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Bite Compass
Shore / Estuary

King George Whiting

Sillaginodes punctatus

King George whiting are Perth's most prized shore-caught table fish, feeding over sand near seagrass in sheltered waters like Cockburn Sound and Shoalwater. Target with light tackle and fresh pipis, mussels or worms. Around all year, peaking spring and autumn.

Size
Up to 72cm and almost 5kg, commonly 400–800g
Peak season
Year-round
Minimum size (WA)
28 cm
Bag limit (WA)
12

Overview

King George whiting are arguably Perth's most prized shore-caught table fish. They feed over sandy bottoms near seagrass beds in sheltered waters, and catching a feed of KGs from the shore is a deeply satisfying experience. They're smart, wary feeders that reward finesse and fresh bait.

Identification

Also known as KG, KGW, spotted whiting, South Australian whiting

Long, slender and pale sandy-brown, covered in rows of distinct rusty-brown spots — no other whiting in WA is spotted like that, which makes it the easiest one to name at the water's edge. Small pointed head, low-set mouth built for grubbing in sand, and a body noticeably longer and rounder in section than the other whiting. Juvenile KGs are paler with faint spots, which is where they get mixed up with western school whiting (dusky mid-body stripe) and yellowfin whiting (plain silver with yellow fins). The rule on the flats: spots means KG, stripe means school whiting, plain with yellow fins means yellowfin.

How to Catch

Best Baits

Pipis, mussels, tube worms, beach worms, prawns

Lures

N/A — bait-only species. Occasionally taken on very small soft plastics but bait is far more reliable.

Rigs

Running sinker rig with a size 4–6 long-shank hook and just enough weight to hold bottom. Use 6–8lb fluorocarbon leader — KGs have good eyesight. Keep the rig simple and the bait fresh.

Technique

Wade out to sandy patches near weed beds and cast into the gutters. Use fresh, quality bait — KGs are fussy and will reject stale offerings. Fish with the rod in hand and feel for the gentle tap-tap-tap bite. Patience is key — don't strike too early. Let the fish take the bait and move off before setting the hook.

Best Time

Best from September through April, especially in the warmer months. They feed through the day, midday included, on a moving tide and the higher part of the tide. Calm, clear days are ideal — KGs feed by sight over the sand.

Size & Growth

A good shore-caught KG in Perth is 30–40 cm and 400–800 g. Anything over 45 cm is a very good fish and a 50 cm-plus KG will draw a crowd on the jetty; the near-5 kg headline size is an old, deep-water fish, mostly a South Australian story. They're slow-growing for a whiting and live to about 15 years, so the big ones are old. Most metro shore fish sit just around the legal size, which is why a proper bag of KGs takes real effort rather than luck. Boat fish over the deeper sand run consistently bigger.

Diet & Habitat

KGs are bottom feeders — marine worms, small crabs, prawns, shellfish and anything they can suck out of the sand. They work clean sand patches and gutters between weed beds, usually in 1–10 m from shore, moving up onto the shallow flats on a rising tide and dropping back as it falls. Seagrass is the key: no weed, no KGs. In WA they run from about Jurien Bay south and right along the south coast, with Cockburn Sound, Shoalwater, Warnbro, Safety Bay and Geographe Bay the classic grounds. Larger fish move out into deeper offshore sand as they age, which is why big shore-caught ones are unusual.

WA Size & Bag Limits

Minimum size 28 cm
Bag limit 12
Counts toward Counts within the statewide nearshore/estuarine finfish mixed daily limit of 16.

Minimum size: 28cm. Bag limit: 12. King George whiting count within the statewide nearshore/estuarine finfish TOTAL mixed-species daily limit of 16.

Last checked . Limits change — confirm with DPIRD before you fish.

Eating Quality

Yes — King George whiting are among the best-eating fish in WA, and for a lot of people they're the whole reason for going. Sweet, delicate white flesh with fine flakes, almost no fishiness and no bloodline to trim. Fish under about 35 cm are best scaled, gutted and cooked whole; anything bigger gives two clean fillets worth doing properly. Simplest is best: dust in seasoned flour and pan-fry in butter a couple of minutes a side, or grill or bake whole with lemon. Don't heavy-batter them — you'd be paying good money to taste batter. Bleed and ice on capture and eat within a day or two. They freeze acceptably if you skin, portion and vac-seal, but the delicacy is the point and it's the first thing a freezer takes.

Where to Catch King George Whiting

Albany (Emu Point / King George Sound / Salmon Holes) Augusta (Hardy Inlet / Flinders Bay) Bremer Bay (Town Foreshore / Bremer River Mouth / Point Gordon) Bunbury Koombana Bay (Inner Harbour / The Plug / Casuarina Boat Harbour) Burns Beach C.Y. O'Connor Beach (North Coogee) Cape Le Grand (Lucky Bay / Hellfire Bay / Thistle Cove) Cape Naturaliste (Dunsborough / Bunker Bay) Cheynes Beach (Waychinicup) City Beach Groyne Coodanup Foreshore (Peel Inlet) Coogee Beach Cottesloe Groyne Denmark (Wilson Inlet / Ocean Beach / Lights Beach / Hay River) Duke of Orleans Bay / Wharton Beach (Condingup) Dunsborough (Geographe Bay / Old Dunsborough) Emu Point (Albany) Esperance (Esperance Jetty / Bandy Creek / Cape Le Grand / Twilight Beach) Falcon Bay Floreat Beach (Floreat Drain) Golden Bay Gracetown (Cowaramup Bay) Halls Head Hillarys Boat Harbour Hopetoun (Mary Ann Haven / Two Mile / Four Mile / Starvation) Leighton Beach Madora Bay Mandurah (Foreshore / Jetty area) Mangles Bay (Rockingham) Marmion Beach Middleton Beach (Albany) Mullaloo Beach North Beach Jetty Ocean Reef Marina Palm Beach Jetty (Rockingham) Port Kennedy Boat Ramp (Boat Launching Facility) Quinns Rocks Rockingham Jetty Rottnest Island (Shore Fishing) Safety Bay San Remo Beach Scarborough Beach Secret Harbour Shoalwater Beach Sorrento Beach South Beach (Fremantle) Swanbourne Beach Tim's Thicket Trigg Beach Two Peoples Bay (Albany) Walpole / Nornalup Inlet (Coalmine Beach / Mandalay Beach) Warnbro Beach Windy Harbour (Salmon Beach / Point D'Entrecasteaux) Woodman Point Jetty (Ammo Jetty) Yanchep Lagoon

Guides Featuring King George Whiting

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