queensland Elimbah Creek - 2.1.16

[curranboy99]

Hello All, another report but this time from Elimbah Creek near Meldale.

I left home at 7.30ish to stop in at Sandgate Bait & Tackle and buy a couple packs of live-bloodworms (nb1 whiting bait) but got up to Meldale at about 8.30am. There was about 1knot wind from the southeast, the water was clear and blue (much nicer than cabbage tree creek), and I was fishing the start of the rising tide to try an catch a 35cm - 40cm whiting.

The setup I was using was a Shimano Sonic Pro 7'0 2kg - 4kg spin rod with a shimano sieena 1000 loaded with 3lb fireline. And the rig I was using was a sz2 ball sinker running onto a sz12 brass swivel then about 1.5m of 4lb fluoro leader (trying something longer) and a gammie worm sz4 hook. My first cast landing about 30m from the bank onto a sand bank and straight away I felt a tap, tap, tap then the rod loaded up under the fishes weight (which wasn't much) and I started reeling in some "dead weight" and before I knew it I had a micro-sized flathead on the bank which was pushing 20cm but it was my first flathead on bait! I handled it with a bit of cut cotton supporting the belly and got spiked by the fish still which drew blood, i got back to the water instantly and it had swimmed off fast.  

(first flattie on bait )

I keep fishing with the sand flies after a good start but would have preferred a 30cm whiting over the tiny flathead . And as it got to around 10.00am/10.30am I had caught around a dozen whiting from 19cm - 23cm (didn't keep the 23ers as I prefer to keep fish a couple centimetres above legal size). Then I got a sand whiting which was the biggest whiting of the day 23.5cm!! That had got hooked deep in the mouth and was spewing blood from the gills and as I swam it to release it didn't kick away except it just floated so I decided to keep it as it was 23.5cm (just legal and it was dead when it got released). I filleted the fish with my new fillet kit at the waters edge and got a good amount of meat return from the smaller fillets (compared to a 27cm - 30cm+ fish). After that I keep fishing for another hour and pulled another 6 or so fish with a couple dropped fish. So all up 17 - 19 sand whiting, 1 flathead, and heaps of sand flies that caught me, all in a few hours at a new spot/system.     

(one of the many just-under sand whiting)

 

[Albinus]

You'll have great fun on that light gear. Bloodworms were always awesome bait as a kid in my case. Thanks for the report.

[Oggy174]

Sounds like a pretty good morning out, suck that so many sand flies were out but you caught some good fish which makes it all worth while 

[curranboy99]

29 minutes ago, Albinus said:

You'll have great fun on that light gear. Bloodworms were always awesome bait as a kid in my case. Thanks for the report.

Thanks Albinus. That gear is always fun on pretty much any size fish unless you get stingray which takes forever to land and when it is landed you can't do anything with them and bloodworms are always a first choice bait for whiting, they are just simply the best.

12 minutes ago, Oggy174 said:

Sounds like a pretty good morning out, suck that so many sand flies were out but you caught some good fish which makes it all worth while 

Thanks Oggy. It was a good morning out considering it was my first session in that system and had no idea how to fish there. The sand flies were a pain you could see hundreds in the sand there as well as some yabbie crab hybrids I've never seen before which I thought I was having hallucinations at first until I had a closer look.  

[Albinus]

41 minutes ago, curranboy99 said:

That gear is always fun on pretty much any size fish unless you get stingray which takes forever to land and when it is landed you can't do anything with them

Strange as it may seem, my mother is obsessed with stingray. I used to catch at least one a week as a teenager. She claims it tastes like a cross between mud and sand crab. Need to be skinned IIRC.

[samsteele115]

Nice place to fish isn't it. Try wading the flats there too, picked up a couple of decent flathead in there. 

[curranboy99]

1 hour ago, Albinus said:

Strange as it may seem, my mother is obsessed with stingray. I used to catch at least one a week as a teenager. She claims it tastes like a cross between mud and sand crab. Need to be skinned IIRC.

Wow never would have thought they would taste nice. Thanks for that info

28 minutes ago, samsteele115 said:

Nice place to fish isn't it. Try wading the flats there too, picked up a couple of decent flathead in there. 

It is a very nice place up there, beats Redcliffe for dead. The waters are beautiful up there so if I head up there again which I will, i'll bring some plastics with me and give it go wading for flathead as well as trying to get one of those whopper whiting which I know are in that creek somewhere