A high chance of rain is forecast from Friday onwards, with winds turning sou-easterly on Saturday afternoon. Rain and wind is tipped to increase on Sunday and continue through the week.

The east coast low to kick off the school holidays is a blow for anglers and local fishing shops but comes after a good few days on the water.

Jason Nunn, from Fisherman's Warehouse at Marks Point, said plenty of boats were on the water in Lake Macquarie over the weekend and he heard good reports of fishos bagging out on tailor and bream, with some nice flathead caught as well. He suggested getting out on Friday and Saturday before the worst of the weather sets in.

"Friday and Saturday, the wind doesn't look that bad," Nunn said.

"You can salvage that out of it but people are going to need a raincoat on.

"There's plenty of luderick around, leatherjacket in the channel and some solid reports of bream, flathead, tailor in the system over the weekend. There was a fair bit on offer.

"One of the guys who comes in regularly, he fishes the beaches and coastal headlands, and he got some nice tailor, one up to about 76cm."

Brent Hancock, from Tackle World Port Stephens, said bream had dominated reports from the bay.

"There's been some good fishing," Hancock said.

"In the bay, there's been plenty of bream, which is great and typical for this time of year. The beaches are fishing good for bream as well and there's been some big tailor."

Anglers keen to get offshore after a run of poor weather had mixed results last weekend.

"The guys who fished on the Farm and the deeper water, they got some small snapper, but very good catches," Nunn said.

"There were a few kings down south, but the inshore situation fished incredibly well. There were quite a lot of snapper, tailor, trevally and trag."

Hancock added: "One of our staff members, young Jay, went out jigging at Allmark on Sunday and got plenty of kings, up to about 10 kilos. He tried out some new cast jigs and did really well.

"There was some nice snapper on the inshore reefs. Jack Hammond got one at 8.3 kilos on a soft plastic, so there's plenty of those around. Plenty of trag coming in off the Big Gibber and the 21. So the fishing has been pretty good offshore, we just need the weather."

However, fishing further offshore was disappointing.

"There was no yellowfin," Nunn said.

"I know a couple of the boys went for a run for yellowfin and they got a little dolphin fish and a striped tuna. They went out to 1000 fathoms and the water was too warm. It was 22 degrees and there was still current running downhill.

"Earlier in the week there were a few yellowfin caught east of Broken Bay, or a bit south of that, out at about 1500 and the water was about 19.5. It was a bit more settled.

"So that's the problem off our part of the coast. Past the shelf, it 22 degrees, which is unseasonally warm.

"By now that should have broken up and we should have got rid of the east coast current and we should have cooler water, but it hasn't."

The warmer waters have their benefits for game hunters, as some locals discovered off Swansea when they snared a 464kg tiger shark.

"Another monster, and that's a reflection on just how warm the water still is," Nunn said. "A lot of these big sharks follow the whale migration and pray on smaller whales."

While on sharks, a couple of videos of what appear to be great whites in Lake Macquarie have done the rounds this week.

A piece of daytime footage showed one checking out a boat between Pulbah Island and Dora Creek.

"We all know those juveniles, around the two and half metre mark, sometimes three, frequent the lake," Nunn said. "There's no denying it and certainly at this time of the year. There's not as many Australian salmon off the coast as normal, and after a lame old mullet season, they are probably chasing tailor into the lake.

"And no doubt fish of that size take a liking to our lake mulloway because they are nice fish from 90cm to a metre long."

He said whalers, hammerheads and whites were known to frequent the area, which showed the lake was a healthy and diverse estuary.