My last fishing session in April was on the Richmond River at Ballina. It was a Friday lunchtime and I decided to look for some flathead as the tide ran out. The tide was high at about 11.00 am and I started fishing as the run out got going at 11.30 am. I was using my ultra-light spinning set up; 2-4 kg rod and a 2500 size spin reel. I had 12lb braid for main line and a 10lb fluorocarbon leader. The first soft plastic I selected was the GULP 4″ Pulseworm in the beige Moebi colour. I rigged it on a 1/8th ounce, size 1/0 hook jighead. I like the look of this shape it has a ribbed body and a curly tail, and it has caught a few flathead for me.

The weather was cloudy and overcast. March had been a very good flathead fishing month in the local estuaries. We had had some rain earlier in the day and we were due some more. The wind was from the north-east, and the sky was gradually turning greyer and greyer. I started fishing from the rocky shoreline, just down river from the small boat harbour, opposite the Ramada Hotel.

I cast back towards the mouth of the harbour, let the soft plastic sink and hopped it back along the bottom, with the current. Just a few minutes after starting I caught a 40cm flathead. It struck very close to the shore. I cast out again and hooked up again, but the hook did not stick and the fish swam away before I got a look at it.

I moved a little way further along the bank towards the river mouth. I swapped to a GULP 4″ Minnow soft plastic in the Chartreuse (yellow and white) colour. After a few casts with this I caught another good sized flathead. It was just over 55cm. I carried on moving along the bank for another 20 minutes or so and caught two more smaller flathead on the same soft plastic. Every fish had hit my lure less than two metres from the shoreline – so you don’t have to cast right out into the middle of the channel to find them.

The rain started and before long it was torrential, so I withdrew. I love fishing the Richmond River at Ballina. There are a lot of great land-based fishing spots that consistently produce fish and many are only 5 minutes from the centre of town.