Sandringham Breakwater

The extensive breakwater around the Sandringham Yacht Club and harbour gives one of the biggest land-based platforms on the eastern side of the bay. The layout is tidy: outside the wall there are King George whiting, garfish, salmon, trevally, pinkies and the occasional calamari, while inside it black bream can be caught. Hampton Pier, inside the same harbour, has been rebuilt and reopened, adding a pier with a floating pontoon to the mix. A whiting outfit and smaller baits will deliver results on either side — which is a refreshingly modest promise for a fishing spot.

Outside the wall, fish small baits on a paternoster or light running sinker into the sand and weed for whiting, and drift a float under berley for garfish and trevally. Pinkies come to bigger baits cast wider at dawn and dusk. Inside the harbour, fish lightly weighted baits or small soft plastics near the moorings and rock edges for bream. Calamari show up outside in clear water; carry a jig. The yacht club's race start is the noisiest berley in Melbourne; fish the other side of the wall.

King George whiting (27 cm, bag 20) and garfish (combined 40) outside the wall in the warmer months, pinkies year-round (28 cm), and trevally (20 cm) and salmon (21 cm) as they pass. Black bream (28 cm, bag 10) inside the harbour, best through winter and spring. Calamari are an occasional bonus (squid combined bag 10). Skates and rays can't be taken within 400 m of the breakwater.

In Port Phillip Bay's intertidal zone (high-water mark out to 2 m deep) you may only take marine worms, bass yabbies, squid, octopus and cuttlefish — no mussels, crabs or periwinkles off the rocks. Don't fish across the harbour entrance channel or the yacht club's moorings and pens — boats come and go constantly. Hampton Pier's pontoon is for boating access; fish from the pier and wall, not from where boats tie up. Outside or inside, the whiting rod is the right answer more often than the snapper rod.

Sandringham Harbour is off Beach Road, Sandringham, beside the yacht club, with parking around the harbour that fills on race days and summer weekends. Public toilets are near the harbour beach. The breakwater top is rock and uneven in parts — not a wheelchair platform — while Hampton Pier's timber deck is flat and pram-friendly.

The outer wall faces west into the bay and catches westerly and south-westerly chop; the inside of the harbour is calm in almost anything. Whiting and calamari need clear water, so a run of northerly or easterly days is ideal outside. On a blown-out day, the bream inside the harbour are the fallback.

Breakwater rocks are slippery, uneven and wash in strong westerlies — wear grippy shoes and stay off the outer face when waves are breaking. A lifejacket is sensible for anyone fishing the outer wall alone. Watch for boats at the harbour entrance and around the pens. Keep children on the flat pier deck rather than the rocks.

King George whiting, garfish, salmon, trevally, pinky snapper and occasional calamari outside the wall, and black bream inside it.

Yes. Hampton Pier in Sandringham Harbour has been rebuilt and is open, with a 24 m floating pontoon, improving access for walking, fishing and boating.

Outside for whiting, garfish and pinkies in clear water; inside the harbour for bream when the westerly has the outer wall wet.