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Mills Charters are a Western Australian fishing charter company who run night charters on Friday and Saturday nights all year round. There are only two factors that stop them from getting out - other than the obvious issues that might be had with boats or skippers. The first is the weather, the second is the crayfish. Because the fishing is at night they have to be more selective with the weather they go out in. This means that 15-16 knot winds tend to be the top end of the conditions as opposed to the 22 knot winds they will go out in through the day. The reason for this is purely safety. When you're on the water at night visibility is extremely low so the potential for hitting an unexpected set of bone-jarring waves needs to be effectively managed, as does the ever present, but yet to occur, risk of someone going overboard.
The second factor that can stop a charter going out at night is when crayfish are moving through the depth of water the guys like to fish. During this period of time there are large amounts of professional craypots dropped through the 100-130m line and when this occurs it's best for everyone to stay at home to save the problem of drifting over and hooking up on pots dropped through the area.
 Deep water mulloway are a great catch
THE FISH After an hour and a half of travel we reached our first spot out th eback of Rottnest Island. Once we had got upwind of the mark we dropped our baits over and it didn't take long before a mix of mulloway and pink snapper started to make their way up onto the deck.
These are two of the species you are most likely to come across fishing out here at night. Pink snapper first, mulloway second and everythign else is almost considered by-catch due to the irregular frequency of catching it. Other likely possibilities are red snapper, sharks and the any random fish happening to be hungry when your bait drops next to it.
Although the number of species available for capture is significantly lower than you'll find during the day it is worth noting that on these charters you are fishing with 50 percent less people which kind of evens out the issue. The reason for the reduced numbers is another safety factor in place. No fishing is allowed on the bow of the boat and is restricted down the side ofthe main cabin where the lighting is low. Because of this passenger numbers tend to be around 15 people, just under half of the normal load.
We spent some time fishing the lumps and troughs around this area and caught a good number of mulloway ranging up to over a metre in length before it was time to try somewhere new and target some pink snapper instead.
After a short motor we turned up at the first pink snapper spot and again the lines went down. The fish were there and it didn't take long before flashes of pink started to appear in the spotlights shining off the side of the boat and for the rest of the night there was rarely an occasion where at least on pinkie didn't come ot the surface for each new spot we fished.
Some larger fish made an appearance to give us a taste of what can be encountered at this time of the year and boy can they pull. Anyone who has hooked a pink snapper knows how well they fight, but when you put them in 100m of water it's really something special.
All year round you find pink snapper out the back of Rottnest but winter is when the big pinkies really begin to come into these waters. After the first few blows in early-mid June the larger fish befin to school in depths of around 100m as they make their way closer to shore to breed. This gives you an idea of the peak times to get out and test your tackle.  Memories of a Mills Charter / Lemax SeaGame winter snapper last for a long time. We saw a couple of fantastic double-headers landed where both fish were around 650mm. Because you're fishing with a smaller group everyone knows when someone is onto a beauty and with our lines still in the water we all peered anxiously down the boat hooting, cheering and calling what was on the end of the line while we waited to see some colour. One of the guys we went with, Luke, picked up an absolute cracker fish on the very last drop of the night, a finsh you couldn't script. Fish like that give you week-long smiles. As well as these fish there were some monumental fights that eventually came to grief. Whether they were XOS pink snapper, sharks, mulloway or the Rott-Trench monster we'll never know but they all contributed to the night's entertainment and created discussion and speculative conversation on the 'what could have been' for the rest of the night.
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