| With some good weather and the school holidays beginning over the weekend, there have been plenty of anglers trying their luck in the local waterways. Despite a reasonable swell and variable winds there has been good numbers of boats crossing the bars to try the offshore grounds. |
Snapper and squire are still one of the more popular targets with plenty of these fish taken along the 36 fathom reefs east and southeast of the Seaway. Pilchards, squid, strips of fish flesh and five to seven inch soft plastics all worked well and also accounted for pearl perch, parrotfish and a mixture of other reefies. Jigging on the 42s, 50s and beyond
has also been very productive with plenty of
kingfish and amberjack from five to 20 kilos landed.
Close in there was plenty of action with good numbers of cobia, tailor and a few spotty and school mackerel taken on the local bait grounds. Metal slugs worked well on the smaller fish while a whole live tailor was the best way to tempt a big cobia.
The number of anglers fishing plastics on the shallow reefs is increasing and these anglers are being rewarded with squire, snapper, trag and tailor. Drifting pilchards around dawn and dusk on the 24s east of the Casino produced plenty of trag jew and a few quality squire and snapper.
The estuaries have been very busy with the start of school holidays so try and find somewhere out of the way or fish dawn, dusk and the evenings for better results. Good bream have been caught throughout the river systems on plastics, small hard bodied lures and baits of yabbies, mullet flesh, gut, whitebait or prawns. Whiting are also starting to move in the rivers and can be targeted on the evening incoming tide using worms, yabbies, soldier crabs and shrimp. Try the usual areas like Chevron Island, the Council Chambers and Monaco Street. Numbers of trevally are on the increase in the rivers too, with quality fish to five kilos taken on B52s, X-Raps and Lively lures around eddies, bridges and canal entrances.
The Seaway has been fishing steadily with quality bream, flathead, trevally, tarpon and kingfish landed over the past week. The trevally and tarpon have been falling to metal slugs and white soft plastics on the incoming tide, while bream were taken on baits along both walls. Drifting livebaits along the pipe or at the end of the north wall has produced school jew, kingfish and a few large flathead. Try the edges of the weedbeds and sand flats in the Broadwater with plastics and whitebait for some quality flathead, just don’t forget that the big breeding females over 70cm must be released.
The beaches have been producing plenty of the usual summer species, with bream, dart, whiting and flathead landed in the gutters along the Coast. Best baits have been locally caught beach worms and pipis, although frogmouth pilchards were a worthwhile alternative. A couple of tailor were taken on pilchards along the Spit and down south at Currumbin although persistence was needed as only a few schools have been moving through the gutters.
The fishing in Hinze has continued to get better, with plenty of bass taken during the week. Plenty of small fish to 40cm were taken casting lures around the sloping banks in the mornings and afternoons. Fishing the steeper points and deep inlets with shrimp and worms or Jackals, spinnerbaits and diving minnows produced some better bass as well as a few yellowbelly and silver perch. A few saratoga are starting to become active in the upper reaches of both arms of the dam. Try fishing for them with small surface lures and plastics or shallow diving minnows.
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