Maroochy River Haul

[mdcotton]

Hi Guys,

My first post so let me know if there is any extra info I should have included.

Got to Maroochydore on Saturday the 24th just before dark and threw the pots out as quick as we could before we ran out of light (I have done a seperate report on crabbing which will I put up just after this one) and then headed straight for the Maroochy Plaza shopping mall to fish the pylons underneath and the surrounding mud banks. There were two of us fishing and we picked up one nice Flathead at just under 50cm as well as some very small trevalley. The Trevalley were taken on Ecogear SX40's and the flathead on an old school Mann's Stretch 5+ Rainbow Trout colour. I was using 15lb Diawa TD Sensor Braid and my mate Zane was using Varivas Avani Seas Bass Max Power Braid 15lb and we were both using Megabasss Dragon Call 16lb Flurocarbon as our leader. The picture of the flathead is a little dodgy we trouble getting a good pick on my phone in the dark.

Sunday, day two we headed over to the Bli Bli Barra farm where we were joined by another mate Darren (in the big Straw Hat) and his son Jordan (red shirt). We had a good day landing plenty of good fish all on 6lb Megabass Dragon Call Fluro Carbon with a mixture of Braids and running fluro straight through. I have done a seperate post on the Barra farm explaining the method I use when fishing there as it requires a very unique style to fish it successfully so check it out if you are thinking of heading up as it may be helpful.

Monday, day three arrived and it was time to give the Maroochy River a good pounding so we hit the water early at around 4am checking the pots at which time it was high tide and then trawling through until we could start pumping Yabbies on the bank, we picked up 7 average Flathead on the trawl but nothing overly exciting (all under 50cm).

Collecting Yabbies in Maroochy can be hard work and after a good hour and a half we were in my favorite Whiting spot and ended up picking up a couple of grunter, a golden Trevalley (Zane's first Golden), plenty of bream a couple of whiting including one at 28cm. Again all were on 6lb Megabass Dragon Call Fluro.

As the tide rose we were back on the trawl changing out leaders down to 6lb pound from 12 - 16lb we were using to trawl earlier hoping to entice a strike from some larger flathead. We worked a few spots I had a lot of success at previously getting as close to the banks as we could hoping to pickup any of the fish working their way up with the tide and we ended up landing 29 flathead as well as another grunter a couple of bream and a half decent silver trev (38cm). Sadly none of the flathead were over 50cm with many being undersized and about a dozen sitting in the 40-50cm range. Normally using the 6 pound we would have lost a few lures but luckily we managed not to loose a single one. The entire time we trawled we used either lucky craft or ecogear in the 40-50mm range I personally have found that if you go upto the larger 80-120mm lures in the Maroochy you can pull out some really nice sized fish and as you would expect you won't get a lot of the smaller fish. Zane's electric wasn't working so we just used his outboard to trawl and even with the 40 Yamaha running on the shallow banks we didn't have any trouble picking up fish but in saying that I am sure it contributed to us not hooking upto any larger fish. Also a word of caution for those who haven't fished light leaders for flathead some days it will work and you won't have fish taking the lures right down other days you will get bitten off 10 times in row so you do need to feel it out and decide wether the extra hookups are worth not just loosing the lures but also leaving flathead in an awkward position while the hooks rot out.

Monday evening/night, after so many smaller fish we were keen for something a little larger so we changed to live herring off my jetty and fished all the way through to 4am landing some ok Bream and getting done in by some solid fish that we had trouble stopping before pulling us around snags.

Tuesday morning, day four was here and we had intended to head back to Brisbane at the crack of dawn and be home in time to have a shower and head to work but the need to land the monster was too great so we decided to do one last two hour session drifting with livies along a rock wall past the famous "Cod Hole" and finally we picked up a solid estuary cod to finish out the trip on a high. We used 16lb Megabass Dragon Call fluro with size 1/0 Owner Gorilla hooks one going through the nose of the Herring and the other as a stinger through the tail. This will also keep your herring alive for a lot longer you just need to make sure the hook through the nose is first on the line and pulling all the weight so your bait swims properly.

After wearing the same the same set of two shirts and shorts over four days we were happy with the results and ended up keeping a handful of Flathead, the larger of the two whiting and the silver trevalley which went down beautifully with a few mates on tuesday night.

Cheers,

Michael.

[daveylad]

Nice cod, was it caught under the bridge area on the boat ramp side, or nearer to chambers Island?

Dave

[mdcotton]

Thanks mate,

It was on the boat ramp side about a third of the way along from the bridge to the boat ramp.

[rosstralia46]

great report mate sounds like a good few days

[fishguru5]

top report and great detail

thanks pat

[FishoDave]

that was a really great read mate, great report

looks like a great few days fishing

[waldo]

Well that has it all, some nice fish, good pics and an awesome report, and by the looks a on the faces a bloody good time, well done guys.

[Angus]

Nice cod mate!

4 posts in and 3 good reports.

Loving it!

Welcome to the site mate.

Angus

[francomas777]

very jealous i didnt end up coming up there nice work bro