Mangrove Jack

I knew exactly what I had hooked and had deliberately set my drag tight so there was no way this fish was dragging me into its home. This jack was doing everything it possibly could to snap me off, however the rudder system attached to my new kayak allowed me to easily manoeuvre my kayak and the fish out of …

I landed a couple and had several wipe-outs when I hooked what I initially thought was just another small kingfish. But then I looked over the side and saw something orange coming up. Perplexed, I gave the handle a few more turns and saw a mangrove jack of 4-5kg nearing the surface. In that split second when I recognised what the fish …

AS you may already know, I absolutely love chasing jacks, and fortunately I know how to catch mangrove jack thanks to many years of persistence. I recently shot out to chase a jack with good mate Ryan and my dad. After launching my Sea Jay Creek Masta we headed upstream in a local creek. On the first cast dad hooked a little …

Jacks also respond to a wide variety of lures and techniques. Casting surface poppers tight and parallel to structure works well, as does casting soft plastics and hard-bodied minnows tight to structure. Trolling hard-bodied minnows along the rock walls and broken reef areas of the rivers also entices plenty of jacks and allows you to cover a lot of quality ground. When …

4. Fish along the wall on the slack of the tide for luderick, bream, jacks and jew. It is deep water so don’t be scared to use big baits. 5. Right along the wall near the hospital you’ll find bream, flathead, jew and jacks. The wall is fairly easily traversed, so if fishing with kids it is pretty safe. Fish the slack of …

G’DAY everyone, in this month’s article I will offer you a few tips for chasing the hard-fighting mangrove jack. January and February have always been my favourite months to target jacks because they tend to school up and feed more freely before the cooler winter period arrives. Unlike some of the systems in the far north of the country, the Gold …

MY family and I recently made our annual trip to Hinchinbrook Island in north Queensland. The best barra of the trip (caught by yours truly) was landed off the bank at night. Good thing there weren’t any snapping handbags around because to land it I had to stand in the water. Yes I know the dangers of crocodiles but we didn’t have …

Though if you want to have some fun have a go chasing the whiting on surface lures, with the 65mm Fish Candy Skinny Dog producing the better numbers and the odd elbow slapper. Though the water is warm the trevally schools have be present throughout the Tewantin Ski Run and Woods Bays. Using surface lures early morning like the River2Sea …

As the tide slowly began to drop, these somewhat safe shallows started draining, forcing the smaller fish and bait into dangerous territory, and we attempted to imitate the nervous bait using soft plastic and hard-bodied lures. A hot fishing session earlier in the year resulted from casting around this draining ledge, so I was itching for another hot barramundi bite this …

WINTER in Gladstone year has been very mild until recently, with temperatures rarely dropping below 12C on the central coast. This has seen the water temperature staying higher over winter and fish such as barra and jacks remaining a common capture. As the temperature begins to rise towards the end of August, these fish will start to bite for longer …