When to fish for Bonito: The run-in tide over a headland or off a bommie is the classic window, because it pushes bait up against the rock and concentrates it.
Also known as Australian Bonito, Watson's Leaping Bonito, Bonnie, Horse Mackerel. Bait, technique, tide windows, and where the bite is on right now.
Bonito — Headland speedster — the fish that teaches you to spin off the rocks. Also called Australian Bonito, Watson's Leaping Bonito, Bonnie, Horse Mackerel.
Australian bonito carry their dark oblique stripes on the BACK, above the lateral line. Striped tuna (skipjack) carry theirs on the BELLY. Anglers conflate the two constantly, and it matters, because the two fish sit under different rules and the identification — not the fillet — is what a fisheries officer reads. Bonito also spoil faster than almost anything else you will catch off the rocks: bleed them at the gills inside a minute and get them onto ice, or the flesh turns to mush and metal by the time you are home.
Bonito is also known as: Australian Bonito, Watson's Leaping Bonito, Bonnie, Horse Mackerel. Headland speedster — the fish that teaches you to spin off the rocks.
Regional names can confuse anglers and cause misidentification. The table of common names below covers the most-used alternatives across Australia, New Zealand and the US:
Key to correct identification: check the regulations-authority species sheet for your state or territory before keeping any fish — minimum legal sizes, bag limits and identification guides are published by each fisheries department and are the authoritative source.
How widely Bonito is in season across the 3 regions we cover it in. A full month means every one of those regions has it in season; a faint month means only some do. This is the expected season, not a catch record.
Hero spots in our coverage where Bonito is in season for October. Click through for the live forecast.
Out of season across our covered spots in October. Check back in December.
Bonito are a visual fishery — you look for them before you cast for them. Watch for terns working tight over a patch of water, for bait showering, or for the fish themselves cutting a fast dark line through a swell face. From a headland, cast a chrome slug past the school and retrieve as fast as you physically can with the rod tip low; bonito track down anything and a slow retrieve gets refused. From a boat, troll small chrome around the edge of the bait school rather than through it, because running the boat over the top pushes the school down and shuts the bite off for twenty minutes. One detail that separates them from the other rock-hopping pelagics: bonito have small conical teeth, not the shearing dentition of tailor or mackerel, so a 20–30 lb fluorocarbon leader is enough and wire only costs you bites. Bleed every fish you keep the moment it is on the rock.
The run-in tide over a headland or off a bommie is the classic window, because it pushes bait up against the rock and concentrates it. On open ocean rocks, light level beats tide outright — the first hour of daylight will out-fish a perfect tide at midday. From a boat, current lines and the pressure edge where clean blue water meets green hold fish through any stage of the tide.
Bonito are only weakly moon-linked. What actually moves them is water temperature and the bait: the run switches on when the current pushes warm water down the coast in late spring and holds while the bait stays. Spring tides around new and full moon strengthen the current lines that concentrate bait, which helps indirectly, but a warm-water push on a neap tide beats a cold week on a perfect moon every time.
Figures come from each jurisdiction's own fisheries authority, with the source linked on every page above. Rules change — closures in particular are reset annually — so confirm with the authority before you keep a fish.
Bonito are managed as a named species rather than folded into a general pelagic allowance, and the figures for each jurisdiction are above. The practical trap is identification, not arithmetic — Australian bonito, Watson's leaping bonito and striped tuna are routinely confused, and they are not the same fish under the rules. Check where the stripes sit before you decide what you have caught. Bonito are also one of the best live and dead baits in Australian waters for marlin and big kingfish, so a fish you were not going to eat still has a use.
NSW size & bag limits for Bonito — current DPIRD limits, verified →
Olli-Mikael Vaittinen has fished his whole life. Fifteen years of fly fishing, guiding seasons on Norway's Lakselva — his favourite Atlantic salmon river — and a blue marlin landed in Vava'u, Tonga. Founder of Fishare — the app that puts the data behind the decisions every angler makes on the water.
Fishare scores every hour for your spot — tide, weather, light and moon in one verdict — and keeps the rules one tap away on the water. The forecast, saved spots and catch log stay free, forever.
Open Fishare