newbie with new poppers

[jhedrick]

Hi, I am new to qld and I really want to try poppers. 1. I dont know what colours catch what fish 2. Dont know where a good place on the gold coast is (from land) 3. What pound leader i should use.

I am a land based person but i really want to get into fishing here as bait fishing gets a bit boring. I have attached a photo of the lures i have bought. It would be great if someone can help me out saying which ones will catch what fish and what techniques i should use. They are all 60mm. Any help will be awesome. Thanks guys

[taib]

Hello and welcome mate. Nice lookin poppers mate... ebay specials? ... dont worry, i bought some last week and just as keen as you are to wet them.

Mate, check out the gold coast reports, im sure you will get some tips on spots.... Schilling just put a post up 2 days ago.....

/>http://www.australianfishing.com.au/forum/8-south-coast-reports/255265-finallymangrove-jack

He used bait, but im sure poppers are worth a shot at Marine Pde, Runaway Bay (near Harbour town). Mate you could also try in Cascades garden... Good lure spot.

Ive heard people catch very descent sized fish in the little river at Pacific Fair.... underneath the bridge... both on lures and bait... just watch out for those snags, otherwise, there is a little beach there that i personally have done pretty well with. WHiting, flatty, bream, dart. Seen squire in there.

As for Soft plastics... check out previous posts. My personal fav is the berkely 4"smelt with 1/4 jig. Its a deadly weapon if ur chasin flatty.

Good luck mate. Hope to see a great report from you tomorrow.

[51MPL]

Hi j,

My first popper session was about 2/3 weeks ago and i landed a 30cm trevally. Things to look for are - fast moving current (with some eddies), rockwalls, bridges, jetties etc

Use a fast bloop-bloop retrieve with not many pauses for trevally & other big fishies and slower retrieve for bream etc (yet to catch a bream on popper only had 2 sessions)

Any other questions ask me, im still new at poppers too but im keen to learn & share my knowledged (albeit limited)

[jhedrick]

Thanks for the help mate. cant wait to get out and try a few of those spots. It was a ebay special for $5 bucks or something. Hopefully they work okay. I will also give your favorite soft plastics a try when im out and about next. Thanks again this site is quite helpful

[jhedrick]

Thanks for the tips mate. I caught a 35cm trevelly on chevron island (where i live) on a hard bodied lure i use for cod in the murry back in victoria. Put up a hell of a fight on 10lb line. Those things seem to grab anything that is moving fast as i wasnt even working the lure. Was a crappy cast that i was trying to get back quick. Turned out to be no so crappy.

[Schilling]

Hey all..... Looking back through a collection of old fishing mags and came accross an article in Catch 2008, Surface Paradise- A fish by fish guide on how to target the gold coast's favourite species on top!!!

It lists some of the top species to target such as bream, trevally, mangrove jack, herring, whiting and flathead; the best locations to fish and some of the techniques required to target each species.

Gold Coast Hot spots.

Bream

Sanday canals of the nerang river.

Trevally

Fast running water around canals. Monaco street canals and sovereign islands.

Mangrove Jack

Monaco street canals, sugarfield grates in the tweed and canal mouths of the nerang, runaway bay and sovereign islands

Herring

Lake orr, rumrunner lake and lake intrepid

Whiting

Weedy shallows of the broadwater, terranora and jumpinpin

Flathead

Jumpinpin, crab island and tipplers passage during late winter and spring

Just a quick snippet on some techniques......... As i have caught the mangrove jack fever the article says the best times for jacks on the surface are around midnight. It also says make big single pops followed by long pauses. Keep the poppers right near the structure as long as possible and you should be in with a chance. Also goes on to state you should always upgrade your trebles on your lures cause jacks are dam tough and you can get away with using light line while lureing for jacks but they will def bust up your lures.

If u want any extra info on the other species let us know and i'll type some stuff up for you all..... "Once you've experienced a bit of SURFACE PARADISE, you're sure to be hooked for life!!" Just a quote from the article......... SOOO TRUE!!! Keep those lines tight AFOers

[rosstralia46]

you can try either a river 2 sea or rebel pop a both in clear work really well for whiting, bream and flathead a constant retrieve works best but if chasing bream 3 or 4 pops and stop.

if ur on chevron drive over the bridge towards ashmore, go to the right and follow it until the houses start stop and you can work sp's along that bank at high tide for flatty's 4 inch nuclear chicken sp and also try ur poppers there for whiting as well good luck looking forward to reports

[jhedrick]

Holy crap that is some great information thanks mate. Went out today and caught nothing. Few bites that made a mess of my soft plastics and one of my lures will be stuck on a reef for the rest of its life. Thanks for the great feed back and i will try some new spots and techniques.

[51MPL]

anymore detailed info on trevs? I've had a little bit of success during mornings catching them but only get 2-3 per session

I've been told to try at night and target more fast moving water whereas ive been trying to get them through the day and the canals i target dont have really fast flowing water

[kakaryan]

Hey mates I wanna ask,

I am using some small freshwater popper <5cm for targetting inshore species. They have feathers attached, and I find it someway easily get dirty or damaged by saltwater species.

Do you guys change that feather hook to normal hook in saltwater? Does it affect bite rate? :dry:

[51MPL]

not sure with the popper but i bought some cheapo mojiko poppers to try last nite and they're not that great.. definitely gonna go back to at-least r2s poppers work so much better.. when u flick they actually 'pop' whereas cheapos sometimes just dive under and do nothing T__T

[idrewapicture]

my favourite poppers are rebel pop-r, r2s bubble pops in 35 and 45, stiffy pop, and a cheap outback chug n pop bout 70mm with teaser, picked up a few of my best bass on this $4 lure.

[RyanG45]

personally i like the stiffy poppers but that's just me.

cheers ryan

[trev_boy]

if u ever go up the noosa and go to the end of gympie terrece there is a woodern platform its worth fishin there early in the moring and the trev stop smashin the bait around 11am and then go back on at night

and where the fisheries base is up at noosa 4 about 15mins a day right on when the sun if goin down the trev go frekin crazy all u c is white wash for them if u throw a popper in there u can get my pb 88cm trev 25min fight yee

good luck