Jump to content

monduran 08 tempter

faulked

By faulked
in Freshwater

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 115
  • Created
  • Last Reply
Feral Newbie

Feral

Posted
Posted

Cant be bothered digging out the camera at the moment, I'm buggered. Maybe after the missus has gone to work and the kids quietened down!

But currently Brian is in the lead, and Team AFO have caught over 14m of Barra in total. I'll leave the biggest fish secret, until the winner gets home to announce it, but I was in the lead until this morning with a 115cm model. Its been swapping around regular all week!

We have video of quite a few of the catches, including Brian's epic hook up at the ramp on his first cast, getting wrapped around a snag, then launching the boat to get it off only to pull in a Terry Special! Ok I believe there are Catfish in Monduran now!

It was a great week, we got messages of more catches all the way home. Passed a really sparkly green skeeter just south of Childers, so I assume Stu and Andrew were on schedule to join in the fun.

Graham Pflaum, after hearing about the hot bite at Monduran, kicked his missus out of bed whilst on holiday in NSW, dropped her off home, and was on his way to Monduran as we were leaving.

I wish my balls were that big!

Anyway the run down from my point of view. Note its all a blur, so I could have things all out of wack and on the wrong days, I am sure the others will fix up the mistakes for me.

Ferg and I arrived Sunday to be greeted by a fridge full of Barra fillets and 3 Cheshire cats.

We hit the dam that arvo, Ferg and I just having a reckie to see what had changed since the water level rose. We found some really fishy looking spots and cast till about 8pm and went home fishless.

Next morning we went out with Ray on the promise of a bit of trolling then a run up the back in the faster boat. Well after watching Ray pull in 2 big barra on the troll, we went up the back for a mornings casting. No fish for us.

That arvo we once again went casting, covered bird bay and a few likely looking weed beds, for no fish. Brian and Ray catching a few more trolling in the main basin.

Next morning Ferg and I crossed to the evil side, we gave in and went trolling with Ray. Everyone one else was catching Barra on a horrible green looking lure called guns and roses (for god knows what reason), which I didn't have, so as the water was a goldie brown colour I consulted my limited lure collection (remember I took only 48 lures!) and dug out an old gold and orange halco and put it on.

What then resulted could only be described as frustration! Two hook ups, but lost the fish two or three minutes into the fight. Then a couple of bumps with no hook ups!

So at lunch time I looked at the Halco, it was a really old one (no one can even remember a 4m Halco, not even in the tackle shop), and the hooks while solid, were quite a bit smaller than all the other lures. So I whacked on a set of VMC 6X size 2 trebles for the next session.

Next session Ferg and I continued our degradation to the dark side and started trolling straight away. Within 40 metres a solid hit on the Halco and I was on! 8 minutes later I had landed my first Monduran Barra, 95cm of pure muscle! Mind you I had a boat load of drunken bums in AFO gear come screaming over to offer "helpful advice" for the last 5 or 6 minutes of the fight!

I was wrapped, I had broken my "big barra" hoodoo. Caught it on my LH Scorpion baitcaster on one of my Tsunami 5-8 kilo 5'8" baitcasters. A few photo's handshakes etc etc and back she went for someone else to catch.

Next morning Jason and Brian hit the water before dawn, Ferg, Ray and I departed at a more realistic time of about 5am. When we got there they were the only boat on the water, and Brian already had a 96cm Barra boated.

Anyway resting on my laurels from the day before I thought I would depart from the successful lure and try something else. I spotted this big old no name gold and red lure I had picked up in the Amart bargain bin for $2. It was called "super barra" well I thought, that's what I want a super barra, so that will do. So on it went, on my new Egrell, with my lucky RH Curado that caught me my murray Cod at Glenlyon.

Well in almost the same spot as I had caught my Barra the day before I was on. I new immediately this was different, immediately this "horse" was tail dancing across the dam, then huge deep runs, I've never seen a rod take so much punishment as that Egrell. It was another short but intense fight, about 10 minutes.

Then we had her boated. I was super stoked, 115cm of Monduran Barra, not only did I break the metre, but was leading the pack!

Unfortunately this girl was so whacked from the fight there was no letting her go, she was stuffed, we tried swimming her for ages, but could not get a kick or even gills moving. So she went in the freezer.

It was about now Ray got all despondent, as we had now technically "bagged out" and he couldn't keep any more ! This was despite his, Jason's and Brian's best efforts to find 50 ways to cook a barra! Problem is one fillet off these horses is way too much to feed the five of us!

Somewhere in between me getting the hookups with no fish and my actually catching something, we did a raid to Foxies, and Ferg bought the same Halco, and managed a great 96cm Barra after a 5 minute fight. He was using his new Egrell (The small one, 4-6 kilo 6 footer) with 20lb braid and 20lb mono leader. (all my reels are spooled with 30lb braid, and IO was using cajun 50lb leader)The fish swam away strongly when released. Mind you Ferg's arms were shaking for a good half hour afterwards, hard work on that light gear!

Anyway I am wandering again - Hardly had my 115cm horse been stuck in the esky we heard from Brian, Jason had also scored a horse, 112cm, caught as he was running out the lure prior to trolling, hitting him with the bail arm open! Some very swift action (and no doubt a lot of prayer) got the bail arm closed without losing the fish. Jason also released this one, and she swam away well.

The afternoon session saw things pretty quiet, we then did another couple of hours trolling this morning before heading home, but unfortunately with the overcast conditions they did not come on the bite again until about an hour after we left, which Ray and Brian were quite happy to point out with regular updates all the way home!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Feral Newbie

Feral

Posted
Posted

Pb220094.jpg

Pb220101.jpg

Pb220105.jpg

Pb230120.jpg

Ray was pretty proud of his Barra until this little old lady rocked up to the cleaning table

Pb230122.jpg

Pb230127.jpg

Pb240024.jpg

Pb240026.jpg

Pb240031.jpg

Pb240032.jpg

Pb240035.jpg

Pb240038.jpg

Barra fillet anyone?

Pb240042.jpg

How to eat Barra no 32

Pb240043.jpg

Pb240044.jpg

Pb240048.jpg

Pb240131.jpg

Pb240136.jpg

My First un

Pb260211.jpg

Pb260072.jpg

Pb260207.jpg

Pb260212.jpg

Pb260214.jpg

Pb260215.jpg

Brian insisted on this photo specially for Jeff!

Pb260218.jpg

My Second un

Pb270233.jpg

Pb270075.jpg

Pb270076.jpg

Cop a look at the ring and hook on the "super barra" lure after that!

Pb270078.jpg

Still cant believe I was silly enough to put out a $2 lure without changing the hooks and rings and got away with it!

Pb270223.jpg

Pb270227.jpg

Faulked's second un

Pb270237.jpg

Pb270684.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites
STU Newbie

STU

Posted
Posted

Had a great trip, good too see everyone out there gettin into some, when we first got there saw brian with a 124cm barra 70lb made a 88cm look small so we where keen but no luck till we did hrs of casting and alot more hrs trolling in 4 sessions for 1 pb barra for me of 118cm caught on my smaller outfit with 20lb braid great fight :) [img size=499]http://www.australianfishing.com.au/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/118cm_Monduran_barra_p.jpg

post-1103-14459847928_thumb.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing
×
×
  • Create New...