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Tuesday

I went down to the Tweed River mouth again on Thursday morning hoping that the swell would have eased. As I arrived about 4.00 am (Qld time), the wind had dropped away and the swell had completely disappeared. The tide was running in and the water was very clear. It was a big high tide and the water was running around the end of the rockwall and up into the river with considerable force. For the first time in ages the sun came over the horizon like a great flaming ball and there was not a cloud in sight.

Conditions seemed perfect so I went through the usual drill. Just before the sun rose I tried a 110mm RIVER 2 SEA Dumbell popper for about twenty casts, with no luck. I then switched to a GULP 5” lime tiger jerkshad on a 5/8th 4/0 jighead for about 20 minutes – again no luck. Then I put a HALCO 70g Twisty slug on and put in about 40 casts, in all directions – again, nothing. Perhaps the conditions were too good.

I moved round to fish in the river mouth for the last of the run in tide. I decided to switch to a more natural coloured soft plastic so I chose the GULP 5”banana prawn jerkshad. I cast it out and let it sink to the bottom. I let it drift for about 15 seconds and then lifted it slowly off the bottom and let it drop again. The second time I did this I got a solid bite, but no hook up. On the next retrieve I tried the same technique. As I lifted the plastic off the bottom it was hit hard again. I dropped the rod tip for a few seconds and when I lifted it – I had a fish on. I landed it safely, after a short fight. It was a small Tailor just on 30 cm, so I threw it back. I cast back again in the same spot and over the next 20 minutes, I had a few more strikes but did not land any fish.

I carried on casting the plastics until the tide turned and started to run out. I used some lighter jigheads with smaller hooks and plastics and managed to catch a few small Dart at the base of the rocks. Overall the weather was great but the fishing was not so good. Perhaps it was the wind change, the lack of swell, the fullish moon, the big tide – who knows?