Brisbane River Session #163 and #164

[AUS-BNE-FISHO]

Hi all

My school holidays started yesterday, so I decided to start them the right way by going fishing. In the prior weeks, I had been busy with school, but managed one (pretty crappy) session at my local park. 

The session at the park started off on a Friday arvo. I brought some dead bait along and first deployed lines, and then @TheCharliefisho arrived. I got to cast netting to try and catch some livies, but I couldn't manage anything good. Early on I think I got one bite on my heavy rod but for the next while it was dead. I eventually threw my net on top of four or five tilapias, and then another large one fell out in the following casts. Although it brought some excitement, it definitely wasn't welcome because it still means they are swimming around in the river. I eventually caught a couple of anchovies and bony bream, so we sat back and waited for a line to go off. Despite many mozzies, staying into dark, and a couple snags, we didn't end up catching anything. "Oh well", I thought - at least I went fishing!

Tillies

Stats of Trip:

Tide: 2:40PM, 1.9M, High, 8:57PM, .6M, Low

Moon Phase: 50%, Decreasing

Bait Caught: Bonies, Anchovies, Glassies

Bait Used: Live and dead bonies, and anchovies

Fish Caught: -

Tackle Used: 8, 15, 30 pound braid mainlines. Abu Garcia Veritas 4.0 on Diawa Tierra 2500. Shimano Stradic 3000 on Shimano Raider. Shimano Sedona 6000 on Abu Garcia Nexus. Size 2 and 6 ball sinkers, 4/o circle/suicide hooks. 

Humidity: 84%

Air Pressure: 1011

Overall Success Rate: 20%

The next session was a lot more exciting, and happened yesterday. I started the day off collecting livies for about an hour and a half, which mainly consisted of mullet and small silver biddies. I tried fishing briefly as well but did not have any success. After that, we determined we had enough bait to get started. The first fish of the day was a legal sized squire caught by Andrew - things were looking good. Surprisingly, it was not on a livie but instead a pilchard. 

I started having some more luck in the cast net, and I got about 30 herring for bait in quick succession. Unfortunately for us, this is when we started pulling in toadfish after toadfish. They would all hit the bait/fight like an alright fish, but they were very disappointing to see. We did have the jetty all to ourselves though, which was good. It was a nice day, and, as it had not started to warm up, it was a good temperature. 

As the tide started to run a bit harder, the fishing went quiet and our baits were consistently pickered. The tide was very slow compared to what it usually is, and I decided to experiment with a paternoster rig. I was dropping one line (light rod) straight down with a 6 ball sinker, and the other, with a size 4 star sinker, was being casted out into the middle of the river. Eventually, after some more toadfish and picker attacks, Andrew was on to another squire - which went undersize. After that, it was quiet again for another 45 minutes or so before he caught another legal squire which was released. At this point, I had still caught nothing - my most significant catch might have been a cast net full of decent sized scat. 

The tide was half way through the rise when things went really quiet, and basically any livie was not getting a touch. In fact, the only thing that seemed to be catching fish at that point was pilchards, and even then they were only getting pickered to bits. It was at this point (a bit before 2) that we were all considering packing it in, as it looked like the bites had stopped. I did managed to land one sea toad in this period, and got mysteriously busted off by something which took my whole hook, dropper, and sinker as soon as it bit my herring. 

At about 2, I switched my pilchard back to a live herring on my dropper rig and fired it out into the middle of the river. I went back to sit down but it didn't take long before the end of my 8 foot rod was bouncing around and line was being yanked off my baitrunner. I set the hook and got the line tight, and immediately felt a lot of strong headshakes. I was almost adamant my luck had not changed and I was on a toadfish, but the fish was taking a couple of snappy runs so I was eager to see it anyways. Initial thoughts were a slightly larger squire, but we were pleased to see a nice and fat grunter on the end of my line! After a couple more dives and a struggle landing it, the fish was eventually gaffed and lifted onto the jetty. Woohoo!

60CM of Brisbane River Grunter

Following that, the fishing started to go crazy! Andrew had a fish on both of his lines at one point, and landed a legal squire after a nice tussle, and after I redeployed my bait with another live herring it didn't take long before I had a 39cm squire on the jetty as well. I was pretty happy with that, as it was my first from the Brisbane River. Michael then hooked up as well, but it was unfortunately just another toad. To finish the hot bite period off, Andrew pulled in a 35cm bream, which was a random but nice catch as well. It is worth saying this all happened in the space of twenty minutes, after hours of no action. 

Squire

Anyways, after the fish stopped biting so much (high tide change), Andrew headed off. We all managed to catch ourselves some keepers, but unfortunately for one other fella fishing on the jetty there seemed to be no more biting. Michael finished the day with a stingray, which seemed like it could be a thready at first due to the runs it was taking. I was happy with my PB grunter as I left the jetty, and I had some tonight - it's a delicious fish! 

Thanks for reading, here are the trip stats:

Stats of Trip:

Bait Caught: Mullet, herring, silver biddies, glassies, ponyfish

Tide: 8:00AM, .7M, Low, 2:45PM, 2.1M, High, 9:30PM, 1.0M, Low

Moon Phase: About 40%/Third Quarter, so not much run

Bait Used: Herring, silver biddies, glassies, mullet, pilchards

Fish Caught: Multiple toadfish, 5 * squire between us all, 1 grunter

Tackle Used: 8 pound braid mainline, 20 pound fluoro leader, Abu Garcia Veritas 4.o, Diawa Tierra 2500, Shimano Aero Baitrunner, 8 foot Jarvis Walker cheapy, J-braid 30 pound and 30 pound fluoro leader. Size 4/o suicide and 6/o circle hooks, six ball and 4 star sinker. Large barrel swivels. 

Air Pressure: 1006 dropping to 1002

Humidity: 89% in the morning, dropped to 47% in the arvo

Air Temperature: 21 degrees in the morning, increasing to high 20's/30 degrees

Overall Success Rate: 80% - good session

Hope you enjoyed the report,

Cheers Hamish

[ellicat]

That's a mammoth barred grunter for the river, Hamish. Excellent work. It makes your squire look undersized. haha

A slow day, but plenty of action in that short bite period will see you back for more before the holidays are over I'm guessing ??

[GregOug]

Well done Hamish!

[AUS-BNE-FISHO]

8 hours ago, ellicat said:

That's a mammoth barred grunter for the river, Hamish. Excellent work. It makes your squire look undersized. haha

A slow day, but plenty of action in that short bite period will see you back for more before the holidays are over I'm guessing ??

Thanks Brian, It definitely dwarfs the squire.

I’ll definitely be going back here throughout the holidays and also will be trying a couple of new spots as well.

6 hours ago, GregOug said:

Well done Hamish!

Thanks Greg.

[Drop Bear]

Nice work mate. that is a prize bag from the river mate. Well done. 

Enjoy some delicious dinners. 

[Old Scaley]

That is a great grunter, @AUS-BNE-FISHO. Sounds like a really good day. Good to see the squire are around in that part of the river again. Fingers crossed we don’t have any major flooding this year.

[Hweebe]

11 hours ago, AUS-BNE-FISHO said:

I did managed to land one sea toad in this period, and got mysteriously busted off by something which took my whole hook, dropper, and sinker as soon as it bit my herring. 

I reckon the sea toad had another go at your rig. Some sharp teeth on the larger specimens

[benno573]

nice work mate, that's a great session.

[Neil Stratford]

Nice work , those big grunter go hard don’t they!

regards

neil

[AUS-BNE-FISHO]

11 hours ago, Drop Bear said:

Nice work mate. that is a prize bag from the river mate. Well done. 

Enjoy some delicious dinners. 

 

11 hours ago, Old Scaley said:

That is a great grunter, @AUS-BNE-FISHO. Sounds like a really good day. Good to see the squire are around in that part of the river again. Fingers crossed we don’t have any major flooding this year.

 

11 hours ago, Hweebe said:

I reckon the sea toad had another go at your rig. Some sharp teeth on the larger specimens

 

8 hours ago, benno573 said:

nice work mate, that's a great session.

 

3 hours ago, Neil Stratford said:

Nice work , those big grunter go hard don’t they!

regards

neil

Thanks guys, appreciated. Hopefully there is no more flooding for ages. In fact I think if the rain holds off the river will fish great in Summer with the amount of bait around.

Cheers Hamish

[Kat]

Awesome session Hamish.  Fantastic Grunter!!!!  

Did you by any chance see if the bite was the same time as the solunar calendar predicted?

P.S.  will def send you the yabbie/fishing map tomorrow

[AUS-BNE-FISHO]

10 minutes ago, Kat said:

Awesome session Hamish.  Fantastic Grunter!!!!  

Did you by any chance see if the bite was the same time as the solunar calendar predicted?

P.S.  will def send you the yabbie/fishing map tomorrow

Thanks Kat. I did not see the solunar calendar but I believe the fish were chewing due to the small/slow tides, and the change of tide. That yabby map would be great too - I'm keen to try a few new spots this holidays.   

Cheers Hamish

[jon]

Excellent work again Hamish some good fish there!!

[charlie.hans.fishing]

On 18/09/2022 at 8:20 PM, AUS-BNE-FISHO said:

Hi all

My school holidays started yesterday, so I decided to start them the right way by going fishing. In the prior weeks, I had been busy with school, but managed one (pretty crappy) session at my local park. 

The session at the park started off on a Friday arvo. I brought some dead bait along and first deployed lines, and then @TheCharliefisho arrived. I got to cast netting to try and catch some livies, but I couldn't manage anything good. Early on I think I got one bite on my heavy rod but for the next while it was dead. I eventually threw my net on top of four or five tilapias, and then another large one fell out in the following casts. Although it brought some excitement, it definitely wasn't welcome because it still means they are swimming around in the river. I eventually caught a couple of anchovies and bony bream, so we sat back and waited for a line to go off. Despite many mozzies, staying into dark, and a couple snags, we didn't end up catching anything. "Oh well", I thought - at least I went fishing!

Tillies

Stats of Trip:

Tide: 2:40PM, 1.9M, High, 8:57PM, .6M, Low

Moon Phase: 50%, Decreasing

Bait Caught: Bonies, Anchovies, Glassies

Bait Used: Live and dead bonies, and anchovies

Fish Caught: -

Tackle Used: 8, 15, 30 pound braid mainlines. Abu Garcia Veritas 4.0 on Diawa Tierra 2500. Shimano Stradic 3000 on Shimano Raider. Shimano Sedona 6000 on Abu Garcia Nexus. Size 2 and 6 ball sinkers, 4/o circle/suicide hooks. 

Humidity: 84%

Air Pressure: 1011

Overall Success Rate: 20%

The next session was a lot more exciting, and happened yesterday. I started the day off collecting livies for about an hour and a half, which mainly consisted of mullet and small silver biddies. I tried fishing briefly as well but did not have any success. After that, we determined we had enough bait to get started. The first fish of the day was a legal sized squire caught by Andrew - things were looking good. Surprisingly, it was not on a livie but instead a pilchard. 

I started having some more luck in the cast net, and I got about 30 herring for bait in quick succession. Unfortunately for us, this is when we started pulling in toadfish after toadfish. They would all hit the bait/fight like an alright fish, but they were very disappointing to see. We did have the jetty all to ourselves though, which was good. It was a nice day, and, as it had not started to warm up, it was a good temperature. 

As the tide started to run a bit harder, the fishing went quiet and our baits were consistently pickered. The tide was very slow compared to what it usually is, and I decided to experiment with a paternoster rig. I was dropping one line (light rod) straight down with a 6 ball sinker, and the other, with a size 4 star sinker, was being casted out into the middle of the river. Eventually, after some more toadfish and picker attacks, Andrew was on to another squire - which went undersize. After that, it was quiet again for another 45 minutes or so before he caught another legal squire which was released. At this point, I had still caught nothing - my most significant catch might have been a cast net full of decent sized scat. 

The tide was half way through the rise when things went really quiet, and basically any livie was not getting a touch. In fact, the only thing that seemed to be catching fish at that point was pilchards, and even then they were only getting pickered to bits. It was at this point (a bit before 2) that we were all considering packing it in, as it looked like the bites had stopped. I did managed to land one sea toad in this period, and got mysteriously busted off by something which took my whole hook, dropper, and sinker as soon as it bit my herring. 

At about 2, I switched my pilchard back to a live herring on my dropper rig and fired it out into the middle of the river. I went back to sit down but it didn't take long before the end of my 8 foot rod was bouncing around and line was being yanked off my baitrunner. I set the hook and got the line tight, and immediately felt a lot of strong headshakes. I was almost adamant my luck had not changed and I was on a toadfish, but the fish was taking a couple of snappy runs so I was eager to see it anyways. Initial thoughts were a slightly larger squire, but we were pleased to see a nice and fat grunter on the end of my line! After a couple more dives and a struggle landing it, the fish was eventually gaffed and lifted onto the jetty. Woohoo!

60CM of Brisbane River Grunter

Following that, the fishing started to go crazy! Andrew had a fish on both of his lines at one point, and landed a legal squire after a nice tussle, and after I redeployed my bait with another live herring it didn't take long before I had a 39cm squire on the jetty as well. I was pretty happy with that, as it was my first from the Brisbane River. Michael then hooked up as well, but it was unfortunately just another toad. To finish the hot bite period off, Andrew pulled in a 35cm bream, which was a random but nice catch as well. It is worth saying this all happened in the space of twenty minutes, after hours of no action. 

Squire

Anyways, after the fish stopped biting so much (high tide change), Andrew headed off. We all managed to catch ourselves some keepers, but unfortunately for one other fella fishing on the jetty there seemed to be no more biting. Michael finished the day with a stingray, which seemed like it could be a thready at first due to the runs it was taking. I was happy with my PB grunter as I left the jetty, and I had some tonight - it's a delicious fish! 

Thanks for reading, here are the trip stats:

Stats of Trip:

Bait Caught: Mullet, herring, silver biddies, glassies, ponyfish

Tide: 8:00AM, .7M, Low, 2:45PM, 2.1M, High, 9:30PM, 1.0M, Low

Moon Phase: About 40%/Third Quarter, so not much run

Bait Used: Herring, silver biddies, glassies, mullet, pilchards

Fish Caught: Multiple toadfish, 5 * squire between us all, 1 grunter

Tackle Used: 8 pound braid mainline, 20 pound fluoro leader, Abu Garcia Veritas 4.o, Diawa Tierra 2500, Shimano Aero Baitrunner, 8 foot Jarvis Walker cheapy, J-braid 30 pound and 30 pound fluoro leader. Size 4/o suicide and 6/o circle hooks, six ball and 4 star sinker. Large barrel swivels. 

Air Pressure: 1006 dropping to 1002

Humidity: 89% in the morning, dropped to 47% in the arvo

Air Temperature: 21 degrees in the morning, increasing to high 20's/30 degrees

Overall Success Rate: 80% - good session

Hope you enjoyed the report,

Cheers Hamish

Great grunter and squire the other day Hamish. Yesterday was fun too!

[Bob9863]

Some nice fish their, I particularly like the tilapia I've got a soft spot for them. 

[Cavvy]

Both fish did taste particularly good - and all I had to do was eat what was served up since Hamish cleaned and cooked them . A better start to the school holidays than usual!  Fingers crossed they keep biting!

[AUS-BNE-FISHO]

Thanks everyone.