queensland Borumba Dam, No Photos.

[Luvit]

My bother came up to escape the Victorian weather Friday last week. Without a boat we had no plans so last minute we threw a couple of yaks on the roof and headed to Borumba Dam for a few days of camping.

We called into the tackle store there and spoke with the owner Graham and he said the bass were schooled up in the main basin and to just sound them up and jig with blades, ice jigs, spinner baits etc.

I bought a new net and we both bought 2 silver twisty slug type lures for the information he offered.

The only problem was I don't have a sounders in the yaks and that was going to make things tough. The basin is a big area and so our plan was to watch the boats that had sounders and strategically get blown by the wind some where near them hoping we could find the edge of a school. We only saw a few fish caught and we were speaking to one fellows who said he was doing alright on tail spinners slowly jigged off the bottom once he located a school. I didn't have any tail spinners so we opted to use the smallest blades I had which were Bushy's "Stiffy" Blades. They are a good lure but we had no hits on them. We had to work these things out, so I spoke with 4 other anglers trying to gather information on what was working. 

I played the sympathy card saying we had caught nothing, which was true and like most fisherman they were happy to offer tips.

The next morning we got up early and the fog was very thick and I was not keen on doing the paddle in it with lots of boat going out and no light on the yaks. We opted to go and have some breakfast in town washed down with a hot coffee before dropping the yaks in the Yabba creek for a explore. There was nothing in the creek as we suspected but, it was a nice morning. Everyone left Sunday night and with a rising barometer expected on Monday our hopes were high. Early morning again and paddled about 1-2km up the dam to a yellow marker that people had said the bass were at on Saturday. My brother headed off in search of a Toga on surface Jitter bug and I tried for the bass.

 The blades had not been working so I dropped down to the most subtle presentation I could, being a small paddle tail. 3rd cast into it, I got a bump and then a hook up. A nice health 30+ bass. No photos in the yak sorry.

I had a few more bumps but the wind started to get up which made it very hard to get the lightly weighted SP down 15m as the yak drifted. 

A boat motored past us and stopped quickly. Obviously he saw a good show of fish and dropped the electric motor in and first cast he got a bass. While he was releasing his first fish, his lure was dangling over the side of the boat and in the distance I saw a silver flash. That gave me the idea to try the twisty silver slice we had bought at the shop. He left a short while latter so I headed in the direction where he was hoping there was still some bass there. With the new lure dropped to the bottom and slowly lifted and re-dropped, bang I was on again and landed a good 40+ bass.  I called my brother who started paddling back towards me and by the time he got to me I had another one on. I gave him my rod and I re rigged his and quickly he had nice 50+ bass in the yak. 

We had finally cracked the code as the wind slowly increased making it harder and harder. Together we landed 13 fish in a short time before the white caps send us packing. I lost a few and had many other bumps.

We could nearly surf the south wind waves by the time we hit the ramp.

So rewarding catching fish after catching nothing the 2 mornings earlier.

We left yesterday morning and I dropped bro off at the Airport to fly home.

It was great to catch up with him again and share some drinks and stories around the camp fire for a few days.

[ellicat]

You could have paddled upwind then cast downwind to give your lure a chance to drop.

[Luvit]

5 hours ago, ellicat said:

You could have paddled upwind then cast downwind to give your lure a chance to drop.

That’s what we did. But once you past the vertical and drifted past we did not get as many bites with the line on the angle. Vertical and all bites on the drop. 

[kmcrosby78]

Nice one Wayne, good to hear your persistence paid off and you got some nice fish in the end. If you ever want to borrow my yak (Prowler 13) just sing out - it's got a sounder (although now you've reminded me it played up when we were at Noosa at Easter and I've forgotten to fix it - another job for the list .... ).

[Luvit]

10 hours ago, kmcrosby78 said:

Nice one Wayne, good to hear your persistence paid off and you got some nice fish in the end. If you ever want to borrow my yak (Prowler 13) just sing out - it's got a sounder (although now you've reminded me it played up when we were at Noosa at Easter and I've forgotten to fix it - another job for the list .... ).

Thanks for the offer.

This trip was a impromptu trip and my brother is a little strange. He is not obsessed with fishing like my youngest bro & I. So if we had caught nothing he would have been happy enough to have just had a paddle. 

 

[Luke Landrunner]

Nice get away Wayne. 

You could have stopped by and picked up the hobie = sounder and pedal power.

I have yet to have a bass session out there like that so thanks for the tips.

[Luvit]

Thanks.

There were a lot of Hobbies up there. A club called Yak Hunters had a gathering and they nearly all had Hobbies.

The small Freak kayaks I have are more suited to the skinny water I like to fish. On a dam its a fair effort to paddle long distances with them.

Also trying to jig and then paddle one handed into the wind to hold position was not as fun as you would expect.  

[Drop Bear]

Nice one mate. Sounds like a great weekend. Thanks for the report.