Sunday

After a pretty good session on Friday, I decided to go back up to Bribie and try again on Sunday morning. Low tide would be a couple of hours later at 6.39 am. The moon was in the waning gibbous stage – about half full. The wind was light from the south west and there were a few clouds around.

I was fishing the flats by the old oyster jetty, as usual and as I waded out under the bridge, there were plenty of flathead lies on the sandy bottom. I was pretty confident but my first fish was a tiny whiting, just north of the jetty.

I put on a larger Mad Scientist Optishad soft plastic and started flicking it around, to the south of the jetty. This is a paddle tailed soft plastic which the flathead seem to love. The water was very shallow and clear. After a few casts, I felt a good bite. I paused and set the hook. It was a flathead just under 40 cm. I released it and moved on.

Then things went very quiet for about an hour. I waded all the way down to the green channel marker, gradually changing through a few soft plastic lures. As the tide started to run in, I was fishing with a GULP 2” Shrimp in the peppered prawn colour. First I caught a couple of small Pike. Then, a few casts later. I found a 30cm flathead.

I turned back and started wading back towards the bridge. I felt a couple of hits on the shrimp soft plastic and then a double tap and the rod tip bent over. It was a solid 32cm bream. I released it and carried on back towards the jetty.

On the way out I had felt a couple of bumps as I moved my soft plastic over a sandy hole in the weed beds. I stopped to give it another try. On the first cast I felt another light tap, then nothing. I was sure a fish was lying there. I put in about 20 more casts with no response. I was about to give up, when I decided try a different soft plastic. I swapped to a 3” GULP Minnow in the Sardine colour. On my first cast, with the new plastic – bang – a massive hit and an instant hook up. This was a solid flathead and it angrily came to the surface straight away, shaking its head and trying to spit the lure. It stayed hooked and I slowly turned towards the shore. It made a couple of determined runs but it was nicely hooked. I pulled it into the shallows and paused to admire it. It was a big female, well over 75 cm. I unhooked her and she paused momentarily before swimming away (see video).

That was it for the day. I waded back to the bridge with nothing for supper, but it had been a great session.