern and a 7'6" budget squid rod with a 2500 reel and 10 pound braid. Total cost should be under one fifty. Go to the nearest jetty over weed at sunset. Cast off the end. Count to ten. Whip, whip, pause. Whip, whip, pause.

When the line goes heavy, lift slowly. Wind steady. Slide it up over the rail.

You will land a calamari within the first hour or two on most southern Australian jetties. Cook it that night. Then come back tomorrow at the same time. This is the easiest gateway to fishing in this country, and it is no accident that thousands of Aussie anglers caught their first feed off a jetty with a jig.

Rodney Baker, Harson Outdoors