Estuaries such as the Swan River near Perth, the Peel-Harvey Inlet near Mandurah, and the Leschenault Inlet are key nursery areas for juvenile tailor. Most of the tailor that occur in these areas are below the legal size of 25cm, and well below the spawning size of 28-30cm. These fish leave the estuaries towards the end of summer, and school along the beaches, moving offshore as the water temperatures cool down, in what is thought to be a pre-spawning migration. Juvenile tailor probably move into the estuaries as tiny fish in early summer, and grow rapidly over the warm months. These tiny tailor may come from large fish spawning around Perth's outer reefs, or from as far away as the Abrolhos Islands, carried down in the warm waters of the Leeuwin Current.
Tailor are a voracious predator, and are easily caught by beach fishers.
During a good run it is possible to catch a fish every cast. This makes for exciting fishing, but also makes tailor highly vulnerable to overfishing. Tailor take between two and three years to reach spawning size at between 28 and 33cm, but may survive over 14 years to reach in excess of 8 kilos. Marine scientists think that heavy recreational fishing, on both beaches and in estuaries, is taking most tailor in or before their first spawning year. Very few fish survive to become adults.