Thursday

October saw some good fishing on the Bribie Island sand flats. On Thursday the wind was forecast to be a west south-westerly at 10 to 15 knots, easing off through the morning. It was a fairly cool 13 degrees when I arrived to start fishing at about 5.15 am. Low tide would be at about 5.45 am. The moon was a waxing crescent and six days old.

I started fishing on the mainland side of the Pumicestone Passage under the bridge. The sun was just coming up. There was lots of bait in the shallow water under the bridge. I waded to the south and saw a school of small tailor swim through. There were also lot of small garfish, herring, mullet and long toms around.

I was fishing with a GULP Jerkshad in the Satay Chicken colour. On a 1/8^th ounce, size 1/0 hook jighead. I was using about a metre of 10lb fluorocarbon leader tied on to the Aldi 8lb yellow braid, which I now have on most of my reels.

I dropped a couple of flathead close to the new floating pontoon then steadily started catching legal sized fish, just to the south of the jetty. In 30 minutes I had filled my bag with five good fish and then caught a couple more, which I released.

As the tide slowed I waded back to the car and crossed the bridge to fish the start of the run in tide at Bongaree. I started fishing on the sand flats in front of the fresh water lagoon at Buckley’s Hole and soon found a 45 cm flathead. I waded north along the shore towards the seaside museum drain and found a deep gutter close to the shore that was filling quickly. As I walked along beside it, a couple of decent flathead went flying off.

I moved back a little and put in a couple of casts. After a few tries I felt the solid bite of another flathead. I pulled it ashore and released it. It was about 55cm long. As I released it, a small eagle ray glided past in the shallows. A few moments later I heard a loud slap, as it flew out of the water and landed just behind me.

At about 10.00 am I retired to breakfast with and esky full of flathead. It had been a great morning of fishing.