queensland Beach fishing the Gold Coast over the long weekend

[cboy69]

I'm going to have a crack at the beaches along The Spit, Currumbin, Tallebudgera over the long weekend.

I can catch beachworms pretty well now, and I have 8 frames from the fish shop next to work so I should be able to catch all the worms we need.

If you can make it, I will probably pick your brains on how to identify structure in the beach. I have read heaps of great posts here, articles online, and watched youtube videos but even with fresh worms my success is very hit and miss, which I put down to being in the wrong place (my line keeps getting swept north despite trying to walk with the line)

PM or SMS 0412 099 999 would be great.

[jeff f]

what sort of sinkers are you using?

[cboy69]

I have been using single ball sinkers about the size of a 20c piece.

I have also tried paternosters on 30lb fluro with 2x whiting hooks and a star sinker on the end (30lb was nice and stiff and I had less tangles as the hooks stayed away from the straight section of line).

[jeff f]

there's your problem mate ball sinkers roll along the bottom with the current

get yourself some flat sided sinkers that slide and catch on the ripples in the sand that will slow the drag north or even stop it compleetly

you need "surf" sinkers,"coffin" or "pyramid" sinkers if you can find them and some "beach bar" sinkers for when it's really bad.

[waldo]

The surf can be pretty tough till you learn what to look for, and the gear you use can also complicate things.

A 20cent sized sinker is about a 10 ball, 30lb fluro, whiting hooks and worms will catch you a potential mix of whiting, bream and dart. The problem is it's a poor setup for all of those species. The 10 ball is for anchoring baits wide out chasing dart. 30lb fluro would be suitable for big greenbacks or jew. The bait is fine for the 3 mentioned.

Fishing heavy sweep for those 3 species isn't going to be a lot of fun at all. They all hang out in slightly different areas as well. I have notime at the moment but I'll try dig out something that will show a bit of what to look for a bit later on if I can.

[waldo]

Quickly grabbed a screen shot off google earth, its not great but might help a tad. These are actually a lot bigger gutters and further out banks than they really look but just to give you an idea.

Whiting like skinny quiet water and are most esily found on the runout. Fishing 2 to 3 kg line with lightly weighted worm baits will catch them if they are there.

Bream are often at the end of gutters waiting for easy meals washing off the banks. They will also wander along the back of the shore break so no need for long casts. The whiting gear will do for them.

Dart in small sizes usally sit in close. The bigger fish however are more usually out on the banks of deeper water. They like a bit of white water cover.

Assumming the pic was taken on the last hour or so of the runout I would fish for the species as marked during the day. That small wide bank being the first area I would cast to (probably wouldnt reach it in reality) chasing dart.

As the tide came in I would fish more for bream in the whinting area, fish for dart in the far western gutter and probably settle in there for the night waiting for tailor (pilchards or flesh baits).

[cboy69]

Quickly grabbed a screen shot off google earth, its not great but might help a tad. These are actually a lot bigger gutters and further out banks than they really look but just to give you an idea.

[attachment=49810]goldcoastsurf.jpg[/attachment]

Whiting like skinny quiet water and are most esily found on the runout. Fishing 2 to 3 kg line with lightly weighted worm baits will catch them if they are there.

Bream are often at the end of gutters waiting for easy meals washing off the banks. They will also wander along the back of the shore break so no need for long casts. The whiting gear will do for them.

Dart in small sizes usally sit in close. The bigger fish however are more usually out on the banks of deeper water. They like a bit of white water cover.

Assumming the pic was taken on the last hour or so of the runout I would fish for the species as marked during the day. That small wide bank being the first area I would cast to (probably wouldnt reach it in reality) chasing dart.

As the tide came in I would fish more for bream in the whinting area, fish for dart in the far western gutter and probably settle in there for the night waiting for tailor (pilchards or flesh baits).

So you start fishing in the low tide? I have been trying to fish the 2hrs prior to high.

Generally I cast as far as I can, which according to the multi-coloured braid is about 50M+

Will the large whiting be close in also? I have caught a few undersized models whilst retrieving my line.

Thanks for the tips

[cboy69]

there's your problem mate ball sinkers roll along the bottom with the current

get yourself some flat sided sinkers that slide and catch on the ripples in the sand that will slow the drag north or even stop it compleetly

you need "surf" sinkers,"coffin" or "pyramid" sinkers if you can find them and some "beach bar" sinkers for when it's really bad.

I have some surf sinker but which didn't work as they were probably too small. They were flat disc's that looked like a M&M's, flat donut with spikes on both sides, and long torpedo looking sinker with 4 bendable wires at the end. I will go and try to upsize them at the tackle store and have another shot.

Thanks for the help

[Damien2Rad]

With whiting I fish the bottom of the tide, no need to cast more than 10m most of the time. Cast out, retrieve slowly, then try again. Start at one end of the gutter and walk to the other. If you don't catch a whiting, there is probably none there.

Do you have polarised sunglasses?

[cboy69]

With whiting I fish the bottom of the tide, no need to cast more than 10m most of the time. Cast out, retrieve slowly, then try again. Start at one end of the gutter and walk to the other. If you don't catch a whiting, there is probably none there.

Do you have polarised sunglasses?

I don't have fishing sunnies but wear maui jim polarised glasses. Would I be able to see the whiting in the water?

I thought low tide wasn't productive for fishing and use that time for worming.

I'll give this a go also. Are the whiting keepers? I don't eat them as I find the bones a hassle. But I like to keep the fiancee's mum happy with the occasional fish

Do you have a preference with rigs? I mostly do running ball sinkers with about 40cm of fluoro then a baitholder long shanked hook. However I have recently experimented with paternosters.

Thanks for the info

Chayya

[waldo]

This is going to go around in circles because you are responding to a range of suggestions for a range of targets. What is your exact setup eg rod and reel. What are you really wanting to catch.

[cboy69]

This is going to go around in circles because you are responding to a range of suggestions for a range of targets. What is your exact setup eg rod and reel. What are you really wanting to catch.

I would agreee defining my target is good start.

I think I'd like to target Dart first.

My setup is a 11' Penn slammer graphite rod paired with a Daiwa Windcast X5500 spooled with 20lb braid on one spool and 20lb mono on the spare spool.

I have a license to fish in NSW also if that's a better place to practice.

I have fished the Spit quite a bit parking next to the roller coaster and walking straight across to the beach. quite hit and miss, and the sweep is so strong my line is going sideways within minnutes.

I find spotting the gutters there to be quite challenging. the worms are plentiful but quite thin though.

I don't mind putting in the hours and being on the beach at dawn or into the evening.

Thanks very much for you assistance, I'll taking all the info and reporting back asap.

[cboy69]

Glad to report I had some success on the weekend. I went out twice on Sunday 6-11am and Monday 6am-6:30pm

First day we started at currumbin midway between elephant rock and Kings life saving club using prawns and I got one legal dart and undersized models, so we started to do some worming as we fished and got enough to start fishing with worms. in the end the total was 3 legal dart. My friend didn't get any nibbles as he didn't change to a heavy sinker until the end. We suspect the size 5 surf sinker allowed me to cast further to where the dart were hiding.

Second day I went out on my own at Currumbin and realised 30mins into the drive I left my worms in my waist bucket from the previous day at home in the fridge. So I started worming straight away, The worms south of the life saving club were incredibly timid and I lost about 20mins to get about 4 worms. I started fishing beside the life saving club on the northern side (where they had marked out the flagged swimming areas) as I thought this would be slow moving water and maybe a deeper section. I only managed a baby sting ray, which swallowed the hook and was cut free.

By 9am I figured the fishing was pretty shut down so I went into the creek to cast lures and wait for low tide and serious worming. I tried standing on the sandbank in the creek casting sideways along the sand bank drop off with a crackJack and a squidgy wriggler. Nothing took it. I know there were Flatties there as I saw 2 swim away whilst walking out. I will have to try and find a flatty hard body for next time.

With low tide in about 3hrs I decided to head back to worming. On a previous trip I found the worms south of the surf club to be a decent size but timid, this was still true. It was hard work to fill a 600ml bottle with worms. I did this for a few hours and nice guy called Paul came along and suggested go a little more south past a rocky point (with a concrete drain) as the waves were more forgiving for worming and he was absolutely right. The worms were also far less timid. So I started having more success and pulled some slimeys as long as my legs. Eventually I almost filled my bottle and wanted to get rid of some (smaller models and to prevent over crowding in the bottle) so I counted out 20 of the biggest and threw back the remainders.

Paul was still fishing so I went over for a chin wag and fish, he explained to me the structures and water/fish movement over the structures. He already had a big Luderick and I fished with him. He suggested circle hooks which suprised me as I actually like cicle hooks for flesh bait but wasn't certain how effective they would be with worms. He swore by them and I changed my rig from that has been suggested from everyone on AFO to include a circle and it was just as effective and no gut hooking like the previous day. At the end of the gutter the fish started to come in with the tide and I managed 1 forearm length whiting and 2 big dart.

Best of all I applied what I learnt, learnt even more and met a new fishing buddy as we exchanged numbers.

Thanks to all for their suggestions

[rosstralia46]

awesome stuff mate congrats always good to see someone applying what they have been told and getting results well done

[max pwr]

Nice report cboy

[Homer4duff]

Great to hear you had success cboy69. Sounds like u are slowly getting the hang of it.

[zan0_15]

6am till 630 pm :ohmy: thats a hell of a beach session mate good on ya

great to see u got some fish for ur efforts, look forward to reading more beach fishing reports from ya.

[Damien2Rad]

Good to hear mate. I love beach fishing, if I've ever got the time we'll go for a fish on the beach some where. You can catch the worms as that is something I still struggle with after all these years (I find I really start to get the hang of it after about 6 beers though).

Hope to hear more reports mate.

[cboy69]

Thanks for the positive comments. Yep was a hell of a session, I have the tan lines as evidence now

I'm gonna have another go tomorrow as it's my day off and just like to be out there. Hopefully I have something to report back tomorrow night.

Cheers

Chayya

[Homer4duff]

How did u go this time?

[cboy69]

Sorry for the late report. I got back late last night and had work this morning.

I started a little later on Wednesday morning as I didn't prepare as well the night before. However I did remember everything this time and started fishing in front of the Tugun Surf Life Saving Club at 6am. I walked along the beach north towards the small rock wall. in 2 hours I got 2 dart and lost one as I was fumbling my Subway breakyroll whilst reeling in the fish. The fish stopped biting so I put on the 40gm Spanyid and tossed it about with no success, I saw another guy on the beach doing the same with no luck either.

called it quits about 8am as I was getting frustrated with my frozen preserved worms being a little limp and difficult to thread on the hooks, plus the fish had gone.

For the next few hours I travelled about the local k-mart and Big-W looking for a velcro waist belt for my bait bucket but couldn't find any. Got some Jarvis walker surf sinkers on sale at k-mart for $1.50 per pack. They had quite a few on sale and if you live local and surf fish I would check it out. Also I picked up a roll of 20lb vanish flurocarbon.

I went back to worming after lunch and wormed for a while. It was actually quite hard worming. I don't know if it's because I was using 2x dart frames, or the conditions for the day were bad. The weather was beautiful, sunny and little wind though.

After a while I realised I only had about 1hour of sunlight remaining and quickly switched over to fishing.

So I rigged up as follows. Reel -> 20lb Unitika braid mainline -> 2 rod lengths of fluorocarbon with size 5 smarties shaped surf sinker -> black barrel swivel -> approx 50cm 20lb fluro -> Mustad 3/0 circle hook -> entire beach worm bunched/looped.

Very soon after the first cast I got a big strike with very little nibbles and the fish went pretty hard. however I just cranked as hard and fast as I could to maintatin tension as it would often run towards the beach. After some furious reeling I landed a 34cm bream to the fork. this was repeated with 2 more bream 29cm to the fork then 2 big dart.

I packed it up about 7pm once the fish went quiet. So the tally for 13hrs of worming and fishing, minus a few hours for shopping and lunch can be seen in the pic

If anyone is gonna beach fish anytime soon, there is a gutter from the Tugun surf Life saving club running north until the first rock wall.

Any advice on how to chase Jew fish or use a metal slug would be very much appreciated.

Or even suggestions on how to use the downtime between High to low tide/ dawn to dusk. There must be some other style of fishing I can do. beach or nearby estuary is fine.

Thanks for reading

Chayya

[waldo]

Jew on the coast are probably best left on the back burner for a while as there is a LOT of time and water between them. Fishing whole worms as you are doing might snare you one while chasing other fish if you are very lucky. Winter tailor numbers on the other hand will start to increase over the next few months.

Your metals are mainly for chasing day time tailor although the odd dart will take them, especially if there is a bit of bait around. Dart and tailor often hang out in similar water so that type of gutter is a good place to start.

I throw metals when I have either a specific reason or I'm speculating,

Specific

I see a bait ball with fish working them, this is prime time but doesn't happen a lot.

While scanning the waves I see a spray of baitfish clear the water.

I get a bite off which is almost certainly tailor. Be quick and pepper the area.

Speculating

Walk the beach throwing a few casts into each suitable gutter. Deeper water with some white water cover is a nice area to focus on. Around the rocks eg currumbin and a few others but be careful if there is much swell of any kind.

Vary your retrieves as often the fish can be there but will only react to certain retrieves. Drop to the bottom start slow then accelerate. Cast then close the reel just before the lure hits the water and rip it in skimming over the surface. Take note of the areas where you get hits and always try to give your lure as much time as you can in those areas.

40gm is great general size, 20gm works well on lighter rods (yours is probably too heavy) and 60gm can be a handy for a bit more distance if you are falling short.

[cboy69]

Thanks very much Waldo. That's great info.

[Homer4duff]

Nice mixed bag cboy. That effort you are putting in is really paying off.