Do$tylz

No better way to start your work day before being desk bound for the rest of the day 🙂
 

i don't think i have any 3" ones left but certainly have a bunch of 5" skin blue and even the old moebi colour! i think i need to do more fishing if i haven't managed to lose all of them yet!

been a while since i had a before work session. we used to do them a lot mate. How good are the skin blues.
I hit mud once with khoi and i had a 1/8oz and he used a 1/16, he cleaned me up till i changed to the lighter ones

So I got to squeeze out a quick 3.5 hour fish this morning before work.
An old work colleague was kind enough to hit me up for a deckie spot and I couldn't say no 😄
We were on the water by 3:50am and our plan was to have a look at the blue beacons past the Brissy river mouth (1mile?) to see if there were any mackies around. Water wasn't as glassed as I expected but we could still motor near WOT.
We got there as the sun was just starting to light the sky and found 2 boats at the first beacon where we had about 4 casts before deciding to have a look at the 2nd beacon.
Got close to the 2nd beacon and saw 6 boats already on it so decided to give up on the mackies and head to mud.
Drifted the south eastern side and chucked 95% placcies with a few casts of a hardbody thrown in. Started off with 1/8th jigheads which is usually heavier than I like in the shallows around mud. Lots of touches but not a lot of hook ups. The fish didn't really convert until I went back to my usual of 1/12 or 1/16 sized jigheads. Most of my fish came on Damiki armour shads and rippers. Long live the Skin Blue colour!!!!! Thank you @Zim man (not that you are on here much anymore).
Lots of littlies around and lots of tackle lost to the rubble. I reckon I lost 10/12 jigheads this morning. How good are the colours!

and then on the classic "last drift/last cast" finally got a better grassy.

 
All fish went back for a swim and I made it home right on 8am to fire up my laptop and get stuck into my work.
Happy Friday everyone 🙂 Cheers

So I got to squeeze out a quick 3.5 hour fish this morning before work.
An old work colleague was kind enough to hit me up for a deckie spot and I couldn't say no 😄
We were on the water by 3:50am and our plan was to have a look at the blue beacons past the Brissy river mouth (1mile?) to see if there were any mackies around. Water wasn't as glassed as I expected but we could still motor near WOT.
We got there as the sun was just starting to light the sky and found 2 boats at the first beacon where we had about 4 casts before deciding to have a look at the 2nd beacon.
Got close to the 2nd beacon and saw 6 boats already on it so decided to give up on the mackies and head to mud.
Drifted the south eastern side and chucked 95% placcies with a few casts of a hardbody thrown in. Started off with 1/8th jigheads which is usually heavier than I like in the shallows around mud. Lots of touches but not a lot of hook ups. The fish didn't really convert until I went back to my usual of 1/12 or 1/16 sized jigheads. Most of my fish came on Damiki armour shads and rippers. Long live the Skin Blue colour!!!!! Thank you @Zim man (not that you are on here much anymore).
Lots of littlies around and lots of tackle lost to the rubble. I reckon I lost 10/12 jigheads this morning. How good are the colours!

and then on the classic "last drift/last cast" finally got a better grassy.

 
All fish went back for a swim and I made it home right on 8am to fire up my laptop and get stuck into my work.
Happy Friday everyone 🙂 Cheers

So when I started getting back into fishing a few months ago, I was down to my last pack of skin blues. I went looking to buy them and for the life of me couldn't find them at any of the normal suppliers, but did find 2 on ebay and bought them.
So I hit up Rob to find out wth was going on. He had a laugh and told me people stopped buying them 2 or 3 years ago so he stopped bringing them in. Lucky for me he was able to find a few others who were keen to get their hands on some again so Rob was kind enough to do a small batch order for us on his next shipment. I have enough 3inch shad skin blue's to last me a few years now 🙂. I should just sell off the rest of the 3" plastics I own... I honestly never use any other.

So I got to squeeze out a quick 3.5 hour fish this morning before work.
An old work colleague was kind enough to hit me up for a deckie spot and I couldn't say no 😄
We were on the water by 3:50am and our plan was to have a look at the blue beacons past the Brissy river mouth (1mile?) to see if there were any mackies around. Water wasn't as glassed as I expected but we could still motor near WOT.
We got there as the sun was just starting to light the sky and found 2 boats at the first beacon where we had about 4 casts before deciding to have a look at the 2nd beacon.
Got close to the 2nd beacon and saw 6 boats already on it so decided to give up on the mackies and head to mud.
Drifted the south eastern side and chucked 95% placcies with a few casts of a hardbody thrown in. Started off with 1/8th jigheads which is usually heavier than I like in the shallows around mud. Lots of touches but not a lot of hook ups. The fish didn't really convert until I went back to my usual of 1/12 or 1/16 sized jigheads. Most of my fish came on Damiki armour shads and rippers. Long live the Skin Blue colour!!!!! Thank you @Zim man (not that you are on here much anymore).
Lots of littlies around and lots of tackle lost to the rubble. I reckon I lost 10/12 jigheads this morning. How good are the colours!

and then on the classic "last drift/last cast" finally got a better grassy.

 
All fish went back for a swim and I made it home right on 8am to fire up my laptop and get stuck into my work.
Happy Friday everyone 🙂 Cheers

Welcome to AFO GJay.
There's a TON of knowledge and info here on AFO. There are a few guys that have put in years of learning and effort that are willing to share with those who participate and give back to the AFO community.
To help narrow down some more specific info to share, can you tell us what kinda fish you guys are after? Are you after bream? whiting? flatties? jewies? snapper? mackeral? tuna? jacks?
The gold coast broadwater, rivers, canals and inshore can be a hard spot to fish - it gets lots of boat and fisherperson traffic so tactics and techniques need to be refined to give you a better chance.
I have minimal experience with the offshore scene so won't say too much about that except it seems like when the mackeral are on, you can get them hand over fist. Tugger, Marty and Benno are your guys who have lots of info shared on AFO for offshore/mackies etc. Check out their past posts.

Welcome to AFO GJay.
There's a TON of knowledge and info here on AFO. There are a few guys that have put in years of learning and effort that are willing to share with those who participate and give back to the AFO community.
To help narrow down some more specific info to share, can you tell us what kinda fish you guys are after? Are you after bream? whiting? flatties? jewies? snapper? mackeral? tuna? jacks?
The gold coast broadwater, rivers, canals and inshore can be a hard spot to fish - it gets lots of boat and fisherperson traffic so tactics and techniques need to be refined to give you a better chance.
I have minimal experience with the offshore scene so won't say too much about that except it seems like when the mackeral are on, you can get them hand over fist. Tugger, Marty and Benno are your guys who have lots of info shared on AFO for offshore/mackies etc. Check out their past posts.

Welcome to AFO GJay.
There's a TON of knowledge and info here on AFO. There are a few guys that have put in years of learning and effort that are willing to share with those who participate and give back to the AFO community.
To help narrow down some more specific info to share, can you tell us what kinda fish you guys are after? Are you after bream? whiting? flatties? jewies? snapper? mackeral? tuna? jacks?
The gold coast broadwater, rivers, canals and inshore can be a hard spot to fish - it gets lots of boat and fisherperson traffic so tactics and techniques need to be refined to give you a better chance.
I have minimal experience with the offshore scene so won't say too much about that except it seems like when the mackeral are on, you can get them hand over fist. Tugger, Marty and Benno are your guys who have lots of info shared on AFO for offshore/mackies etc. Check out their past posts.

Welcome to AFO GJay.
There's a TON of knowledge and info here on AFO. There are a few guys that have put in years of learning and effort that are willing to share with those who participate and give back to the AFO community.
To help narrow down some more specific info to share, can you tell us what kinda fish you guys are after? Are you after bream? whiting? flatties? jewies? snapper? mackeral? tuna? jacks?
The gold coast broadwater, rivers, canals and inshore can be a hard spot to fish - it gets lots of boat and fisherperson traffic so tactics and techniques need to be refined to give you a better chance.
I have minimal experience with the offshore scene so won't say too much about that except it seems like when the mackeral are on, you can get them hand over fist. Tugger, Marty and Benno are your guys who have lots of info shared on AFO for offshore/mackies etc. Check out their past posts.

Welcome to AFO GJay.
There's a TON of knowledge and info here on AFO. There are a few guys that have put in years of learning and effort that are willing to share with those who participate and give back to the AFO community.
To help narrow down some more specific info to share, can you tell us what kinda fish you guys are after? Are you after bream? whiting? flatties? jewies? snapper? mackeral? tuna? jacks?
The gold coast broadwater, rivers, canals and inshore can be a hard spot to fish - it gets lots of boat and fisherperson traffic so tactics and techniques need to be refined to give you a better chance.
I have minimal experience with the offshore scene so won't say too much about that except it seems like when the mackeral are on, you can get them hand over fist. Tugger, Marty and Benno are your guys who have lots of info shared on AFO for offshore/mackies etc. Check out their past posts.

Hi all
Well this morning I woke up earlier than anticipated so I got the gear ready, and took the cart down to the jetty. It had three rods, the net, some bait consisting of frogmouth pillies, prawns, and Bony Bream, and an esky. I arrived about 5:45AM to a medium tide and a flat water, not a ripple to be seen in sight. The temperature of the misty air was very nice for fishing, and the odd 'hello' from walkers was the only thing that broke the silence. The smell of the Brisbane River and wet forest was making a weak aroma which I liked (good memories of course!). The sun was still rising, and I was ready for a fish.
The salmon line was deployed with the head part of a Bony Bream, and casted out as far as it would go. One line had a little Motor Oil placcy, and the other line still needed rigging. I didn't even have that done after about 20 minutes of being on the jetty, and nothing had happened then. I did see a large school of baitfish 'boil' when I casted my line in, meaning that they may be around. While I was tying on a hook though, the salmon line buckled over and off screamed line like no tomorrow.
I picked up the rod, tightened the drag, and the fight was on. I lifted up the rod, then cranked the reel handle as hard as I could. Unfortunately, I then felt something that ruined that experience.
"Foosh!"
That was the fish spitting the hook on me. I left the bait out for a bit longer but soon enough realised what happened. I reeled the line in slowly, and up came nothing. I made an educated guess that it might be a Thready, as the leader wasn't very frayed and the speed of the run taken was far faster than any shark I had ever come close to catching. I switched everything over to a new rig just to be safe, and then deployed the next bit of biddy.
My dad was down by now, and he did a bit of cast netting. On the first throw, he got a juvenile Yellowfin Bream, and some little prawns. We kept them (the prawns) for bream bait, seeing as though the only thing I'd be using if I didn't catch anything would be herring (dead). We did some more throwing, and got together a small amount of herring and prawns (as well as one lone mullet). 
I started flicking the SP around as well. I flicked it under it mangroves, around the mudflats, and under the pier numerous times for no love. I was using a 'hop-hop' technique, which I figured would've made the lure very enticing for a flathead or cod. Just as I was walking towards the jetty, the salmon line went off. This time the fish did not take that much line, so I tightened the drag and struck straight away. It felt good- heavy weight and shakes. Then, just like the last one, it spat the hook! This time also had me coming back empty handed, so once again I replaced my trace as there was a little bit of fraying and put out the final bit of Bony Bream, the tail bit.
Everything went slightly quiet now; nothing on the plastics still, and no hits on the rod which had a little live prawn out. I then decided to do a bit of cast netting. My dad and I use the same technique, except he has a variation of it which requires you to give it a larger whip. I tried this - one throw was OK, with about 60% opening (he gets 90%,99% of the time) and then the next was a doozy as the net was pretty well closed and banana-ed. (Funnily enough, we got a prawn in this throw 😉). 
I saw the salmon line get some action then - a bit of line went off. I picked it up, held it out there for a minute, then reeled it in. There was still an intact bait, so I threw it back out waiting for another fish. My dad had to head off now, and in his last throw he got the mullet then. It was about 15 minutes until I saw a peck-peck-peck on the salmon line. I assumed the bait would've stayed on but after checking it I realised that it was gone. I reeled in, disappointed, and chucked out a half frog mouth pilly.
It was about 15 minutes of nothing, at around 7:30AM, when the line buckled over completely. Line was screaming off, and I eventually got there, tightened the drag, and prepared myself. After a bit of cranking, he went for the pylons. I managed to coax him out though, and then he took the fastest run a fish has ever taken for me out into the middle of the river. He was near the surface but wasn't coming up now. I gained line on him but as he was about to surface, he took an even faster and stronger run straight back down. This happened about three times now, and by this time I had a serious case of the shakes. After many tense moments I finally gained enough line to get an ID on him.
"HOLY MOLY! THAT'S MASSIVE"
Or at least that's what everyone thought (and I bellowed) when I saw it. Some passers by luckily came down to give me a hand netting it up, and in no time it was on the jetty. I got some quick photos, seeing as though the hook was a goner cut that off, and then I measured him. 115CM long. Jeez, Louis! 
I picked up the fish and lowered him back into the drink, ready for the release. He gave a massive kick off, and that was probably the best feeling I had in a while! Here are some photos of the fella (pic heavy) - 

Landing Him

Up you come

115CM of Threadfin Salmon

I could hardly lift him!

IMG_2475 (1).MOV Up ya come!

Trying not to dislocate a shoulder

IMG_2479 (1).MOV Back ya go!
Well, after that exciting series of events... Quite frankly... Disaster Struck! The Thready resurfaced floating in the river. We tried desperately to get him in the net before he got too far out, but it was too late. We couldn't get him. "Please go down, Please go down, Please Swim away, Please swim away" was all I could say. It wasn't looking good, and I was about to dive in (the people stopped me), so I tried the next best thing - hooking him again. This was a complete no go, and I failed miserably each time. 
There was only one option - I called dad, quickly explained to him what had happened and why the kayak needed to come down. Fifteen minutes later, my faithful fishing mate was there and my dad and I were paddling down the river, as fast as our arms could carry us, to the threadfin salmon. We got to him about 500 Metres down. I grabbed him, and the first thing we did with a sharpened screwdriver was to vent him. He stabbed it into the very inflated part, and heard the hiss of air come out.
That confirmed my suspicions- bloody barotrauma had got to the poor bugger. 
We paddled to the bank, allowing air to go through his gills the whole time. I prayed he would give a massive kick and go straight back down. He didn't... YET. We found some rocks under someone's jetty walkway, and stopped there. My dad did a kamikaze jump straight out of the kayak into chest deep mud and water. LOL. I waited with him for a long time, with not much progress except the fish getting a tiny bit stronger. I paddled the double kayak back to the jetty up the river, to say hi to my mate.
I told him the situation, and I was still praying the fish would be gone by the time I got back there. It didn't end up swimming off though, so there was more trying to do. I was back with my dad for another ten minutes, and after watching the fish kick I had hopes. I went back to tell my mate, who said, "Well, it's either a happy released fish or BBQ salmon dinner, Hamish!".
The whole time, my dad was in waist deep water standing on a dodgy rock bar. He said he could feel the odd thing brushing past his leg when he was down there, like an eel. Yuck! 😕 
Since he paddles too, I decided to ask him if he wanted a go. He replied yes, so I quickly paddled back to dad to tell him. The fish was not progressing, not even in the slightest. We swapped life jackets and sunnies, and now my mate was going to give the fish a check out. In this ten minute period, I frantically messaged everyone who I could that might know about what the hell to do with a fish that's been vented in the swim bladder and swimming for an hour, as well as make the URGENT thread in AFO.
Lets just say it's not URGENT anymore!
After that, my mate was back, so we swapped over. The fish was swum for around an hour and a half-two hours by this point, and we still needed to try and released him. My mate informed me my dad said I had a choice - to release him and waste him or keep him. I got there and I saw that the fish had pretty well died on Dad. I was very sad at this moment, and I felt really bad about keeping him. I knew this was always a possibility though so I have only myself to blame for catching these fish.
We loaded him up on the yak... Got him back and had a brief admiration session of the fish. It was absolutely huge. Dad loaded the fish in the yak, and got going straight away. He needed to get the ice on the fish as soon as possible so it tasted as best as it could. By the time I was home with my mate, we had ice on the fish and we were ready to fillet him up. We decided that I would do it, and that we would let him ice down a bit longer.

In the Esky
It was then my Mum and Dad had the silliest idea ever- to take the fish to a fish shop to get it filleted. "What kind of BS is that", I thought... After some convincing, we piled into the car and got there. Even though they then refused to fillet it (my dad literally said, "Hello, I have a large fish here, will you fillet it for payment?". That was responded to with, "Yes, $15!") they had some good Bony Bream, Mullet, and other baitfish in there so that may be a cheap seller for me if I run low.
Once we got back home, I started the filleting job. I was doing well until I hit the backbone, and then... I forfeited and handed the knife over to Dad 😉. After lots of struggle though, we ended up with 3.2KG of meat, and probably about an extra 500g of fish crap. We threw the frame away, as it was to big to freeze, and now the meat is sitting in the fridge waiting for a BBQ dinner with me and my mates families tomorrow. 

Dad Filleting

3.2KG of meat

About 10KG (it seemed WAY more than that... I can lift a 12KG barbell and could hardly lift that so either dodgy scales or I've gotten weaker, LOL)

Quick photo
That was the salmon done. The biggest fish of my life, that I've ever seen and caught. I felt very bad about it, but what happened has happened. Next time though, I do not think I will be putting out the salmon line. It also seems the ones that are smaller are far more hardy than big ones, so a few of them would be nice. 
Thanks for reading this report, and I hope you enjoyed. It sure was an epic day. Here are the stats of the trip. 
Stats of Trip - 
Tide: 2:40AM, 1.6M, High, 8:20AM, .5M, Low
Moon Phase: Waxing Crescent - not too much run
Air Pressure: 1010.7
Humidity: 68%
Temp: High was 33oC
Weather: Sunny, few clouds
Time Fished: About 5:45AM - 7:45AM
Fish Caught: Threadfin Salmon x 1
Bait caught: Mullet, herring, prawns
Bait used: Bony Bream, Half Frogmouth Pilly, Prawns, Herring
Tackle Used: 12lb, 14lb, 30lb braid mainlines, 20lb and 80lb mono leaders and traces, size 2 and 5 ball sinkers, 4/o and 6/o suicide and circle hooks, large barrel swivel, size 2500 Diawa Shinobi 2500 on Abu Garcia Veritas, SHimano Nasci 2500 and Ugly Stik, Penn SSM 650 on Rogue Firepoint Boat rod 
Overall Success Rate: I can't give it 100% (as much as you wanted to read that @Another Wazza) as it didn't swim off. Settle for 50%.
Cheers Hamish

P.S. No one has made an attempt to guess why I changed my profile pic on December 19th and only then, 😉. 

On a positive note barnicles leave scars and chicks dig scars

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

Hey Tae,
I'd recommend talking to Duncan and the team at Fishhead. They are only online these days but he does have a warehouse where you can see and fee the rods down at the gold coast.
You're going to need deep pockets as rods with specs like that at Fishhead will get ~$1200.

Hey Tae,
I'd recommend talking to Duncan and the team at Fishhead. They are only online these days but he does have a warehouse where you can see and fee the rods down at the gold coast.
You're going to need deep pockets as rods with specs like that at Fishhead will get ~$1200.

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

Congrats Brian!!! Finally got the legal snapper off the list. Now they'll come flooding in mate.

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

I've found soaking a cotton ball in vinegar and leaving it on the contacts over night cleaned off my green corrosion pretty easily. Then I kept up with spraying lanox/im6 on the contacts after each fishing session and that has kept it clean since.

Hey Tae,
I'd recommend talking to Duncan and the team at Fishhead. They are only online these days but he does have a warehouse where you can see and fee the rods down at the gold coast.
You're going to need deep pockets as rods with specs like that at Fishhead will get ~$1200.