Bush 'n Beach Fishing Magazine Location reports & tips for fishing, boating, camping, kayaking, 4WDing in Queensland and Northern NSW
Hi everyone, hope you are all having a nice week. We have seen a bit of a mixed bag when it comes to weather on the Gold and Tweed coasts this week, with some nice days and some windy and rainy. The good news is, at the time of writing my report, the weekend ahead and the start of next week is looking fairly reasonable, with light wind and plenty of sunshine on the cards, which is great news for everyone keen to wet a line. If you are thinking about heading offshore, keep in mind that as of July 15, snapper and pearl perch are on the no-take list in Queensland waters. Visit this link for more information. Let’s have a look at a few options to try your luck at. Gold Coast Coomera
Flathead have been around in good numbers throughout the Broadwater and Jumpinpin Channel areas over the past week, with plenty of happy fishos finding plenty of quality fish on offer. If you are keen to catch a feed or you like to catch and release, chasing flathead at the moment is a good option. There are plenty of baitfish and jelly prawns around in cooler months and flathead love to lay in wait for an easy feed to swim past them. Flathead respond well to the cooler conditions, usually resulting in fish schooling up in decent numbers in certain areas during winter, making them a good target for lure fishos. When targeting flathead, choosing the right areas to look will be tide dependent. If the tide is rising, flathead tend to head on to the top of sandbanks, shallow flats, around shallow mangrove islands and into feeder creeks in search of prey. Once the tide starts to fall, they will make their way off the banks and shallows and sit on the edges and drop-offs of sandbanks, and in the mouth of feeder creeks, looking to target baitfish and prawns making their way out of these areas. In saying that, some larger female fish also tend to prefer deep water options such as the Gold Coast Seaway and Jumpinpin Bar entrances and will sit in the deep waiting for a feed to swim past. These larger fish also attract a good number of smaller male fish that will school up around her. Gold Coast Coomera
The more popular methods to target flathead are trolling hard-body lures, casting surface lures in the shallows, casting soft plastics, working and tea bagging soft vibes and metal vibes. If you prefer to use bait, drifting is the best way to cover ground and locate fish. Western Australian pilchard, white pilchards, prawns and mullet fillet make good dead bait. Live bait work very well – herring, hardyhead, silver biddies and yabbies all make great options. Some good spots to try are the Nerang River, Wave Break Island, Crab Island, Rat Island, Brown Island, Aldershots, Never Fail Island, Tipplers Passage, Bedrooms, Crusoe Island, Tiger Mullet Channel, Kalinga Bank and the Logan River mouth. Gold Coast Coomera
If you are thinking about heading offshore for a look, there have been some top-quality jewfish being caught on the 18 and 24-fathom reefs of the Gold Coast over the past couple of weeks. Jewfish are a great target species during the snapper and pearl perch closure. The best way to target jewfish is by having a good look around on the sounder to locate an isolated rock that is holding bait. You will usually see larger jewfish holding close to the bait. I recommend anchoring up and float lining live bait such as yakka, pike and slimy mackerel into the show. Dead bait will also work well – fresh flesh bait such as mullet fillet, tailor fillet, bonito fillet, trevally fillet or butterflied dead yakka and slimies. As well as jewfish, you will also be able to target cobia and will come across a good mixed bag of teraglin, tuskfish, moses perch, maori cod and spangled emperor. Out wider on the 36 and 50-fathom lines, you will have a chance at scoring yellowtail kingfish, samson fish, amberjack, teraglin, tuskfish and cobia to name a few species.
Brad from Brad Smith Fishing Charters reports… The beginning of this week brought on some rollercoaster weather conditions but by working hard, some great fish came across the gunnels. The trick this week was to find some good areas that were protected from the wind and also provided spots where bait schools were concentrated. As usual for this year with the huge amount of rainfall, bait is holding where the dirty meets the clearer water from run-in tides. Trolling a combination of shallow and deep-running minnows, being the ever-reliable Pontoon 21 Crackjack and Hurricane Slam lures, provided the most consistent results. The fish caught were a heap of flatties, bream and even little school jewies that are in the biggest numbers I have ever seen in the river. It is great to see the sun shining once again and I look forward to talking to you all next week.
Clint from Brad Smith Fishing Charters reports… A funny old week I found, with occasions of falling air pressure during the day coinciding with slower bite periods. Whatever happens, we always find a way to grind out a result for our customers and we caught squid, flathead, flounder, winter whiting, sand whiting, tailor, bream and trevally. Best lures were Samaki Vibelicious 70mm Fork Tail in UV squid colour, Ecogear ZX40 in 440 colours with Sax Scent UV Prawn added and the best squid jigs were Ecogear Dartmax 3.0 in colours D201CG in cloudy conditions, D08G and D35CS in clear sky and Daiwa Emeraldas Nude 2.5 and 3.0 in Brown Ebi colour. I spray a tiny bit of Egimax scent onto the hook end of jigs. Gold Coast Coomera
If you have any great catches or photos you would like to share, please email us and let us know how you went, brett@coomerahouseboats.com.au or brett@fishotackle.com.au
Stay up to date with all fishing regulations in Queensland https://www.daf.qld.gov.au/business-priorities/fisheries
Fisho Tackle and Coomera Houseboat Holidays now have Hire Tinnies follow the link to view https://www.coomerahouseboats.com.au/our-fleet-type/hire-tinnies/
Seabreeze is a great website to access a local forecast http://www.seabreeze.com.au/graphs/
Good luck with the fishing.
Brett
