Barra are back

It’s been a long three month wait and I’m glad we’re at the end of it. Not being able to target one of your most favourite species is hard.

Though the break does give you a chance to go back through your old diary notes and devise a plan as to what you could do differently for the coming year.

Find out what worked well and what didn’t, and also try to come up with new theories or techniques to try.

If you continue to do the same old thing, then you are limiting your growth as an angler. One of the improvements I would like to work on is targeting saltwater barramundi on big tides.

The majority of our barra fishing is based around neap tides, when the water is cleaner. These tides are when our competitions are held too, so it kind of makes sense that we only barra fish the neaps.

It would be great to get to a point where you could go out at any stage of the lunar cycle and be consistent with putting barra on the deck. I’ve watched a heap of videos where anglers in the Northern Territory are smacking barra over the spring tides.

 

Those videos gave me a few good ideas for us to try here. There’s nothing like dedicating a bit of time to doing some research.

So, that’s enough about barramundi, let’s get onto what’s been happening locally. With all the rain, it’s no surprise that mud crabs have been moving well.

Great reports have come in from all areas of the net-free zone, including Corio Bay, Corooman Creek and the Port Alma area.

The Fitzroy River has been hit and miss due to the amount of fresh still getting around. Better reports have been coming in about towards the mouth area.

Fingermark have still been biting well on smaller tides, when the water had cleared up.

The Connors Rock bar out at Port Alma has been the number one pick. It’s highly pressured but still produces some amazing results.

 

The better catches have come from anglers searching out smaller isolated rocks away from the main area.

Vertically jigged soft vibes such as Zerek Fish Traps have worked well and fishos who did some live baiting with mullet and herring have also done very well.

Mangrove jack have been a bit hit and miss. Our jack campaign didn’t go well at all during this closed season.

The most consistent place for jacks was the ever-faithful Causeway – between Yeppoon and Emu Park.

Anglers soaking live bait from the bridge during the peak run, through periods around the full and new moons, cleaned up.

Skip casting plastics around the mangrove fringes in the upper parts of the Causeway was another great technique, but unfortunately the jacks were on the small side.

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