AFO

Please let us know if it is now resolved 

Please let us know if it is now resolved 

Yep, the AFO site has been updated 😀
We will be working on making sure everything works as it should over the coming days. Lots of new features added and more coming.

The site was upgraded today.

Yep, the AFO site has been updated 😀
We will be working on making sure everything works as it should over the coming days. Lots of new features added and more coming.

Yep, the AFO site has been updated 😀
We will be working on making sure everything works as it should over the coming days. Lots of new features added and more coming.

Didnt see any signs today at clontarf. No fisheries , no water police. Beautiful arvo tho... 
Did myself a favour and went looking for new spots in the bay to fish for something other than snapper. 
Found some great looking ground out south of the 4 beacons that looks promising.  
 

I know it has been mentioned many times in posts on this forum but I thought it might be worthwhile to make a separate topic letting everyone know that we have now entered the one month closure for snapper and pearl perch in Qld. A mate who is not on this or other fishing forums called me yesterday to see when we were going snapper hunting and that made me realise that it would be easy to miss these changes. Let’s hope it has the desired effect long term.  Here is further info.
http://statements.qld.gov.au/Statement/2020/7/2/snapper-and-pearl-perch-spawning-closure

I went out to my not so local break wall but nearest break wall 40 minute drive fished there a few times got some good bream there before . So this arvo I rocked up to the breakwall light breeze sunny last 2 hours of the run out perfect time for flathead fishing flicked some zman slim swims for about 1 hour . only a few bites from some small bream couldn’t believe it so I switched to a surface lure and walked to the sandflats not far from the breakwall to see if any whiting were interested in taking my pimped 70m sugurpen not a single chase . So I walked back onto the breakwall and started fishing with bread fished this one spot for about 40 minutes caught 4 bream all under 15cm it was almost time to go .starting to get dark as I walked back I had a quick flick using bread not to far from the cleaning stations that they had on the breakwall .same thing small bream . I switched to a curly tail grub got snagged 2nd casted so I went back to bread on my last cast prepared to catch a 10cm bream on bread I cast out wait 30-50 seconds stairing at my braid with my bail arm flipped over waiting for a bite or a run suddenly braid starts flying through my guides and shooting deeper into the snaggy looking water I set the hook expecting a few good head shakes and then skull dragging a tiny bream but instead I got some massive head shakes and then a run like a Freight train and my rod was bending more then I was comfortable with I was huffing and puffing this fish was pulling line like a kingfish btw I was using 6lb braid 6lb leader and a 1.5-3.5kg atomic arrowz bream surface rod the fish didn’t give up as the fish got closer to the rock wall I seen a silver flash and a arrow shaped tail what could this be . I pulled it in closer making sure it didn’t wrap me around weed or oysters or even dive under a rock I got my net and scooped up a 33cm silver trevally that I originally thought was a pb bream or a juvenile kingfish or school jewfish a very good surprise for my last cast I brain spiked the fish with a knife and bleed it out and put it a bucket with water and kept it and is now in the freezer btw I’ve never caught one before I’ve only been fishing probably for just over a year never had a fish like that fight so hard . Fought harder then my PB flathead 55cm .so know I’m trying to do research so I can catch more of these things 

Hey people, I have shifted the non-meme chat to a new thread -
 

Hey Dyln
First up, welcome to the forum! 🙂 
I cannot exactly help with the question, but rayke1938 did a report on it just a day or so ago, it's titled Hinze Western Arm 8/5/20. Maybe you could pick up some tips from that.
Cheers Hamish 

Hey Legends, anybody have any side scan images of wintertime bass schooled up in the impoundments. Sounded all through The west arm of Hinze this morning, with my Garmin Striker 7 and definitely did not find what I was looking for. I know guys got onto a heap during the week out here. One guy said he caught over 200 in 3 outings this week. Id love to be able to use my sounder to find a nice big school but I just don’t think I’m getting as much out of my side scan as I could be. Not asking for marks or spots but any info that might help me make better use of my sounder would be much appreciated. Cheers

All good. I service fishing reels and the Stradic is an excellent option. All the internals are solid and you get what you pay for. 

Thanks lads. I’m meeting someone at Colmslie & deciding if tow the boat to there or go up the river, as Colmslie is 52klm from home. Current travel limit is 50klm. Surely the cops would spot me the 2 Klm  

Have you seen OzFish? 
I run the Moreton Bay Chapter. We are restoring shellfish reefs in Moreton Bay. 
https://ozfish.org.au/
Junior membership is $15, Adult $25 and family is $35
We have a boat and an oyster lease that is great fun and good to fish from. 
This is our chapter page.
https://ozfish.org.au/chapters/central-moreton-bay/
Perhaps have a look and see if it is something you would like to join. 

Hi kmcrosby78
Yes, it is. I just spent the last 10/20 minutes reading all of the thread so I could understand (I like reading a lot of old threads, probably to many) everything and yes ellicat, you would've had so much work then. In my opinion, the forum still does have some friendly debate about topics, but we all get along well. 
Cheers Hamish 🙂 

Hi Drop Bear
Yes, I 100% agree with you. Everyone here is great, polite, and helpful. I missed all the crazy big chats back a long time ago, LOL, in fact, a couple of them I would've been 3 or 4 (I don't know, but I do know way to young to type 😉). I do hope to meet some of you guys eventually (even if no one wants to meet me...) because you are all so nice and the forum itself is a great site! 
Cheers Hamish 🙂 

Hey,
I thought I would give you an update on what is happening with OzFish in Moreton Bay. We are continuing to recycle huge amounts of oyster shells and hope to have a trial reef in the water in November. 
We just got a grant to purchase a shell washing machine that will help us to wash loads of shells ready to make reefs out of them. 
OzFish have moved all our info to their website now. Check it out and let me know what you think or how we can improve it. 
https://ozfish.org.au/chapters/central-moreton-bay/
Our major fund raising event "Wynnum Fishing Classic" and "Wynnum Manly Seafood Festival" has had to be postponed due to the health restrictions we have at the moment. I don't have an idea yet of when we will do it again. Hopefully September but who knows. 
We are working with the Port Of Brisbane authority to do our trial shellfish reef out there. This is going well but very slow due to covid stuff.
We have 50 ROB baskets out at the lease full of shell. These have caught loads of oysters over summer and these oysters are growing well. 
We will be making a load more over then next few months to put in out at the port of Brisbane. 

Hi guys. My first post. Does anyone have any experience and views on the Ocean assassin deep drop rod. I previously bought a Penn Ally deep drop rod through mail order but when it arrived I discovered that the reel seat was too wide for the reel clamp posts on the reel I wanted to use with it. It's hard to get info on what No. butt it is and Penn customer service don't always answer queries.
Your thoughts please.

Hi all
Yesterday night I decided to go for a trip to the local park, so I did. I was supposed to be back by 8:30AM but I ended up going 1 hour overtime. It was pretty quiet on all scenes but I still got some fish. 🙂 
I arrived at approximately 6:30AM, and casted my lines out baited with prawn. After the flat salmon - some bait I caught when I was in Yeppoon - was thored, the shark line was thrown out to. It didn't take long for the first bite either, because in about 10 minutes of waiting I had a run. It was short though, and to my disappointment the fish (most likely a catfish) had dropped the bait. I rebaited that line but the next time, in about 5 more minutes, the rod next to the pylons went off. I didn't have a chance to pick it up before it bricked me in the artificial wire rock wall retainer, so I picked it up, felt its vigorous head shakes but couldn't pull it up. I walked over to where it had taken me, and started pulling. Hoping it was another cod, I pulled it up. To my surprise, it was a nice eel, of 45cm. There wasn't a second thought in my head, and straightway this fish was shark bait. The legal limit is 30 cm for Longfin, Pacific Shortfin and Southern Shortfin so in to the esky it went. 🙂 I didn't want to chop it up on the jetty though in fear of it slipping back into the water, and the fact it was still alive. The fight was pretty lousy as in my experience eels normally go pretty hard, but hopefully the next time I go sharking it will produce. Here it is - 

I only got a picture of Sharkbait (I named it, how original) at home 😉 
After that was initially dealt with, I had a throw of the cast net. Hoping for some prawns, my first couple of throws produced a couple. I baited up a line with a good sized banana prawn and chucked it out. In five minutes time the live prawn rod went off so it was frantic. One eel flopping around in the bucket and me trying to reel in a fish. It was fighting quite well, and I thought it might've been a large catfish, or even a bream. Though, after 30 seconds or so, maybe one minute, I saw the fish. It was a small catfish, and I was shocked at how it had fought. Head shakes and tiny runs. Pretty good for a catfish though. Here it is - 

Catfish do fight well! Taken on a live prawn
After the catfish, I threw the net some more. A couple small prawns was all I caught initially, but after I had one more throw I saw some silver. I had made one good cast which gave me some prawns and three big frogmouth pilchards. These are my favourite bait in the river, especially if they're alive, so I emptied the cast net bucket and took them over. One problem - the eel was currently occupying it! I put the eel in the esky after some failed attempts at it, and then filled the bucket up. A couple ones were dead, but one was going good. The aerator was fired up and off they went😉. After chucking them in though, I noticed one was orangey, not blue like the usual. I might need and ID on this if it is not a frogmouth, because while I am 99% sure it is, I just wanted to check. I got some ID photos and threw it back, kicking and alive at the end.  

Sorry the photos are bad. Is it still a frogmouth?
By now, it was about eight. I had supposed to be home by 8:30AM, and with a few more casts of the net I decided to take a break from it. I had already checked the shark line once, so this time I saw the tip bent over. I was excited, hoping I was on. When I started to pull it up, all I could feel was a dead weight. This surprised me and I thought maybe whatever it was had bricked itself. I guess I'll never know, because after about 30 seconds, it dropped the bait. I reeled it up to see only a hook... oh well, time for a new bait. The next half of the flat salmon was chucked on, and wished good luck LOL. 
Back up at the pier (there is a pier going down to a jetty, I put the shark line on the jetty and the other lines on the pier) my lines were getting pickered. I missed quite a few fish, and in the period of about 45 minutes I lost a bit of tackle too (snags). I had another throw of the cast net as well, and just caught a tiny herring which I threw back (to tiny for bait). I started to switch up my rigs a bit as well, and I put on a whole frog mouth pilchard (smaller one) and half hitched the tail, like you rig normal pilchard with single hooks. This got me nothing except a snag 🙂 so I switched back to prawn. I decided to change the bait on the shark line as well, as I had recasted it a few times. I put on the largest frogmouth pilchard, in hope of a nice bully - 

It was nice and cool the whole time, and in the shade was nice. In about another half hour from when that bait change had happened, I got a couple more missed hookups. They were all small though, and nothing would've been very big. They were either taking short bursts of line (I have the drag loose) or just picking away. My dad then called and told me I had to head home, and I was an hour late LOL. When I got home, I still had one important job. To deal with the eel. 😞 
I sharpened the bait knife quickly and began to chop. After about 20 minutes and a lot of blood on the bait board (not to mention slime) the eel was done. What I found most disturbing is even after i chopped the head off the body still moved 😮. The final product is now in my freezer, and waiting to be consumed by a shark. Here it is - 


The eel on the chopping board on in chops. 😉 
That is all that really happened, here are the stats of the trip: 
Tide: 3:50AM high, 2:00M, 10:10Am low, 0.8M - I was fishing the run out
Time fished: 6:30AM-9:30AM
Moon Phase: Waxing Crescent, first phase after new moon
Fish caught: Eel x 1, catfish x 1
Bait caught: Prawn, frog-mouth pilchard, herring
Bait used: Flat salmon, prawn, frog-mouth pilchard
Tackle: 4/o Suicide hooks, 6/o circle hooks, 20 inch wire trace, size 5 ball sinker, 30lb mainline and leader, 20lb leader, small swivels, size 2 ball sinker/bean sinker, 1000 size Sieena, 2500 size Nasci (Shimano), 650 Penn, 8ft Ugly stik, 6"6' Ugly stik, Rogue Firepoint, 14lb mainlines. 
Overall success rate: 50% - not the target species but still a nice morning out
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed the report. Sorry if it's a bit boring. I hope everyone is safe with COVID-19. 
Cheers Hamish 🙂 
 

Could not wait any longer, Beau and I hit the pine river yesterday.It was a nice day to have a fish. we didnt go to far before I pointed out to Beau that I used to catch quite a few flathead at this spot. First cast and I was onto and landed a nice legal flathead.Beau hooked up to a underwater snag. Well that was the excitement of the trip, from then on it was no more fish for either of us, Beau continued to get snags and finaly finished on a good fish, probably a cod, that took him to a nice snag. So as Ray keeps saying you can stick the salt🙄  Back in the dam this weekend I hope.
Dino

I recently fished the Lake whilst on holiday off a little jetty in Boreen Point (with a few snags). I had luck with some small bream and lots of catfish on frozen prawns in the afternoon, and two decent cod and two decent trevally using soft plastics early morning and late afternoon.

Hi georgefisho2
Sounds like a nice little holiday you had, good job on the trevs, cod, bream, and catties.
Thanks for the tip on the location. 
Cheers Hamish 🙂 

Thanks for the advice guys - much appreciated. Will definitely head towards Boreen Point - dump the women and kids off at the pub and we'll head to the jetty!

Feral wrote:

Where abouts in the lake would be the best shot at bullies? Towards the southern end the Sparksie referred to or do they tend to patrol all around the shop?

Are the kids likely to get chomped on..! :ohmy: Wife will never let me hear the end of it!