Category Archives: Bribie Island

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 26 May 2014

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Monday

On Monday I had a late morning fishing session at the usual spot at Bribie. The weather was perfect – light south-easterly breeze and clear blue skies. Winter days like this are hard to beat.

I started fishing in my usual spot – beside the old oyster jetty at about 11.00 am. Low tide would be at 1.37 pm, so the timing would be pretty good. This spot most consistently produces fish in the last few hours of the run out tide.

I started with a GULP Crazylegs Jerkshad soft plastic, in the Curried Chicken (red back, yellow belly) colour. The water was clear and there was no missing this lure – it stood out very clearly underwater. Just to the north of the jetty, I found my first fish of the day – a 45 cm flathead. The fridge is empty so I kept this one. I caught another smaller one, a few moments later, then moved south of the jetty.

The underwater terrain is changing here very quickly. I think it must be the more consistent south easterly winds which start to cut channels and drains in the sand banks. I was now fishing much shallower clearer water so I decided to swap soft plastics. As mentioned in my previous post, I am all out of GULP Watermelon Pearl 4 “ Minnows, so I started off with the same shape and size,  in the Smelt colour (white and silver/grey).  It is a fairly good imitation of the small mullet and whiting that are everywhere at the moment. After a few slow sessions, I have dropped down to consistently using 10lb fluorocarbon leader. Lighter leader nearly always means more bites, but you have to play the fish more carefully, if you want to land them.

 

The Smelt Minnow soon found the fish – a 45cm one at first and then a bigger, 55cm version. The tide was running out quickly and would soon start to slow, so I decided to try a bigger hard bodied lure. I chose the MARIA – MJ1-70F, this is a floating diving bibbed minnow with a great action. It has the added bonus of being pretty tough, which helps with flathead. It only took a couple of cast to stir up the biggest fish of the day – a 62cm flathead.

As the tide ran down I walked back across the exposed flats and was amazed at the seafood buffet of whelks, worms, and soldier crabs that litter the area – no wonder the fish like it here.

Bribie – the oyster jetty flats – 25 May 2014

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Sunday

I could fish for a few hours early on Sunday. So I drove up to Bribie. The tide was not ideal. It would be a 2.1 m high at about 6.30 am – which is just about sunrise, at this time of year. I arrived just after first light, at about 6.10 am and waded out under the bridge. There was no wind and conditions were perfect for boating. There were a few boats out already, collecting live bait under the bridge lights.

I heard a few big splashes and could just make out a dolphin putting on its best ‘Seaworld’ display, out in the middle of the Passage. Miraculously, I caught its silhouette, clear of the water, in a photograph, but there was not enough light to make it a good shot. The boats anchored close to the bridge would have had a fantastic view of the show.

I headed for my usual fishing zone – to the south of the old oyster jetty. But as the tide was in, I would be fishing the shallows, close to the foot of the mangrove roots, rather than the edge of the weed beds, further out.

I started with a GULP Jerkshad soft plastic in the Peppered Prawn colour. Someone asked me what has happened to my favourite – Watermelon Pearl colour. My problem is that I cannot seem to find them anywhere, at the moment. It is still my favourite colour, but a lack of stock in Queensland is forcing me to try different things. So Berkley Australia – http://berkley-fishing.com.au/company/berkley-australia/ – if you are reading, time to re-stock the retailers with the Watermelon Pearl 4” Minnow soft plastic!

 

The Peppered Prawn Jerkshad did not let me down, however. I was slowly hopping it along the bottom, in less than a meter of water, when I felt a fish grab it.  It was a 45cm flathead. I released this one and moved on. About 10 minutes later, I had reached the gap in the mangroves, just before the shoreline turns west, towards Sandstone Point. There is a drain in front of this spot and a few deeper hollows in the sand. I cast towards these and soon found another flathead –  a good size this time – just under 60 cm.

Things went quiet as the tidal run slackened, so I swapped to a small hard bodied lure – the DUO Realis Shad 59 MR. I fished this around the same area and had a couple of grabs and knocks – which could have been bream or the long toms.  At about 8.00 am I caught another 45 cm flathead on this lure.

Then things went quiet. I fished for another 2 hours without a touch. It was a perfect day and so there was a constant flow of boats heading out into the bay, which may have slowed the fishing down a little. Beautiful morning but once again, fishing the high tide had been hard.

Bribie – the bridge, the Seaside Museum creek, the old oyster jetty – 22 May 2014

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Thursday

The wind was up again, making it hard to know where to fish. It can be unpredictable, as we move firmly into winter, but as the direction becomes more consistently from the south east, I find the fishing usually improves.

For some reason I could not sleep, so I got up at about 3.30 am and arrived at Bribie at about 4.30 am. The weather was not good. The wind seemed to be building and it was swapping between drizzle and real rain. There had been plenty of activity on the island side, under the bridge, early on Monday morning, so I started there.

The wind had blown the floating sea grass over to this side of the Passage and now it floated by in huge clumps. I loaded up a GULP 3” Minnow soft plastic in the Banana Prawn colour and threw this around for a while. I fished here for about an hour and the contrast with my pre-dawn session on Monday was stark. Despite changing through a few soft plastics, I did not feel a single bite. There was no surface activity and the water seemed completely devoid of fish. At about 5-15 am, I swapped to the DUO Realis Shad 59 MR – my current favourite suspending, hard bodied lure. After a few casts, I caught a small (35cm) flathead. I released it, tried a few more casts and then decided to move on.

At 5-30 am, I moved down to the ledge and the creek drain, in front of the Seaside Museum. The rain had stopped but it was so cloudy that it looked like there would be no real sunrise. Low tide would be at 10.03 am. I waded down to the point where I caught the decent bream on Monday and started casting, with a GULP 2” Shrimp soft plastic. The wind was up and making things tricky. I could see the ledge and I cast at the area both on top of it and beyond it, but did not have any luck. I waded south, following the tide out. I swapped through small and large soft plastics but nothing produced a result.

Then the excavator started up and dug a trench to release the tidal pool that had gathered overnight. I did not think this would do much for the fishing, so I switched locations again. I crossed back over the bridge to my old stomping ground – beside the old oyster jetty.

I swapped to a Powerbait Jerkshad soft plastic lure, in a grey/ silver/ neutral colour. I had also dropped my leader down to 10lb fluorocarbon. The tide was still running out, hard. The water was clear and the sun was trying to come out. It did not take long to find the fish here. I caught the first flathead sitting just behind a submerged weedy sand hill, about 30 metres south of the jetty. It was about 45cm long. I caught three more, about the same size, in quick succession. Then things went quiet.

I was pretty sure there were more fish in the area, so I swapped to a Mad Scientist 4” Optishad soft plastic in the Motor Oil colour. This is a great plastic with a whopping great shad tail that pounds along the sandy bottom. I could not find any more fish in the same spot, so I moved about 10 metres further south. The Optishad worked its magic and caught two more flathead in successive casts. They were almost exactly the same size as the others.

 

 

Over the next hour, I caught about 10 more flathead. Most were about the 40 cm size. Only two looked like they were over 50 cm. I swapped through a few more lures, to see if this would affect the size of the fish, but it did not seem to. I put on the new DUO Realis Shad 62DR – a slightly longer, deeper running version of the Shad 59MR. This also proved a hit and accounted for a few more fish.

Eventually I tied on a large timber Detonator 100 from Lethal Lures  – http://www.lethallures.com.au/ , that I bought at Barra Jacks (in Rockhampton) and gave that a go. It was awkward to fish on my light rod and picked up plenty of weed but, after about 10 casts, it caught another 45cm flathead.

At about 11.30am, with the tide running in, I gave up for the day. There were plenty of fish around on one side of the Passage, today, and none on the other. That’s why you have to keep moving.

Bribie – the bridge and the Seaside Museum creek mouth – 19 May 2014

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Monday

It would be low tide at Bribie just after dawn. I could not resist a quick fish before work. With the water getting noticeably colder, I was sure the tailor would be around somewhere.

Small ‘chopper’ tailor often hang around under the bridge, just before dawn. The bait fish and prawns are drawn to the bridge lights and the tailor, pike, bream and flathead can’t resist trying to ambush them. To the north of the bridge there are some established weed beds which are good fish habitat. The bait is also drawn to the light of the big street lamp, near the boat hire spot, a little further up.

Low tide would be at 7.06 am. Unfortunately, this side of the Pumicestone Passage gets a bit more breeze when the wind is coming from the south, south-west, or south-east. Today it was a cool south-westerly, initially and then turned into to a much stronger south-easterly, later in the morning. There had been rain over night, but not much.

I arrived at about 5.00 am and the moon was completely blocked by some ominous looking clouds. It was growing smaller in its waning gibbous phase – a bit less than half way between full and new. The water was very clear but the wind had lifted a lot of weed.

The tide was running out, so I went round to the south side, and waded into the shallows, in the dark. I cast up, towards the circle of sandy bottom, lit up by the bridge light, nearest to the shore. I started with a DUO hard body that is perfect for clear, shallow water. The DUO Realis Minnow 80 SP is a suspending minnow. Because it is fairly long at 80mm and light at 4.7 grams, you need to rig it on a light leader (10lb breaking strain or less). This enables you to cast it over longer distances. You need to do this, as it is a fairly shallow diver and it takes a few metres to get down to its running depth, about 10 cm below the surface. I think this will be a great bream lure.

As always at Bribie, the floating sea grass was a pain in the neck. After a couple of casts, I saw the lure get knocked out of the water by a small fish. A few moments later, something grabbed it and started shaking its head. It was a tiny pike.

 

I carried on casting in the same spot and had obviously found a patch of them. I caught 3 more small pike before they decided to leave the Realis Minnow alone. I swapped to the DUO Realis Shad 59 MR  – another suspending minnow,  but this one dives a little deeper. I moved closer to the bridge and cast into the shadows underneath it. Once more, it did not take long for the Pike to find this lure. There were a couple of casts when nothing hit the lure, then a tiny flathead grabbed it and came to the surface angrily shaking its head.

It started to rain so I moved north in to the shadows, under the bridge. I cast over the shallows, on the south side and soon foul hooked a tiny bream. It was now about 5.30 am but with the clouds and rain, there was no sign of first light. The surface activity increased as the fish sensed dawn was on its way. I felt a few very aggressive knocks and bumps and decided to increase the speed of my retrieve. This produced immediate results and on the next cast, I saw a small tailor grab the back end of the lure, a few feet away from me. It fell off but on the next cast, I landed one. It was only about 25cm but I was delighted that it had been hanging out just where I thought it would be. I then had a frantic twenty minutes with my lure getting bumped and smashed on almost every cast. I connected with about 8 fish, but only 4 stayed on until they reached the shore. They were all small choppers, the largest of which might just have made 30cm long.

At about 6.00 am a grey dawn started to break and I decided to move down to the drain in front of the old seaside museum, to see what has happened to the terrain there. The works to secure the sea wall are continuing but clearly, the finished, stepped, wall is some months off. I waded out on to the patch of coffee rock that sits in front of the seaside museum. With about an hour to go until low tide, the rocky bottom was completely exposed.

I cast the DUO Shad 59 MR around, but it kept picking up weed so I changed it for GULP 2” Shrimp soft plastic in the Peppered Prawn colour and loaded this up on a 1/8th ounce, #1 hook jighead. I moved south, along the edge of the coffee rock, casting into the deeper what beyond. I got a couple of strong hits and then, at about 6.30 am I felt a solid bite and set the hook. The fish tried to run away under the ledge but I had the drag set quite tight and the rod absorbed its lunges. I soon saw a flash of silver. It was a chunky bream that I later measured at 34cm. I tried for more and had a few hits but could not land any.

At 7.30 am, the wind was up and another rain shower threatened. It was time to head back to work. But a day of work is always easier to bear, when you have caught a fish before it starts!

Bribie Island – WARNING – the old oyster jetty flats – 16 May 2014

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Friday

I only had time for a quick fishing session on Friday, so I raced up to my usual spot at Bribie Island, just before dawn. I was going to fish the flats around the old oyster jetty, on the mainland side of the bridge, again.

A word of warning – this area can be dangerous. The sand banks and weed beds constantly shift and there are patches of muddy bottom, where you can easily get stuck. Once you start sinking, it can be very difficult to free yourself and the waders can make things worse, especially if they fill with water.  You should survey the area at low tide and only fish where you are sure of your footing.  A small self-inflating PFD, is a good accessory to have.  I have heard reports lately of a number of people getting stuck in the mud.  No fish is worth having a heart attack or drowning for – so please take care. A special thank you to local fisherman, Richard –  who safely extracted someone from the mud last week.

I arrived at about 5.45 am and it was the day after full moon. There was no breeze at this stage, but as the sky started to change colour a light, cold wind picked up from the south-west. As the sun came up, I realised I had forgotten my camera. Sometimes it’s more fun just to enjoy the show!

Dinner sorted
New favorite ? Green Camo colour
Only two keepers

After dawn, the wind turned into a stronger south-easterly. The tide was running in. It had been low at about 4.30 am. This meant I could only fish my favourite zones until about 7.30 am, at the latest – after that, they would be out of reach.

At about 6.20 am, I caught my first fish of the day – it was a 48cm flathead and I got it on a GULP Jerkshad in the Lime Tiger colour. I stuck with this plastic for about an hour but I could not find any more fish.

I moved further south and decided to try out a new GULP colour – Green Camo. I had it in the 4 “ minnow pattern; one of my favourite profiles. This soon did the trick and I found another flathead that was just over 45 cm long at about 6.45 am. I fished on until about 8.30 am and caught three more flathead, which were all too small to keep.

At about 9.00 am, with a now belting south-easterly wind blowing, I gave up for the day.

Bribie – the Sandstone Point flats – 27 April 2014

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Sunday

I am so far behind with my fishing reports that I will make this one short and sweet.

Early Sunday morning I headed for Bribie Island and arrived at about 5.15 am. I waded out under the bridge, fishing in the shallows, on the mainland side of the Bribie Island Bridge. High tide would be at about 8.00 am. There was a cool south-westerly breeze blowing.

I started with a GULP Peppered Prawn Jerkshad soft plastic lure on a 1/8th ounce, 1/0 jighead and I was fishing with 10lb fluorocarbon leader. A 5.25 am I caught a 45cm flathead, that was feeding under the bridge lights.

It was a big high tide at 2.3 m, so I decided to head past the old oyster jetty and round the corner towards Sandstone Point. This area is great to fish on big tides. The water was very clear so I decided to swap to a Gulp 3” Minnow in the Lime Tiger colour. At about 7.30am my plastic was knocked around a few times by a Long Tom. Then, about 10 minutes later, I caught a 30 cm Bream. It was followed, a few casts later by another, smaller bream.

I swapped to a DUO Realis Shad 59MR suspending, hard bodied lure. This lure will catch just about anything, but the bream love it. After a few casts it connected with another bream. As I waded back towards the bridge, it caught two more bream – both about 25cm long.

I finished my session at about 8.30 am. It is good to see the bream are back in business.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 23 April 2014

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Wednesday

It was a late start for me again on Wednesday – juggling work and fishing is hard.  But then most of my readers are probably well aware of that!

I arrived at the Bribie Bridge at about 9.00 am and waded out towards the flats to the south of the old oyster jetty. The sun was shining and there was a light south westerly wind. It is definitely getting cooler and the wind had some bite in it. The moon was 37% full and waning. It would be a 0.6m low tide at about 10.30 am.

I started fishing with a GULP 2” Shrimp soft plastic in the Peppered Prawn colour and this soon found a fish. It was a Flathead – just over 40 cm. I released it and went looking for more.  The water was clear but there were still a lot of black clumps of ‘snot’ weed floating around. There were sand crabs everywhere. Plenty of them seemed to be in romantic embraces.

As the tide slowed, I moved further south. In one of the sandy hollows, I caught another fish. This flathead had the brightest coloured tail I have ever seen. I released it and carried on wading south. I swapped to a GULP Jerkshad in the Peppered Prawn colour and as the tide started to run in, I caught another 45cm flathead.

 

 

I briefly tried fishing with a few small hard bodied lures, but they kept getting clogged with weed. I swapped back to a GULP Jerkshad in the Lime Tiger (orange and green colour) and at about 11.00 am I found a couple more small flathead that were probably just under 40 cm.

This had not been a bad fishing session – especially as the school holidays have just finished and this area has been fished pretty hard. All fish were released today.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty to the channel marker – 21 April 2014

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Monday

I am disappointed to report that once more the curse of paid employment has slowed down my posting and fishing. If the current government has its way, I shall be doing more work, for a lot longer than I had planned. I understand that when the pension was first introduced around 1910, the qualifying age was 65 and life expectancy was 58. So it was the ultimate healthy lifestyle bonus. Rarely did the government have to pay out for more than a few years. Now, most of us will get to our mid 80’s (especially if we eat plenty of fish). So we nearly all qualify for some portion of state funding for 15 years or more. Someone has to pay for it and the woeful performance of most people’s superannuation fund managers, means they will not be making much of a contribution. It’s a mess and it can only mean one thing – the current Australian age pension is probably as good as it will ever be.  So next time you see someone with more grey hair than you, whingeing about the cost of bait, remember you will be working long after they put their feet up, so ask them to shout you a beer. Of course, I can’t imagine who will employ me when I am 65 but that’s a whole another can of worms.

That’s enough social commentary. I was keen to see if the flathead glory days of early March would return. I drove up to Bribie on Monday, to fish the run out tide, which would be low at 8.00 am. It was still school holidays and during my last few visits, there has been plenty boat traffic. The wind has been changing between a light south-easterly and a northerly, with the occasionally cool westerly appearing, in the early morning. On Monday, it was light and cool from the south west. The overnight westerlies will start to bring the water temperature down quite quickly, if they persist. We were about half way between the full and the new moon.

I started in the dark and decided to head straight to the area to the south of the old oyster jetty, on the mainland side of the Pumicestone Passage. My last few sessions through the Easter Holidays had produced some quality fish, but the numbers were thinning out.  I decided to fish with neutral/ natural coloured soft plastics, just in case the fish were getting picky. I started with a GULP 2” Shrimp in the Peppered Prawn colour. I loaded it on to a 1/8th ounce, 1/0 jighead.  It was 5.30 am and the sky was just beginning to turn orange along the horizon. I cast the plastic a long  way out and after two hops, I felt a good bite. Then the line went slack. I wound up the slack and suddenly, I was in contact with a fish again. It was swimming towards me but now it turned away. As it pulled away, the hook struck home and it took off with a blistering first run. I gradually subdued it, but it was powerful and angry and this area has a big patch of rocky bottom, close to the shore, so I took it slowly. After a few minutes, I pulled the fish on to the sandy beach. It was a big female, just under 70 cm. After a few pictures, I let her go.

The sun came up and I waded further south, following the falling tide. It was pretty quiet and it was not until 6.25 am, that I got another bite. I had swapped to the GULP 2” Shrimp in the Banana Prawn colour and hooked another slurping, grunting, spiny puffer fish. I pushed it off the hook and continued fishing. I then caught a couple of undersized flathead in quick succession. Then things went quiet again. I swapped to a longer GULP Jerkshad in the Peppered Prawn colour and this soon attracted a few bites. About 10 minutes after the change, I caught a big (35cm) pike. I was now about half way to the green channel marker.

The water slowed and I turned back towards the jetty. At about 7.20 am I caught an almost legal size flathead, which I released. It was getting frustrating. By low tide at 8.15 am, I found myself back beside the old oyster jetty. I had swapped back to the Shrimp in the Banana Prawn colour. I put in a few last casts and then bang, a big fish grabbed the Shrimp soft plastic, just as it landed. The fish was lying in no more than 20 cm of water. It was big and powerful and as it was so near the surface, it immediately started shaking its head. It ran hard but after about four good runs, it was spent. I waded through the soft muddy weed and pulled it ashore. It was another 70 cm model, or perhaps it was the one I caught earlier. It looked a very different colour in full daylight, but you never know.

I had caught some good fish but I had released them all. It may be time to fish somewhere else for a while.

Bribie – the oyster jetty to the channel marker – 10 April 2014

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Thursday

I only had time to fish the afternoon run-in tide on Thursday. I arrived at the mainland side of the Bribie Island Bridge at about 12.30 pm. It was a hot, humid day.  It had rained again, in the morning and there was a light northerly wind. Low tide had passed at 12.20 pm. It was a hot still afternoon.

Clumps of weed everywhere

I waded south past the oyster jetty. The water was hardly moving but it was very dirty. As the tide started to run in, it became difficult to fish as the jighead caught on clumps of black, rotting weed. I swapped through a few different soft plastic lures and decided to stick with the GULP Jerkshad in the Cajun Chicken (black & pink) colour.

Just one keeper

It was hard work and I waded further south. As the tide picked up pace, I caught a 45 cm flathead, about 50 metres to the south of the jetty. It was now about 1.30 pm. I carried on towards the green channel marker and caught another 30 cm flathead at about 2.00 pm.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

I swapped to the Mad Scientist Optishad paddletail soft plastic and I got a few bites on this but could not stay connected with anything. Just to the north of the big exposed sand bar I felt a bite. I hooked the fish but it was a slurping, spitting spiny puffer fish. This reminded me why I wear waders. I carefully retrieved my lure with the aid of my pliers.

Porcupine puffer

By about 2.30 pm the incoming tide was pushing me off the edge of the weed beds so I gave up and waded back to the car. It had been a tough session in the middle of the day.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 8 April 2014

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Tuesday

Stormy weather

Stormy weather

A massive storm hit Bribie Island on Sunday – dumping significant rain and really stirring things up. So I left it until Tuesday to go fishing again. It was now about half way between the new moon and the full moon. The wind was forecast to be a light south-westerly. It felt noticeably cooler as I got out of the car, by the bridge at about 5.30 am. The water was definitely cooler, as I waded out on to the flats beside the old oyster jetty. Low tide would be at about 10.30 am.

Just to the south of the jetty I concentrated on a patch of weed that has produced a few flathead in the past. I was fishing with a Gulp 4” Minnow in the Smelt colour. I had it rigged on a 1/8th ounce, size 1/0 hook jighead. As it is now possible that there are a few Tailor around, I am consistently fishing with a 12lb fluorocarbon leader. This won’t stop big fish but it might give me a chance with some good sized choppers.

At about 6.00 am, I felt a few very aggressive bites but did not hook up. I persisted in the same spot and after about 10 minutes, I felt a solid yank and line started peeling. I had hooked a big Long Tom and it promptly leapt out of the water for the camera. I let it get rid of some energy then released it, recovered my jighead and chewed soft plastic. The leader was completely lacerated. So I cut off the last 10 cm and tied my jighead back on. I straightened the soft plastic and carried on casting.

The fishing was very tough. I tried a couple of small hard bodies and jerkshads with no success. By about 7.15am I had dropped down to a GULP 2” Shrimp soft plastic in the Banana Prawn colour. I managed to catch a couple of very small flathead on this plastic.

I waded all the way down to the big sand bar beside the green channel marker, but the fish were elusive.  I swapped to a GULP 3” Minnow in the Smelt colour and this enticed another 30 cm flathead, but it was a long time between bites.

As the tide continued to run out I waded back closer to the oyster jetty and decided to swap to a Z Man Minnowz soft plastic in the Red Bone colour. As I have mentioned before I am no longer a fan of the Headlockz Jigheads. They hold the lure in place but I think they are a bit clunky for this type of estuary fishing. I therefore chose to put the plastic on a Nitro Bream Pro 1/8th ounce, size 1/0 jighead. I hoped the vibration of the paddletail might be more obvious to the fish. It took a while, but after about 30 minutes I did finally catch a 45cm flathead. I swapped to a Minnowz in the Opening Night colour and after about another 30 minutes I caught another, about the same size.

By 10.00 am I had had enough and the wind had picked up. As I waded back towards the bridge a came across plenty of flathead lies – so the fish are around, somewhere. It had been another tough session.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 4 April 2014

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Friday

There had been a few showers and more were forecast. There was also a cyclone forming, up north. The new moon, four days earlier had not really made any difference to the fishing but it had coincided with some heavy rain, which may have limited its effect.

I set off back to Bribie Island. For the last two months I have fished here, exclusively. I apologise to readers who would like a change. But it has been good to fish through a few moon cycles and big weather changes and notice how they the effect what I catch.

Since the first week in March, I have been catching a lot of flathead from the sand flats, on the mainland size of the Pumicestone Passage, to the south of the Bribie Island Bridge. The fish were probably most numerous and at their most aggressive, in the run up to the full moon on the 16th March. The size of the fish and the numbers then gradually dropped off, after the full moon.  We then had some heavy rain which may have pushed them out to saltier water.

Looking back over my archive of fishing reports, I see I have had a number of excellent flathead sessions at this time of the year, in this particular spot.  The large numbers, the aggressive feeding and the fact that a good proportion of the legal size fish I have kept are full of roe, suggests they had gathered to spawn. It seems unlikely that the flathead only schooled up in this one location and I have seen many reports of good flathead catches, through early March, in the fishing press.

Bribie Flathead

According to the sparse research that has been undertaken on flathead (principally in New South Wales – see ‘Reproduction and growth of dusky flathead (Platycephalus fuscus) in NSW estuaries’ – July 2008. NSW Department of Primary Industries – Fisheries Final Report Series No.101 ), they spawn between – September and March.

This would put this particular spawning session right at the end of the window. This is interesting because most fishing pundits will suggest the end of the cooler months – September / November is when you more reliably catch large numbers of spawning flathead. Hopefully I will have time to fish then, as well and I will compare the results.

Back to Friday – low tide would be at 6.28 am and it would be a fairly high low tide, at 0.7 m. I arrived just before first light, at about 5.15 am. It was still warm and I had driven through a couple of showers on the way up from Brisbane. The wind, if there was any, was form the south east.

I waded out into the shallows beside the bridge and cast around with a GULP 4” Minnow soft plastic in the Smelt colour. It was still dark and a few fish were feeding under the bridge lights. On my second or third cast I felt a solid bite, paused and hooked a good fish. I steered it out of the rocks, which dot the area and dragged it to the shore. It was a solid 50 cm flathead.

The next fish came about twenty minutes later, just to the north of the oyster jetty. I was then treated to a really fantastic sunrise which lit up a rain squall that was coming my way. It was now about 6.00 am. I caught a few more flathead in this spot, but they were all under 40 cm.

I moved to the south of the jetty and pulled out another new favourite of mine. The Lucky Craft 4” Mad Scientist Optishad soft plastic lure, in the Pearl Vairon colour. This is the ultimate shape for a flathead soft plastic. It is a Jerkshad with a huge paddle tail. The slim body accentuates the paddle tail and you can really feel the lure moving as you hop it along the bottom. Thanks to the guys at Jones Tackle for introducing me to these – http://jonestackle.com.au/.  It did not take long to find the fish. Between 6.30 am and 8.15 am, I caught 8 more flathead on this soft plastic. However, only two of these fish were over 40 cm.

At about 8.30 am I was soaked by a rain squall and decided to give up.  There are still plenty of fish out there, but the bigger ones are getting harder to find.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats and the Seaside Museum drain – 2 April 2014

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Wednesday

Wednesday was an almost exact re-run of Tuesday, – except I arrived slightly earlier in the run out tide. It was another bright, sunny day with a light northerly wind. The water is still fairly murky on the bottom of the tide.

I waded around the area to the south of the old oyster jetty and caught fish on the Powerbait Rippleshad in a black and gold sparkle colour, the GULP Jerkshad in Pink Shine, The GULP 2″ Shrimp in the Natural colour and the GULP 3″ Minnow in the Smelt colour. I fished everything on a 1/8th ounce, 1/0 jighead on 12lb fluorocarbon leader. I fished for about three hours and caught eight fish (all flathead), of which only two were over 40cm long.

At about 4.00 I waded back to the car and drove over the bridge to Bongaree to look at the creek drain in front of the Seaside Museum again. I fished along the drop off for an hour, gradually working my way to the south. I caught nothing.

Fishing in the middle of the day, northerly winds and not much bait around may all have been reasons for not finding many keepers. I released  all the fish, as the family will shoot me if I put another flathead on the table.

 

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats and the Seaside Museum drain – 1 April 2014

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Tuesday

New moon had been on Sunday and there had also been another big downpour at Bribie. By Tuesday the sun was out again but the wind was a strong northerly, in the morning. It was forecast to drop off later in the day and turn in to a south easterly.  I would have preferred to fish the dawn but I had been cursed with some paid work that had to be finished, so I decided to fish the afternoon run out tide, which would be low at 4.35 pm.

The burst of northerlies meant the hot day time temperatures were back, but the cool nights and the influx of fresh water had pushed the water temperature down a little. I arrived at the mainland side of the Bribie Island Bridge at about 1.30 pm.

I waded south, past the old oyster jetty and soon found my first fish. I had started with a GULP Jerkshad in the yellow and pumpkinseed Satay Chicken colour.  It was a flathead about 45cm long. I was fishing with Nitro Bream Pro 1/8th ounce, size 1 hook, jigheads. These are built on finewire Owner hooks and are just about the perfect size for GULP Jerkshads. The hooks will bend if you try to muscle a size-able snapper or jewfish, but they are very sharp and are good at lodging in the tough mouths of flathead.

People often ask me about jigheads and what to use. The answer, as always is ‘that depends’.  There are lots of drivers – price, hook quality, size, shape. What is right for a bream, whiting or bass is not right for a kingfish, tuna or big snapper. How easy or difficult it is to put on a soft plastic and how long it stays on, are also important. Trial and error is the only way to test them out. It is also important to understand that one manufacturers 1/8th ounce, size 1 jighead may be very different in size and weight to another. Some use the lead weight only. Some include the hook and the lead weight. This means the total weight maybe up to 30% different to the numbers on the packet.  They also all have slightly different hook sizes. Some manufacturer’s size 1 hooks are almost twice the length of others.

 

The water was still dirty from all the rain and as we reached the bottom half of the tide, it got dirtier. I persisted with the Jerkshad and caught two more flathead – one about 50cm and one about 55cm.

My old friend the cormorant turned up again looking for a free fish. The bird only got the message that I was not there to provide a lunch, after a well-placed tap on the behind, from the end of my rod. Then it flew off, probably with the intention of mugging some other fisherman.

I dropped a couple of fish and slowly moved further and further south of the jetty. The fish were certainly not as numerous as they had been a week or so before. I walked all the way down to the green channel marker and back. Eventually I had five fish over 40cm to take home, but it had been hard work. I caught about 10 fish in total, over 2 1/2 hours.

At about 4.00 I walked back to the car and drove over the bridge to Bongaree to look at the creek drain in front of the Seaside Museum. They are still reconstructing the seawall along here. But at low tide you could see where the creek water runs over the edge in to the Passage and it looks very fishy. It was a beautiful evening and the wind had completely dropped away. Unfortunately this brought the biting midges out in huge numbers. It was now low tide and the water was almost still.

I wandered along the edge of the drop off for about an hour but I could not find any fish. The midges were so thick by 5.30 pm, that I gave up.

Bribie – the channel marker to the bridge – 31 March 2014

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Monday

With massive downpours all along the Sunshine Coast on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I was concerned that the recent flathead bonanza might come to an end. On Monday, I found myself driving up to Bribie to see how the big flush of freshwater had affected things.

I have been doing well fishing the last few hours of the run out tide, over the last few weeks. But after a major rain event this is not ideal. The water is at its freshest and cloudiest in the estuaries, as the tide runs out. All of the water that is running off the surrounding land changes the salt levels quite dramatically and this can force the fish or what they are eating, out to sea.

The trouble is the best drains and hiding spots around Bribie are hard to reach at high tide. So even though the incoming tide makes the water saltier and more comfortable for the fish, you cannot get at them from the shore.

I decided to fish as close as I could to the mouth of the Passage, next to the green channel marker, on the mainland side. This involved a long walk from the Bribie Bridge. I arrived at the sand spit, beside the channel marker at about 1.30 pm. Low tide would be at 4.00 pm. It would be a very low low tide at 0.3m, as we were only a couple of days off the new moon.

I tried a few GULP soft plastics – the 4” Minnow in Pearl Watermelon and the 2” Shrimp in the Banana Prawn colour, with no luck. The water was running out quickly, but it was very dirty. I swapped to a 5” Powerbait Minnow in the Pumpkinseed colour and started casting close to the green channel marker pole. This worked and just before 2 pm, I got my first flathead of the day. It was a decent 55cm fish.

I slowly moved back towards the bridge, casting into the run out tide and following the fringing weed beds. It took almost an hour to find the next fish. By this time, I had swapped to a GULP 4” Minnow in the Smelt colour. It was another flathead, just over 40cm.

As the tide ran out, the fishing got harder and harder and the water got dirtier and dirtier. I dropped another fish, closer to the old oyster jetty but, by low tide I had really only had three serious bites in 3 hours.

Finally, I picked up a few tiny (under 30cm) flathead near the bridge, but overall it was a disappointing session. It is too soon to say that the fish are gone for good. I suspect that if there is no more rain, we may well see them build up again after the new moon.

 

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 26 March 2013

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Wednesday

A strong south easterly would bring more showers on Wednesday and low tide at Bribie was not until noon. New moon would be in three days time. I drove up and started fishing to the south of the bridge, at about 11.00 am.

The wind was blowing 20 knots from the south east and the skies were grey. I had no luck, just to the south of the bridge, so I moved to the area to the south of the old oyster jetty. This has been the most consistent spot for me in recent sessions.

I caught a couple of legal flathead on the Japanese Ikajako 3 ½ inch Powerworm. I then got a shock as a Pied Cormorant surfaced right next to me. Normally when this happens they are as surprised as I am and they swim off pretty quickly.  But this one was not in the least bit startled. It was looking hungrily at the soft plastic on the end of my rod. Each time I cast, it lunged off after the soft plastic.

I swapped to a 5” Powerbait Rippleshad soft plastic. The cormorant got hold of the plastic but I managed to pull it free. I cast it out and after a few hops I connected with a fish. As I wound it in, the cormorant started chasing it around. The fish was a 50 cm long and looked far too big for the cormorant, but it swam around pecking at it. I won the fight and released the fish.

I swapped to a Gulp Jerkshad in the Pink Shine colour. The cormorant kept swimming around close by and kept trying to grab the soft plastic. Each time I caught a fish it would try to grab it. This and the wind was making the fishing pretty hard. I caught a smaller flathead – about 35cm long and the cormorant grabbed it, as it surfaced. It wriggled free, but then the bird grabbed it again and this time it pulled the fish off the jighead. It swam off towards the shallows with the flathead secured in its beak. It was now out of the picture while it figured out how to swallow the fish.

 

South of the bridge – low tide
Pied Cormorant vs flathead
Pied Cormorant – flathead
Pied Cormorant – flathead
Thats my fish
Cormorant
Cormorant
Lucky Craft Pointer in Disco

 

I swapped to a Lucky Craft Pointer X D 75 hard bodied minnow in the Disco colour. I typically use this when fishing for barramundi up north but I thought I would try it on the flathead. It is a suspending lure and the X D stands for extra deep – so it would bump along the sandy bottom. It did the trick and as soon as I found a patch of sandy bottom a flathead grabbed it. I unhooked and released the fish and caught another, a few casts later. This one had really slammed the lure and broken off one of the trebles. I carried on fishing with just the rear treble and caught a few more flathead 40 – 50 cm flathead over the next half an hour.

At about 1.30pm, I finished the session by catching a couple more flathead on the 3 “ Powerbait Rippleshad in the Perch colour with a red paddletail. The fish were plentiful and only the wind and the wildlife had slowed me down.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 25 March 2014

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Tuesday

On Tuesday the tide and wind looked pretty good but it was probably going to rain. I could not resist another session at Bribie Island. I wanted to try a more scientific comparison of the GULP and Zman soft plastic lures, in an area where I was pretty sure there are fish. There are numerous problems in trying to measure lure success. However, flathead are a good species to work with, as they often lie around in groups of 4 or more.

Gulp
ZMAN 3.75″ Streakz in Shine
Plastics don’t get much bigger than this
Certainly swallowed that
DUO Jerkbait 120 SP
They seem to love this one
More wild weather

I wanted to compare the performance of the Berkley Gulp range with the Zman range. Although the ranges have similar offerings, none of their lures match up, exactly. I decided to compare the GULP 4” Minnow in the Pearl Watermelon colour with the Zman 3.75” Streakz in the Shiner colour. Both have approximately the same profile, although the Zman is a little slimmer. The colours are similar but the Zman is more translucent.

I started with the Zman which I loaded on to a TT Headlockz 1/8th ounce, size 1 hook jighead. This set up caught a fish at about 6-15 am. It was a flathead between 50 and 55cm. I cast out again with the same soft plastic and had another hit but no hook up. I decided to give the Zman 10 casts in a semi – circle and then switch to the Gulp and do the same thing. On casts 5, 7, 9 and 10, I got hits but could not hook up with the Zman.

Then I switched to a regular, fine wire, 1/8th ounce, size 1 hook jighead and put on the Gulp Minnow. I cast right back at the spot where I had caught the fish on the Zman and hooked another, after a couple of hops. It was another flathead between 45cm and 50cm. I continued to cast into the now fairly shallow water in a semi-circle. At the end of 10 casts the Gulp had caught three more Flathead – all were just under the legal size limit of 40cm.

So on the face of it – it was GULP 4” Minnow that caught more fish. I have mentioned before my theory that the texture of the Gulp soft plastics is much more fish-like than other brands. They also seem to be more porous, so they retain a scent trail for longer than most other soft plastic lures. But I could not see how this could make much difference in this situation. In these circumstances, where the fish are really aggressive in their feeding, they seemed to hit almost every plastic/ hard body that I threw at them – so why was the hook-up rate not as good with the Zmans?

Then I figured it out. I loaded another Zman 3.75” Streakz in the Shiner colour, but this time on the regular TT  finewire, 1/8th ounce, size 1 hook jighead. On the first cast I felt the hit, paused and counted to 10. When I lifted the rod the fish was hooked. I kept fishing with the same plastic for a while and I hardly missed a bite, converting about five bites in to fish. I know it is not conclusive proof but it seems that either the TT Headlockz are less sharp or the broader gauge hook required to hold the lock in place, prevents them from penetrating as effectively.

After I finished my experiment I moved to the south of the jetty and I decided to see just how big a soft plastic these flathead will attack. I pulled out a GULP 6” grub in a sardine-like colour. I put it on a Nitro Bream Pro 1/8th ounce, size 2/0 hook jighead. This was the biggest I had, and cast it out. After a few casts, I felt a bite. I paused then struck, but I was not attached. This happened three times, so on the fourth cast, when I felt the bite, I dropped the rod tip for a full count of 15 seconds. When I lifted it I had a flathead, but only a 42 cm long one. The lure was well on its way to the fishes stomach, so I kept it. I would recover the soft plastic later.

I finished the session with the DUO Realis Jerkbait 120 SP – a big hard bodied, suspending minnow. This also soon found the fish. In fact, it found the biggest two fish of the day – both well over 60cm. Just after 9.00 am, the incoming tide pushed me off the target area, so I gave up. The fish are still there and they are still hungry.

Bribie – the old oyster jetty flats – 22 March 2014

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Saturday

Back to early morning low tides for the weekend. On Saturday it would be at about 7.00 am. There was a bit of rain around. The northerly winds had been coming and going. The temperatures were warm again but the water is continuing to gradually cool down.

I arrived at the Bribie Bridge a little after 5.00 am. First light would be at about 5.30 am and there was no breeze. I had selected a variety of soft plastics lures to run through. I started with a 3“ Zman Minnowz in the Opening Night colour, on a 1/8th ounce, size 1/0 hook Headlockz Jighead. I chose 12lb fluorocarbon leader and started fishing from the shadows cast by the bridge lights.

At 5.18 am I caught the first fish of the day – a 43cm flathead. It was sitting just to the south of the patch of reef near pylon number five. The tide was running pretty quickly. This can work against the Zmen as they are definitely more buoyant than most other soft plastic lures. After five minutes, I caught another, bigger flathead about 10 metres further south.

There were prawns jumping everywhere and a bit of surface feeding going on, so I swapped to a slightly thinner profile 3.75“ Zman Streakz, in the Redbone (glow) colour.  I cast around and got plenty of hits from something a bit more agile than a flathead. I assumed it was the small Moses perch that are often around, or perhaps some bream. Either way, eventually it was a flathead that I caught with it – about 10 minutes later.

The sun was now up and I moved south, past the old oyster jetty. I swapped to a different colour in the 3.75” Zman Streakz  – Shine. I thought I might find a few more bream and I think I had a few bream bites before I caught yet another flathead at 5.47am. I swapped to a 4 inch Zman Streakz Curltailz in the Bloodworm colour and after a few casts, this caught another flathead. This was a very good size fish – somewhere between 65cm and 70 cm. I worked through the Zmans, catching a couple more fish on the 3“ Minnowz in the Redbone colour.

 

The storm fired them up
Bream
Duo Ebikko
Ebikko
Duo Ebikko strikes again
Duo Jerkbait 120SP – a big lure for a flathead
Duo Jerkbait 120 SP
Duo Popper
Duo Tetra Works Pocopoco
Orange bug hard body
Powerbait 3″ Rippleshad
Rippleshad
Rio Prawn
Sebile Spin Shad
Zman – Bloodworm curly tail
Zman
DUO Jerkbait 120 SP
DUO Jerkbait 120 SP
Duo Jerkbait 120 SP
Rio Prawn
Gulp Jigging Grub

 

It was now about 6.30 am and the sky was looking ominous. A soaking looked like a certainty but at least there was still no real wind blowing. I swapped to my last remaining Rio Prawn lure – the biggest one in their range – the 19 gram. I thought the colour I had was the original or ‘Natural’ but I see it’s actually called ‘Night Glow’. This soon did the trick and I pulled in three or four more flathead over the next 30 minutes. The bigger lure seemed to attract some slightly bigger fish, but after a few tussles the worn leader snapped and I lost my lure to a particularly aggressive, headshaking flathead.

Size of lure did not seem to be an issue so I pulled out the DUO Jerkbait 120 SP. This is a suspending, flat sided, hard bodied minnow that seems to drive the tailor nuts. At 120 mm long it is bit larger than the usual flathead favorites but I thought I would give it a try. I did not have to wait long. The first taker was a fairly small flathead – just over 40cm. The next, a few casts later was a very decent fish – nudging 60 cm. The Duo Jerkbait kept catching fish through the bottom of the tide.

As the tide started its run in I decided to switch to a small lure and see if the fish were still interested. I pulled out the DUO Tetra Works Pocopoco sinking popper. This is a light (4.7 gram) popper that can still be worked quickly on the surface. I had it in the Pink Clown colour. It did not take long to find the fish. Unfortunately it did not last long. I had not upgraded the factory treble hooks. These are too soft for wrestling with hard mouthed flathead and so after a few captures one had broken off and the other was all bent out of shape. On to the next lure – the DUO Ebikko hard bodied, sinking shrimp imitation. This time I had it in a pearly white colour. Once more, I did not have to wait long and after three or four casts I found a fish – another 45cm+ flathead.

It was now about 8.00 am. The stormy skies seemed to have fired the fish up even more than usual. I carried on working my way through the tackle bag. Next I offered a Sebile ¼ ounce Spin Shad – I have never caught much with this lure although I think it should catch plenty of fish. It did not have much trouble today and after a couple of hits the treble hook bit and pulled in another flathead. The last hard body in the bag was a tiny orange and purple Japanese-made bug. This performed like all the others and soon caught a fish.

I finished up the session catching a few more flathead on the Powerbait Rippleshad – first the 5” in the Cola colour and then the 3” in the Perch colour. The fish were very aggressive which might have been because of the barometric pressure drop caused by the big storm that was approaching. At 9.00 am I was back at the car after another great session.

Bribie – from the oyster jetty to the channel marker – 17 – 19 March 2014

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Warm one
Early morning weed beds
Lurking in the shallows
65cm Flathead
Atomic Ripperz 2.5″ Paddle Tail
Best of the day
By the Channel marker
GULP New Penny 2″ Shrimp
Gulp Pink Shine Jerkshad
GULP Satay Chicken
Powerworm
Slider Grub
Ikajaco Powerworm
Flathead in close
Duo Ebikko
DUO Ebikko Terminator
DUO Ebikko

Monday & Wednesday

As the low tide progressed through the day, I timed my fishing sessions to coincide with it. So on Monday, I found myself driving up to Bribie Island, at lunch time to fish for a few hours, through to the low tide at 1.50 pm.

There had been a big northerly blow on Sunday and temperatures had risen again. As I arrived, just before 1.00 pm, the wind was moving round to blow for the east again. The tide was running out and I went off to fish to the south of the jetty, towards the green channel marker.

The fishing was initially a little tougher than it had been but once I found the flathead, they kept coming.  I only had a few hours but again I caught more than 20 fish, the majority of which were over 40cm long. I stuck with the Gulp Jerkshads in various colours; Pink Shine, Satay Chicken, Lime Tiger and Cajun Chicken – they all caught fish.

On Wednesday I was back to fishing the early morning. I could not resist a return to the same area. I arrived at 5.15 am and waded out, under the bridge. Low tide had passed at 4.55 am. I would be fishing the beginning of the run in tide but the water was more or less still, at first light.

I waded to the south of the jetty and started casting around with a GULP Jerkshad soft plastic in the Cajun Chicken colour. At about 5.30 am I caught a 45cm flathead that was sitting in no more than 20 cm of water. I caught a few more, similar sized fish in this area and then moved south, as the sun came over the horizon.

I decided to try a small DUO hard bodied Shrimp imitation called the DUO Tetra Works Ebikko. I had it in the ‘Terminator’ colour – chrome with a white belly. This is a 47 mm, 3.3 gram sinking lure with a simple fluttering motion. I just hop it along the sandy stretches of bottom, hoping to entice a bite. It is pretty light so you need fairly calm conditions to keep in touch with it.

I had a couple of bites. The first taker was a pike. At present, I am only fishing it with one rear treble as I think the two trebles on such a light lure are overkill.  The pike followed behind the lure, snapping, until it connected with the treble. I had a couple of solid bites which I think where flathead but I could not hook up so I swapped back to soft plastics.

I was now about half way between the end of the oyster jetty and the channel marker and decided to work my way through all the remaining soft plastics to see what did and didn’t work.

 

It was now just after 7.00 am. I pulled out a packet of Japanese soft plastics – an Ikajako 3 ½ “ Powerworm in an orange flecked colour with a twin prong tail. On the first cast, the plastic sank and then a fish grabbed it, as soon as I lifted it off the bottom. I released the fish and swapped to a Slider 3” Bass Grub soft plastic. A couple of casts later this one caught a fish. I swapped to an Atomic Ripperz 2.5” Paddle Tail soft plastic , same thing happened, a Powerbait 3” red tailed  Rippleshad, same again. I ran through eight more different Gulps, Zman and no name soft plastics and they all caught fish within a couple of casts. They are not fussy at the moment.

At about 8.30 am the incoming tide forced me from the main edge of the weed beds and I waded back to the car. I caught a couple more fish by casting at the sandy patches, as I waded back towads the bridge.

It is clear that there are plenty of fish around and once you locate them they will eat just about anything. If you want to catch a flathead now is the time.

Bribie -still at the oyster jetty flats – 13/14 March 2014

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Thursday – Friday

I accept that these reports are getting predictable but it is very hard to stay away when the fish are so prolific. So on both Thursday and Friday, I returned to Bribie to fish the last few hours of the run out tide.

The tides would be low at 1.50 pm on Thursday and 2.36 pm on Friday.  The tides were getting bigger, as we headed for the full moon on Saturday. The water was therefore running in and out faster. It was the same wind pattern – east-south-easterly, building through the day. A northerly change was forecast to raise temperatures and blow up on Sunday.

On Thursday, I started at about 10.15 am. There was plenty of water at the base of the mangrove roots, so I started off by casting in to the shallows, just north of the bridge. There is a nice weed bed here and a few sand banks. I started with the GULP 2” Shrimp in the Peppered Prawn colour. I was fishing with 12lb leader and my light spin rod. After a couple of casts, I found my first flathead at about 10.20 am. It was just about 40cm long. I released it and five minutes later I had a much more aggressive bite. I reeled in a tiny moses perch, which had been hovering close to the first bridge pylon.

I moved south past the old oyster jetty and at about 10.45 am, I caught a bigger flathead – about 50 cm long,  on a Gulp 3” Minnow in the Peppered Prawn colour. It was about three hours from low tide and the band of sandy hollows and weed beds, where I have been catching most of the fish in recent sessions, was now within casting range.

I caught a few more fish on the Gulp 4” Minnow and Jerkshad soft plastics and at about 11.30 am, I decided to give the DUO Tetraworks Toto a work out. This is a 2.8 gram, 42mm sinking minnow. It has a tight rolling action. You just cast it – count to five to let it sink, then start a slow and steady retrieve, hop it along the bottom in short bursts like a soft plastic.

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My first cast with the Toto connected with a fish. This lure caught 5 more flathead over the next 30 minutes. The largest was just over 60 cm. At about noon, I swapped to the DUO Realis Shad 59 MR – a slightly larger, suspending minnow. This really is a great flathead lure and will also catch bream, if they are around. It has a good rattle and the buoyancy balance is perfect. It will suspend in the water column for about 5 seconds, before slowly floating upwards – giving a bottom dwelling predator plenty of time to strike.

First cast with the Realis Shad also produced a fish and over the next hour it produced a fish every 3 or four minutes. On average the hard bodies seemed to attract slightly bigger fish than the soft plastics had done.

Just before 1.00 pm, I was playing a decent flathead that had locked on to the DUO Realis Shad. It was a big fish – well over 60cm, so I decided to pull it in to the shoreline to unhook and photograph. I was a bit impatient and had the drag set a little too tight. When it saw that we were heading for the mangroves, it turned, shook its head and snapped the leader. When you are catching plenty of fish the leader gets worn very quickly, so it pays to keep checking it. At this point I gave up for the day.

On Friday it was a similar story. The fish were a little less plentiful, but the wind was far stronger, which may have made them a little harder to catch. I focused my efforts on an area further to the south of the oyster jetty and again found that the hard bodies – particularly the Rio Prawn lure, found the bigger flathead of the day.

I must go and explore if the fish are everywhere or just clustered over on this side of the Passage. Maybe next time.

Bribie – the oyster jetty flats – again – 12 March 2014

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Wednesday 12th

I paused, reluctantly, to dry out the fishing bag and finish filleting and skinning a few flathead, on Tuesday. By Wednesday I had spotted an opening for another fishing session. I was working around the low tide on the flats at Bribie.

I drove up to arrive at about 10.00am – very civilised. We had the same wind pattern as we have now had for about ten days – a 10 to 15 knot east-south easterly wind. It was a bright, sunny day and the wind was building. The water was clear and running out and the full moon would be on Saturday. Low tide would be at 1.10 pm.

I started to fish the small patch of reef just south of the Bribie Island Bridge, on the mainland side. The rocks were just visible above the receding tide. I started the day with a soft plastic. As you will have noticed I prefer to prospect with a soft plastic lure – once I find the fish I will then start to experiment. Today I chose the GULP Jerkshad in the Cajun Chicken colour. I was fishing with 12lb fluorocarbon leader and using a 1/8th ounce, size 1/0 hook, jighead.

I soon found a fish, just to the south of the bridge. This flathead was just below 40cm long. I would release everything I caught today – there is plenty of fish in the fridge. I cast back in the same area and found another, smaller fish.  I moved closer to the jetty and caught 3 more, before wading under the jetty.

As with the previous sessions, the fish kept coming. I swapped from soft plastics to hard bodies and these were even more successful. I caught a 60cm flathead on the MARIA 90 mm MJ Twitch suspending minnow and a 66 cm fish on a RIO Prawn lure, in the 13 g size. The DUO range chipped in with some good flathead on the DUO Tetraworks Toto and, my current favourite – the suspending DUO Realis Shad 59 MR. This one really is a flathead slayer – the action and rattle seems to drive them wild.

Cajun Chicken
Gulp Minnow
Maria MJ Twitch 90mm
Don’t swallow it – DUO Toto
Rippleshad
RIO Prawn got one of the big ones
RIO Prawn – hard body
DUO Tetraworks Toto
Close to the bridge
Gulp Minnow – solid
The DUO Toto is a trout lure
DUO Tetraworks Toto
The DUO Toto makes them mad
Maria MJ Twitch 90mm
Powerbait Rippleshad

I fished from 10.30 am to about 1.30 pm and I rarely went 5 minutes without a fish. I finished the session with some good sized flathead on the Powerbait 5” Rippleshad paddle tail soft plastic, in the black and gold colour (which I usually reserve for chasing Jewfish).

For the fish to be here in such numbers I can only conclude that they are feeding up to spawn. A few of the fish I kept last week were full of roe. It is early but apparently flathead can choose to spawn at any time and do not do it on mass, like bream.

Whatever the reason, I hope they stay for a while –  it’s a great time to be out there fishing.