HI everyone, hope you’ve all had a great week. It’s nice to see all of our houseboats out on the water with lots of families and friends enjoying the school holidays and catching a few fish and crabs. The weather has been nice on Gold and Tweed coasts for getting outdoors and having fun. Let’s see what’s been on the bite this week.
The Gold Coast Sports Fish Club 2019 Flathead Classic kicks off on Tuesday October first with hundreds of teams of keen Fishos ready to hit the water in search of the famous big Gold Coast Flathead. Good luck to everyone, hope you enjoy the event and are lucky enough to find some quality fish.
Conditions have been a bit tough this week for chasing flathead, the northerly winds earlier in the week have made the water quite dirty combined with large amount of snot weed have been testing the most seasoned anglers. Customers have been doing well around Jumpinpin finding some good sized flathead up to the mid 80cm in length which are great point scorers in the Flathead Classic.
The deeper water on the incoming tide has been producing some quality fish, just find the bait on the sounder and pepper the area with big plastics or vibes. As the tides runs out then change tactics and target any creek mouths or drains in the area and the predators will be laying in way to pounce of the bait fish as they are flushed out. Some good spots to try are Tiger Mullet Channel, Canaipa Passage, Cobby Passage, Short Island, Eden Island and Kalinga Bank. If weed is an issue just move around as it make trolling hard body lures near impossible.
Customers have reported great catches of whiting this week, as we transition into the warmer months the fishing will just get better. Whiting are a great target species and can be found schooling in numbers during the day and night time. We are lucky on the Tweed and Gold Coast as we have quite a few land based options as well as spots to try in the boat. Worms or yabbies are the best bait to try, I recommend to use a long trace of 6lb fluorocarbon leader matched with a size 6 bait holder hook for worms or size 4 hook if you’re using yabbies.
Sinker choice is important, if you go too light all you will catch is Bream. I use either a 4 or 5 ball sinker to keep you bait on the bottom where the whiting feed. Tidal flow is also a big factor, as the old saying goes “no run no fun” and this is very true when targeting a feed of whiting. Some good land based spots are Paradise Point foreshore, Runaway Bay, Labrador, Marine Stadium, Nerang River and Jacobs Well. In the boat try Coomera River, Logan River, Pimpama River, Wave Break Island, Tweed River, Currumbin, Tallebudgera Creek or Nerang River.
Smithy from Brad Smith Fishing Charters reports on that Tweed River once again flathead have been the main fish caught on my charters this week, with whiting also beginning to appear in numbers again, they will get bigger and more numerous over the warmer months. Until we get heavy rain the middle to upper reaches of the Tweed River are the best areas to fish.
Trolling finesse lures such as Pontoon 21 crackjack and Ecogear SX48 minnows over sandbanks at high tide early in the morning will always get strikes from a variety of species including flathead, whiting, trevally and bream. I have begun surface fishing over my super banks with MMD splashprawns and Bassday Sugapens. This exciting and visual form of fishing will provide my clients with plenty of thrills through Spring and Summer.
Clint from the Gold Coast reports he has been running some charters this past week up the Nerang River and also in the Gold Coast Broadwater as far North as Sovereign Island. We are noticing the continuing effects of lack of heavy rain for months now, with the estuary systems needing a reset and flush. We can’t do anything about the weather, so we have to work even harder to find fish daily for our guests. Neutral and non UV colour lures are working best, such as Ecogear ZX40 in 411 colour code, and more transparent soft vibes.
Bigger numbers of fish are hard to come by up Nerang River but there are some nice flathead around the bait schools in the far upper reaches, and also grunter, trevally, whiting, bream. In the Broadwater flathead, flounder, whiting, squid, squire, bream, tarwhine and small queenfish dominate the daily catch.
Try the deeper areas around the tide changes then move to the shallower areas when it starts running.
Hope you all have a good weekend and get out for a fish, if you have any great catches or photos you would like to share, please email us and let us know how you went.
New fishing regulations now effective fisheries Queensland http://statements.qld.gov.au/Statement/2019/9/1/new-fishing-regulations-now-effective
Fisho Tackle and Coomera Houseboat Holidays now have Hire Tinnies follow the link to view http://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/
If you have any great catches to report or fishing photos please email them to brett@fishotackle.com.au Good luck with the Fishing. Brett
Fisho Tackle operates with Coomera Houseboat Holidays. We offer a great range of Fishing Tackle on the Gold Coast for our local area as well as bait & ice. We have the experience and local knowledge to get you out catching fish in no time. We offer off street parking and also a courtesy jetty for customers arriving by boat. Call 07 5502 6200
Coomera Houseboat Holidays Website www.coomerahouseboats.com.au
Fisho Tackle Website https://fishotackle.business.site
Fisho Tackle Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/FishoTackle/
Coomera Houseboat Holidays Face Book page www.facebook.com/CoomeraHouseboatHolidays
