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Stunning Day On Lake Samsonvale

Drop Bear

By Drop Bear
in Freshwater

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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This is a bit of a double report. I have to link to Rayke's post with some awesome photos.

I hit Rayke up for a decky spot this week and was lucky enough to get a spot on his boat yesterday. 

My good mate Robbie was at my house and was telling me how much his son Max was loving his fishing. I asked Rayke if he could come along as well and the very generous man said yes. 

Rayke and Rick picked us up at Chandler at totally ridiculously stupidly numskully early o'clock and we enjoyed the cruse up to the Yellow Gate at NPD before gliding down to the boat ramp.

I counted 85 pelicans. They were standing on the ramp but quickly swam out as we arrived. The ramp is feted with stinky poo covering every inch but they are such awesome birds. Just stinky ones. 

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We headed off and pulled a few shrimp pots. Lots of small red claw in them and enough shrimp for the day. Then we got a stack of Red Claw to eat from the pots. I have a nice bag of tails in the freezer for dinner tonight.

We tried a spot on the way for a few good bass then headed to the floats where we parked next to Ken who had caught a few. They were pretty good here. We caught some nice sized Bass and 2 nice Yellowbelly. For some reason most of the fish were coming in on the starboard side of the boat. Rick was killing it with about 6 cracking bass over 40cm. Finally Max Caught his fist ever Bass. It was not a huge fish that popped his cherry but hopefully a memorable one. 

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He upgraded a few times during the day but I don't remember what his best ended up being. The soon went quiet so we went over to the far maker then the new area for not many at all. 

Back to the floats and they were here again. Not in huge numbers but kept us interested. I caught a very nice 48cm. My PB was 50. Rick said he had one at 59 and Rayke couldn't remember his biggest but something like 56 or 58. I really wanted to crack onto the +50s...

The sun was really hot. Belting down on our heads now at about 11am. I was letting my line reach the bottom and counted up 7 winds. This was to try and have the bait where I thought the fish were and a vein attempt to avoid the worst of the snags.  I was finding that the fish were being a little fickle with their takes. The line did some mild flicking, not too dissimilar to the shrimp flicking. I am more used to waiting through the bites for a pull down before lifting my rod but I lost a bait so tried to be a bit more aggressive. Next drop... flick flick... gentle lift and I was on. I caught 2 nice bass in the 30cm range but no +50.  😤 Drop again... flick flick... gentle lift and............ BOOOOMMMM... I was on! To a monster!

I love to fish with my, probably silly, little Alvey reel. A nice old bakelight job my grandfather passed to me.  I love the challenge, when you have a good fish on, to palm the spool and let it run. You do get some minor burns from the line if you don't get to the spool properly and it rubs on your hand but overall its a super fun way to fish. I like to think that it is an extremely skillful way to fish. 🤣

The floats are a spot on the dam that mark a large group of underwater snags that have been very productive. I caught my PB Yella there 55cm and have caught lots of Bass there. The problem with fishing a large snagy structure is you often get bricked. I was fully aware of this when the rod buckled over and I had to let line peel off the Alvey. I put what I thought was maximum pressure on 10lb mono and trying very hard not to high stick (but failing miserably) fought to control what I now knew was a cracking fish. It ran off left before turning right. I had to very quickly grab a lot of line as it swam towards me then instantly switch back to palming as it did thumping run back down to the snags. I got a quick gimps before it again turned and ran. It was pretty special. A huge silver plated Australian Bass... It fought all the way to the net and Max helped me land it. We put it on the ruler and it went 52cm. YEW!!!

You will have to go to Raykes thread for a photo that shows the whole fish. Max must have big fingers haha. 🤣 

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We did get a few more nice fish but headed home soon after this. 

A Cracking day again. Thanks @rayke1938 for taking me out and Rick for driving. (sorry rick I keep forgetting your user name. Reply to this and I might remember?)

Dinner was battered Bass. So Good. Like I said, tonight is yabby pasta. I hope to post some pics of it... hmmm perhaps a yabby curry... Mix it up a bit 🙂

 

 

 

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Fisherman's gear Newbie

Fisherman's gear

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Awesome report Drop Bear, i have never done any fresh water fishing myself, but reading your report tempts me to give it a go. Solid catches. 1 question there, it sounded like you were using shrimps for bait, are they like those little weird looking prawns with two white claws? Or they just like prawns but live in freshwater. Thanks.

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Drop Bear

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4 hours ago, Fisherman's gear said:

Awesome report Drop Bear, i have never done any fresh water fishing myself, but reading your report tempts me to give it a go. Solid catches. 1 question there, it sounded like you were using shrimps for bait, are they like those little weird looking prawns with two white claws? Or they just like prawns but live in freshwater. Thanks.

Hey mate. Its fun as. you should give it a go.

The bait is just a freshwater prawn. They have very long nippers.They are also known as macrobrachium australiense. 

They are caught in small meshed traps and kept alive in tanks with an aerator.

They are with out a doubt the best bait there is. 

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Drop Bear

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3 hours ago, Fisherman's gear said:

Thanks DB, I think i have accidentally caught them use cast net before from Brissy River. 

How do you hook them as bait?  What sort of rig do you set up for bait bass fishing? Will it just be like running sinker for normal breams? 

We use a simple paternoster rig. small sinker and you can only use one hook in freshwater. Ray loves the wide gape circle hooks in about 2/0 to 4/0 (he did tell me but I forgot exactly what size). 

It is a simple matter of pinning the shrimp through the first section of shell from the tail. You go from one side to the other not from underneath and try and miss the poop tube. 

Its a one hit per bait sort of thing. The Bass and yellas suck it in and you are on. The circle hooks are great for releasing fish as you virtually never get a gut hook. 

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Drop Bear Community Regular

Drop Bear

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2 hours ago, Luvit said:

It would cheaper for Searing tackle to sponsor you since I see you winning almost every report of the month with your writing and photography skills.🤣

Enjoyable read and congrats on the PB.

Thanks mate. I have not won one in a long time. 🙂

I am very open to sponsor ship... will talk it up 🙂

 

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