queensland The story so far

[fenelious]

Hey guys, I've had a long lay off from BFO (sorry, now called AFO). I've still been fishing, (although not as much due to more commitments with the kids) but I just haven't been getting on the net much.

It's been over a year since I've posted any reports.. In that time I've had a few real good sessions and a lot of ordinary ones!

I went on a family holiday to New Zealand in Feb/Mar last year and got the chance to sneak away to do a bit of trout luring, and caught a nice handful of smallish Brown Trout over a few enjoyable sessions.

This was the best of them, and my new Trout PB:

In April I got my PB Saratoga in the Pine Rivers catchment area 68cm:

My favorite trip in recent history was my winter Coddessy to the NSW New England gorge country. I'll show you a few photos of this one cos it was awesome:

First look at the river after a 3hr hike in. Got here late afternoon day 1. No time to fish much, just long enough to snag a lure after 3 casts, and go for a nude swim to get it back, in 9.8 degree C water. Bear Grylls was right - the shock literally takes your breath out of your lungs when you immerse in water that cold! Made camp just behind this shot.

Wild pig diggings everywhere, all along the river. Didn't lay eyes on any though, but saw quite a few wild goats.

After a mild 6 degree night, I woke up on day 2 to see the river in flood after a couple of days steady rain upstream. Didn't bode well for good fishing But at least I didn't get rained on while I was there

Same location as the last shot, but looking back downstream.

After a hit and a follow, the reward finally came with this 49cm Murray Cod, just before midday day 2.

I saw another decent Cod hit my spinnerbait right near the bank without hooking up, but a little further along I landed this 56cm model.

Got 1 more hit after this one, but this was the 3rd and final fish landed for day 2 - 54cm.

This gorge marked my turn around point. Headed back downstream the other way from here on.

After a bearable 2 degree night in a good quality fart sack, mid morning on day 3 came this awesome 61cm Cod. My new PB.

Here's the same fish up on the bank. Fat and healthy. Life's good.

Only 10 metres down from the last fish was this 52cm fella, who almost got away before I could photograph and measure him!

And later on this 56cm one.

Great view as I hike downstream.

Dusk closing in with this 50cm little guy. The next half hour was frustrating with two 50-60cm fish being hooked and lost right at the bank side, but all in all a great day.

The temp only dropped to 6 degrees under the trees on the third night. Morning on day 4 - no fishing, just a relaxed brekky then made the long hike back to the vehicle.

My other notable trip of last year was in October to the Manning River in NSW. Me and a good mate canoed for 3 days and 2 nights, and caught a total of 38 Bass, 1 Mullet and 1 Herring on lure. Most of the Bass were quite small - of the 38 the top 4 fish were 50cm, 49cm, 44cm, and 40cm. Here's a look:

My new wild river PB; 50cm

Drew's 49cm fish, and a wild river PB for him too.

Since then it's been a pretty quiet fishing summer for me. I did get my impoundment Bass PB, a 51.5cm fish in the Brisbane River between the dam wall and the Mt Crosby weir a couple months ago, but overall the fishing hasn't seemed to have been as good as in previous years Summers. Maybe it's the lack of rain. I had an unsuccessful Cod session near Canberra over XMas, and an unsuccessful Trout session near Walcha NSW in the New Year, and quite a few donuts and low scores around the Pine Rivers dams area, and Brissy area.

Does anyone else feel this summer has been less fishy than the previous few?

Anyway, here's my big Bass from the Bris River:

Thanks for reading, I'll put up a more recent report again soon.

- Steve.

[Luvit]

The periods between reports is forgiven when you post great pictures.

Great report and yes the fresh has been suffering a little without the rain so concentrating more on the salt.

Still good fishing to be had.

cheers

Wayne

[Angus]

Awesome mate! Got me pumped actually for some more New south Wales exploring!

[kmcrosby78]

Great combo report there mate - that cod fishing looks awesome. I'm heading to Sundown NP on Sunday for 4 days with the wife and 2 and a bit year old - taking a canoe so will be sneaking a couple of sneaky sessions in. Have to go through my lures (NQ barra style) to see which ones will be suitable - looking at yours I'm assuming any of the shorter fatter ones will be worth a crack. Think most of them dive to 2.5-3m. Don't want to go out and buy lures (apart from maybe one or two on the way at a local store) so will make do. Think I have one spinner bait too but need to check how heavy duty it is.

And yes I'll be going in after my lures too - will be nice and fresh!!!

[Samrenny]

Wow is all can say. Amazing looking country and some awesome fish, well done mate, very jealous. Plenty of cod!

[ryanyoung]

Top report mate, great read and pics.

Ryan.

[fenelious]

Great combo report there mate - that cod fishing looks awesome. I'm heading to Sundown NP on Sunday for 4 days with the wife and 2 and a bit year old - taking a canoe so will be sneaking a couple of sneaky sessions in. Have to go through my lures (NQ barra style) to see which ones will be suitable - looking at yours I'm assuming any of the shorter fatter ones will be worth a crack. Think most of them dive to 2.5-3m. Don't want to go out and buy lures (apart from maybe one or two on the way at a local store) so will make do. Think I have one spinner bait too but need to check how heavy duty it is.

And yes I'll be going in after my lures too - will be nice and fresh!!!

Yeah you don't need too many lures in the gorge country. It's mostly rocky so you don't really lose them on snags. Sometimes they can get wedged in a crevice but if you're willing to get wet they're usually easy to free.

For Cod the Barra type lures aren't really ideal, although I'm sure they would still work. For bibbed hards you want something with a fairly chunky profile with a wide heavy vibration (as opposed to a fast narrow tight shimmying action). Don't worry too much if the rated depth is much deeper than the water you're working - it's good to bounce them off the bottom and allow the lure to float up when it hits something. I like stuff by Oar-Gee, Stumpjumper, and Mudeye ('Mudeye Happy' in these photos), but there are obviously heaps more good Cod lures, they're just the ones I have used that I like. I find floating bibbed hards to be the most snag resistant of all Cod lure types.

You'll want a good spinnerbait too. I like double colorado blade ones cos they vibrate more. You could probably get away with a larger Bass type SB at Sundown cos the Cod won't be massive, but it'd be worth your while to maybe just buy one Cod sized one. I'm using the Bassman 'Codman' at the moment (see photos), but again I don't think it's necessarily any better than many others. I actually prefer SBs with an enclosed twisted tow point - I find them stronger and less prone to tangling around the line.

The other type that I find works well on Cod is the bibless vibe. One of these in the 70+mm size would serve you well.

So yeah I reckon all you really need is one shallow bibbed hard, one deep bibbed hard, a SB, and a bibless vibe. If you have confidence in the ones you have that's all you need for a short trip.

Good luck at Sundown. I've been there a couple of times with medium success. Work on getting a Cod a day as a starting goal and you should come home happy :-)

-Steve

[kmcrosby78]

Thanks for the detailed and generous reply Steve, much appreciated. A few of the 'barra' lures I have are fatter (a bit like stump jumpers) so I'll take a few like that and top up with ones like you suggested. One a day for me would be great but even just to catch one regardless of size would be satisfying. Will let you know how I go.

[kmcrosby78]

Quick question while I'm at it - how much do you generally need to pepper an area or is it just a couple of casts and then move on to the next spot? Most of my sessions will probably be in the middle of the day when they young fella has a sleep so will be trying to maximise my sessions.

[fenelious]

Quick question while I'm at it - how much do you generally need to pepper an area or is it just a couple of casts and then move on to the next spot? Most of my sessions will probably be in the middle of the day when they young fella has a sleep so will be trying to maximise my sessions.

Most of the time the cod will hit your lure the first time it goes in his 'zone', but sometimes that zone is very small and you have to put it exactly where he wants it. This is probably more the case in the middle of the day when he's less active. So unless you're very confident where the fish is, what happens is that you pepper the fishy looking spot to make sure you covered every part of it, not because he might not want it the first time but because you're making sure you've put it in front of his nose if he's there. The more accurate you are the less casts you need at each spot.

They do say that sometimes you need to 'annoy' a cod into taking your lure by casting to him multiple times, but in my limited experience I've found they almost always hit the first ACCURATE cast.

The other thing is they sometimes will only follow your lure without striking, but there's not much you can do about that other than cast at him again a couple more times and then try a different lure in the same spot. The different lure approach is your best bet, but I've found that once he follows without striking he's usually gooorrrrn :pinch: The one time this has worked for me was when I got a swirl on a surface lure, and then I chucked out a spinnerbait and got him. Still, if you do get a follow or two the strike will never be far away because it means the fish are around and active.

Hope this helps

-Steve.

[Angus]

Where did you camp/stay on the Manning?

[fenelious]

Where did you camp/stay on the Manning?

We just rolled out our beds on a gravely river bank, making sure not to leave any sign or go into anyone's paddock.

[fenelious]

Thanks for the detailed and generous reply Steve, much appreciated. A few of the 'barra' lures I have are fatter (a bit like stump jumpers) so I'll take a few like that and top up with ones like you suggested. One a day for me would be great but even just to catch one regardless of size would be satisfying. Will let you know how I go.

Did you get to Sundown NP KM?

[kmcrosby78]

Thanks for the detailed and generous reply Steve, much appreciated. A few of the 'barra' lures I have are fatter (a bit like stump jumpers) so I'll take a few like that and top up with ones like you suggested. One a day for me would be great but even just to catch one regardless of size would be satisfying. Will let you know how I go.

Did you get to Sundown NP KM?

Was very dry mate, was only a small waterhole (about 50m long and 5-10m wide) a bit to the right of the Broadwater campsite. I chucked a lure from the steep rocky side the day after we arrived and got a decent hit but no hookup so got a bit excited that one or two may be in there. The next day I noticed quite a few reasonable sized fish swimming around - was a bit hard to identify them with the glare and murky-ish water however the bigger ones seemed to have a red tinge and I suspected carp (or possibly redfin but I don't know much/anything about them). Anyway, long story shorter I ended up getting about a 55cm and 68 cm (on my sons tiny red kids rod .....) carp by berleying them with bread (the wind blew the bread back to the base of the rocks that dropped steeply into the water and every few minutes the big head of a carp would come up and seem like it was looking at you) and catching them with a float and small hook and bait.

Tried the permanent waterhole (solid 20-25min walk) which was about 500m long - was my only early-ish start. Couldn't set an alarm cause it would wake my young fella in the tent so think I left camp about 6am and missus wanted me back at 8:30am (think I stretched it til 9am ...). Chucked a cicada imitation around for no reward - was a cool experience having the whole place to myself, slight fog lifting off the water and just watching the lure and line land on the water and seeing the ripple spread. Obviously I would have liked the serenity to be smashed by a massive BOOF sound though!! Walked most of the way up it as I wanted to see if there were any more steep banks - as it turned out the best looking bank was the first one I came to but I had already pushed it timewise so didn't have time to get back and flick a deep diver along the bank. Next time!!!!

Thanks again for all the advice. Oh we also took the canoe to Glenlyon Dam for a bit of a paddle - towed a lure and just hugged the bank until the missus started getting a sore arm from the drag the lure was creating!!!!!

[fenelious]

Bummer, better luck next time mate. Probably just need to cover a bit more water and get a few more casts in. They can be a bit of a 1000-cast-a-fish at times!

-Steve.

[kmcrosby78]

Spot on mate. As soon as I realised the area we were camping was dry I knew the odds were against me - I hadn't planned to do a heap of fishing over the 4 days but thought if I could park the canoe in front of camp and head off for a 2 hour paddle each day while the young fella slept I would stand a decent chance - will have to go back after some rain!!