Cobiaaddict

Did some exploring for some new territory this afternoon and found a little patch of small Large Mouth Nannygai, nothing huge but a good sign especially for waaaay down the southern bay anyway. 🙂

I've never set drags with scales. 
I go completely by feel, and adjust accordingly during the fight. 
I tend to run heavier drag closer to the bottom and once turned and on the way up I will back the drag off slightly as the fish nears the boat. 
 
If sharks are around then it's the old, lock it up and skull them in. 
Problem with that is you face the issue of terminal tackle failure, like straightening hooks or busting swivels. 
 
I've never free spooled on the reef to let fish get away from sharks. I think this is because, you don't really know when the shark is going to hit the fish. 
I have free spooled in timber chasing barra. Works well. Just have to be careful not to put weight on the fish when you retrieve the line and weave the boat around the sticks, otherwise you will lose the fish. 
 

I do like that idea of letting the fish run from a shark, as opposed to trying to race it in.
I can see a lot of merrit to that approach.
One thing I did forget to mention, is when I run my drag lighter, I tend to ease the fish in easier, they don't seem to fight as hard, getting into the net can be a problem, but I have noticed a difference.
My old method was to work out the maximum drag for my combo and then set it uninhs scales, but I did loose a lot more fish then to thrown hooks, I think easing them in let's you keep a more consistent pressure on them.

I have never measured the drag on any of my reels, have always just gone by feel. In saying that, in clean water, fresh or salt, I will happily play a fish and go a bit easier, if I'm up north on the reefs, I will pretty much fish locked with my thumb on standby, cause if you are trying to pull a big trout out of a bommie or a red from the deep... I really don't like giving them an inch. As for land based sharks, I've always gone has much drag as I can, as long as I can still comfortably stand, and hey... if you start getting dragged down the sand, there is always someone to grab onto ya.!! 

I don't have too many problems near Mud, except for a couple of occasions, and in the river they are a rarity. But head down to Peel and further south they are unbearable in spring and summer.

Heaviest drag on my reels is 15kg.....on 30lb braid    I don't use half of that.
As for sharks I am quick to disengage spotlock on a decent fish and let him swim away a bit to get away from the reef before putting the hurt on them.
To be honest I do not have much trouble at all with sharks wherever I go....river, bay or offshore.

As @ellicat say's, there is no one answer, 
I love fishing heavy drag settings, if I can stop a fish getting back to structure then it's a win for me. 
Found my catch rate improved significantly when I started moving to the more appropriate rods, reel, line classes & drag settings when targeting certain species.  
For example,  Blackspot Tusk fish fight extremely hard for their size,  a 3kg fish fights as hard if not harder than a 5-6kg snapper in my experience,  But the structure & location and feeding habits differ and Tuskies feed very low in the water column giving you very little chance of stopping them getting back to a cave or ledge, meaning  80lb braid & 120lb leaders are required to subdue such a fish,  Snapper feed relatively high in the water column and  5-6kg fish can be easily fought and landed on 20lb or 30lb line if your drag is set correctly and your using your  gear to its full potential,   20-30lb line class would simply not have the abrasion factor required to consistently land big Tusk fish,
 

As @ellicat say's, there is no one answer, 
I love fishing heavy drag settings, if I can stop a fish getting back to structure then it's a win for me. 
Found my catch rate improved significantly when I started moving to the more appropriate rods, reel, line classes & drag settings when targeting certain species.  
For example,  Blackspot Tusk fish fight extremely hard for their size,  a 3kg fish fights as hard if not harder than a 5-6kg snapper in my experience,  But the structure & location and feeding habits differ and Tuskies feed very low in the water column giving you very little chance of stopping them getting back to a cave or ledge, meaning  80lb braid & 120lb leaders are required to subdue such a fish,  Snapper feed relatively high in the water column and  5-6kg fish can be easily fought and landed on 20lb or 30lb line if your drag is set correctly and your using your  gear to its full potential,   20-30lb line class would simply not have the abrasion factor required to consistently land big Tusk fish,
 

Some fish are structure based....cod and blueys etc....there is no way you can fish these guys light and expect them to stay away from cover.
I can't recall getting bricked by a snapper though....i have had them swim around the far side of a bit of structure and break me off      but I do not think they targetted the structure as a place of refuge like a cod would do.
Similarly with jew and threadies, both have been on the other side of a pilon or rope or whatever and I have lost the fish because i couldn't chase it fast enough.
I have caught plenty of jacks in heavy reef on 6lb braid.....less than 20% will fight hard or bury into the rocks, the rest will battle out in open water on fairly light drag settings.....fish them hard and they will bust you most times.
A scared dog that fights always fights harder. Don't scare the fish.

As @ellicat say's, there is no one answer, 
I love fishing heavy drag settings, if I can stop a fish getting back to structure then it's a win for me. 
Found my catch rate improved significantly when I started moving to the more appropriate rods, reel, line classes & drag settings when targeting certain species.  
For example,  Blackspot Tusk fish fight extremely hard for their size,  a 3kg fish fights as hard if not harder than a 5-6kg snapper in my experience,  But the structure & location and feeding habits differ and Tuskies feed very low in the water column giving you very little chance of stopping them getting back to a cave or ledge, meaning  80lb braid & 120lb leaders are required to subdue such a fish,  Snapper feed relatively high in the water column and  5-6kg fish can be easily fought and landed on 20lb or 30lb line if your drag is set correctly and your using your  gear to its full potential,   20-30lb line class would simply not have the abrasion factor required to consistently land big Tusk fish,
 

There's no one answer here.
In the bay out of a boat I enjoy playing a fish in with a lighter drag so as not to pull the hooks, but when the sharks are around this is fraught with danger, so I have to go harder.
In the fresh, landbased at an impoundment, you can get away with a lighter drag and take your time playing a fish in as you don't have to lift the fish as much as you would in a boat. Also, throw in some structure like trees and you will need to run a heavier drag.
That applies a lot in a boat near structure. My mind wanders to @Another Wazza's recent experiences trying to keep jew away from the structure and needing to lock drag or @Cobiaaddict's recent tusky adventures where the fish will run straight for structure.
With the reel/rod interplay, I think you can run a heavier drag than the rod is rated for as long as you don't need to use the rod to pull a fish up, like when fishing deeper water from a boat . When that's not the case you just need to be mindful of the bend in the rod and adjust accordingly.
I generally start my bay fishing with a lighter drag and adjust after the take to a level dependent on how quickly I need to get it in.

The old saying is... the harder you pull, the harder the fish will pull back.

Got my new boat last year after 20 years owning my last tinnie. So I talked the wife into an upgrade and bought a 651 Mclay hardtop.
I got straight into getting some good mojo for the boat with a few trips offshore brisvegas and a trip out on the bunker group up north.
I very happy with it so far and here is a few pictures now we can load them up again on AFO.

All,
Got the new boat on the water end of October 2023 and what a ride it's been, done plenty of trips to break her in, mainly chasing squid and chasing Tuskies which I loved doing in my teens with my Dad.
1st trip was on the tuskies was 2 weeks before I got my boat,  i headed out with a good mate in his boat to see if any of my old hunting grounds still held the elusive blackspot and wouldn't you know it 2nd drop with a rather large sleepy crab wich spells big trouble at this spot in some rather ordinary seas off Moreton Island I was on,  under locked drag, with 80lb braid and 120lb leader I was hooked up to a dinosaur of a blackspot Tuskfish that was running hard for the coffee rock ledge, after some very intense spool thumbing and some grunting I'd managed to to turn this fish and have it heading my way until it decided it wanted that rock some more ,  with a few ugly rod angles and a few more grunts I managed to get him boat side for netting and my 1st blackspot in 20 + yrs was on the floor of the boat and we was in absolute awe of the colours this fish went, ended weighing in at a modest 10.2kg after being bled. 
Enough rambling, I'll let everyone enjoy the pics
Cheers Josh <><
 

Few more pics from this Saturday just gone, this one went 9.4kg 

Good trout @tugger  Im a little bit jealous 🙂
Hoping to start doing trips up that way now I have a Hard Top 
How do you find the McLay ? 
 
 

Nice boat Greg, 
Hope to see you on the water 🙂
 
 

Nice boat Greg, 
Hope to see you on the water 🙂
 
 

Nice boat Greg, 
Hope to see you on the water 🙂
 
 

Good trout @tugger  Im a little bit jealous 🙂
Hoping to start doing trips up that way now I have a Hard Top 
How do you find the McLay ? 
 
 

All,
Got the new boat on the water end of October 2023 and what a ride it's been, done plenty of trips to break her in, mainly chasing squid and chasing Tuskies which I loved doing in my teens with my Dad.
1st trip was on the tuskies was 2 weeks before I got my boat,  i headed out with a good mate in his boat to see if any of my old hunting grounds still held the elusive blackspot and wouldn't you know it 2nd drop with a rather large sleepy crab wich spells big trouble at this spot in some rather ordinary seas off Moreton Island I was on,  under locked drag, with 80lb braid and 120lb leader I was hooked up to a dinosaur of a blackspot Tuskfish that was running hard for the coffee rock ledge, after some very intense spool thumbing and some grunting I'd managed to to turn this fish and have it heading my way until it decided it wanted that rock some more ,  with a few ugly rod angles and a few more grunts I managed to get him boat side for netting and my 1st blackspot in 20 + yrs was on the floor of the boat and we was in absolute awe of the colours this fish went, ended weighing in at a modest 10.2kg after being bled. 
Enough rambling, I'll let everyone enjoy the pics
Cheers Josh <><
 

All,
Got the new boat on the water end of October 2023 and what a ride it's been, done plenty of trips to break her in, mainly chasing squid and chasing Tuskies which I loved doing in my teens with my Dad.
1st trip was on the tuskies was 2 weeks before I got my boat,  i headed out with a good mate in his boat to see if any of my old hunting grounds still held the elusive blackspot and wouldn't you know it 2nd drop with a rather large sleepy crab wich spells big trouble at this spot in some rather ordinary seas off Moreton Island I was on,  under locked drag, with 80lb braid and 120lb leader I was hooked up to a dinosaur of a blackspot Tuskfish that was running hard for the coffee rock ledge, after some very intense spool thumbing and some grunting I'd managed to to turn this fish and have it heading my way until it decided it wanted that rock some more ,  with a few ugly rod angles and a few more grunts I managed to get him boat side for netting and my 1st blackspot in 20 + yrs was on the floor of the boat and we was in absolute awe of the colours this fish went, ended weighing in at a modest 10.2kg after being bled. 
Enough rambling, I'll let everyone enjoy the pics
Cheers Josh <><
 

Thanks Kelvin, we actually did burley a lot more on Saturday that we ever have, mainly because we had a lot of spearo's and other boats driving around us, my fish was a real a fatty. the overall results for the day were my fish @ 9.4kg , my mates was 9.8kg  & 6kg, we both got busted up by solid fish and i pulled the hooks on fish just before the net which would have been around 4-5kg mark.  
you can see in the pic below my fish upside down and how fat his gut was,   

Thanks Kelvin, we actually did burley a lot more on Saturday that we ever have, mainly because we had a lot of spearo's and other boats driving around us, my fish was a real a fatty. the overall results for the day were my fish @ 9.4kg , my mates was 9.8kg  & 6kg, we both got busted up by solid fish and i pulled the hooks on fish just before the net which would have been around 4-5kg mark.  
you can see in the pic below my fish upside down and how fat his gut was,   

The weekend come around with some good weather so we hit up the reef out of Turkey beach for a few days. The coral trout were good quality along with big red throat and cod.
We snorkelled around lunch on Saturday in the shallows then we anchored up Saturday night in the same spot and had a glass out on Sunday.
A few sharks got some of our big trout but most fish made the deck. I'm already keen to do another trip up there fingers crossed for good weather.