Another Wazza

My mate sent me this ages ago, the animal in question?

@GregOug, I think someone has hijacked your profile, and this imposter is posting photos of fish!!!, what’s going on!, Hahahaha, good work in the trying conditions

Hi there Nick, excellent report on your day out fishing, 2 forkies still beats no fish at all. Ive never fished the river by kayak before, but I did do a bit of land based just downstream from Wivenhoe spillway, and Mt Crosby weir, this was back in the late 90’s early 2000’s, so I really don’t know how well it fishes now. Back then we did alright using spinner baits, and feeder crays purchased from a pet shop, there were plenty of quality Bass, and forkies to be caught, and on occasion, big Lungfish, the Lungies would leap like Barra once hooked and took quite some effort to subdue before being released. All the best on your quest for a wild Bass, given the amount of effort you put in on this trip, it’s only a matter of time really, good luck.

Mate, there are a number of ways to work any given lure, the real trick is working out (for yourself) which retrieval gets the fish, there is no substitute for time spent actually fishing. As for knots, that is entirely personal preference, the best knot is the one you can tie easily, and have enough confidence that it will do the job, again, there’s no substitute for time spent trying all sorts of different knots out, to see what works best for you. Im looking forward to seeing some results of all your hard work, best of luck.

The grey suits, aka “the tax man” are sharks, I thought I was sweet and in the clear having already paid more then my fair share, turns out I still owed a bit though.

Hahahaha!!!, the only thing blue that day was the look on my face , hard to gauge an overall size with the scraps I was left with, best guess somewhere around a metre?, it was arguing with me for quite sometime, perhaps thats what led to its demise?

Nice Jewie Steve, good work, it must have been a pleasant surprise I thought I had one for the board, just before Xmas, all the hard work was done, I was just reeling him in the last few metres..... then I got burgled in broad daylight!!, he would’ve been a cracker if I landed him whole. I still managed a decent feed with the flesh that was left though, and decided to preserve the jaws as a keep sake

I forgot to mention earlier, surely the catch of the day was that Kramer shirt Brian was sporting, classic

Nice work boys, will you be keeping those whiting heads for bait?

Thanks Neil, I ended up letting him go so another Southsider can claim him before the months up

Snapper for the Southside, it was just short of the 815mm esky lid, I’ll leave it up to Chris to examine photos and determine a final length

Zerek make a hardbody called the “speed donkey” and claim it’s good for 15kts, I’ve never tried one though so can’t really comment, just thought for $20 it may be of interest?

Hahaha, I was thinking the exact same thing, busy with school, little did I know it was building up like a volcano, and it finally erupted yesterday! Solid reports Hamish, well done, spewing about your crab pots though

Hahahaha, I wouldn’t say overkill, it appears adequate to me

Take some plastics up there for sure man, on that trip one of the deckies got a chance to take a tender out for a fish, he is an extremely able fisherman, and caught 8 nice coral trout in 1 hour using a generic prawn plastic, he has well and truely mastered the art of working that prawn, to put it into perspective, a lot of people onboard fished the entire week and didn’t catch 8 trout.

Ive taken bananas on boats many times and caught fish, have also been on other boats where the skipper is woofing into them, without any catastrophies unfolding. Having said that, I have smashed many...many mirrors in my time, and have no qualms about walking under ladders either, I think it’s entirely up to the individual to decide what sits best with them, and who or what to blame when things go south, Brian, that’s some mighty fine looking worms you got there, I haven’t been able to restock my supply since panic buying became a thing, did you get them from ALDI?, haha

Hahahaha, I’m well aware of that Brian, and don’t envy your predicament

Usually it’s a no brainer, fish beats cricket any day, but I’m going out on a limb here, and suggesting cricket, as I’m not sure the forecast will hold, the crickets guaranteed, the fishing could be canned that morning?, something to ponder Brian

Nice work, that’s one solid whiting

Ringed parrot I believe?, unusual capture on bait.

I almost left this little fella out of the trip pics, he was stunning, and looked mighty tasty, but there’s no way I could’ve brained him

For sure Brian, I’ll have to replenish my stock first, but they have definitely earnt their spot in my tackle bag

Hey Brian, I was mixing it up almost every drift, plastics in around 20m, bait further out, It all depended on how quick the drift was, no plastic stood out above the others, apart from soft vibes, with good fish caught on massive white jerk shads, 5 inch streaks in coconut ice, and nuke chicken,, and big pink grubs, just to name s few. I reckon I could’ve put a hook through my thong and if I could manage to get that down it too would’ve been hammered, hahaha

Whilst fishing out wide, the skipper pushed south that afternoon to another reef where he anchored up for the night, we woke the following day to good weather, but there was some instability on the horizon. We made the most of the good conditions working the eastern side of this reef where I managed to boat a solid Coronation Trout of about 65/67cm The weather from the south got a touch nasty just before lunch, a squall came through which saw us don the wet weather gear, one of my mates had left his jacket on the mothership, he was sending a whole squid down on 6 O gangs when it hit, he stopped his drop midway down to find something to use as protection from the rain, when he got belted by this thing He was stoked to get this one to the boat in one piece, as it was him who got sharked earlier, getting wet doesn’t bother you too much when your catching fish like that. The weather passed through, and later that afternoon we pushed further south to a reef I had fished before, this reef holds a good population of GT’s, and I was looking forward to having a crack at them on stickbaits. Whilst having dinner anchored in the safety of that lagoon, the menacing weather from the south west rolled through There were 2 solid storms back to back that evening, with the boat recording 55 knot winds, the skipper had his hands full that night, he kept the engines running in case we pulled anchor and made our way onto the reef. It passed through and all was well, the big rig handled it nicely. The next morning at this reef the weather was sloppy, standing at the front of the tender pegging stickbaits was out of the question, fishing the eastern side of the reef wasn’t possible as there was a northerly blowing. We worked the southern edge for a couple of hours, for no result, after each unproductive drift, I’d move east just a little more until we were at the south eastern extremity of the reef, it was a washing machine here, but we found the fish. I soon realised soft vibes should be made illegal, they are like fish crack, they can’t get enough of them, the take on the drop is awesome, far more aggressive then I expected. We all caught good fish here, and I managed to lose quite a few also, sometimes we were out gunned, other times you would win the battle only to have the sharks rob you, That afternoon we could work the eastern side, having gone through my supply of soft vibes, I resorted to old faithful, a big pink grub, that plastic out fished both my mates with bait that arvo, with the highlight being a trout that took it mid drop, I was minding my own business just talking to my mate when I had to thumb the spool hard to pull it up, expecting a red throat, I was shocked to see a trout on the end, it was a memorable afternoon. We left the Swains that night pushing south back to Sykes reef for our last day. We woke to more bad weather, with storms all around us, and the decision was made not to crane the tenders off the mothership, no objections from me here, we had gone hard the last 5 days and I was beginning to feel a bit rusty. Speaking to the skipper that morning he told me that at 2am we went through some of the worst weather he has experienced, massive electrical storms all around us with the boat recording a maximum of 78 knots of wind, a deckie filmed some of it on his phone and took a screenshot It shows 73 knots at that stage, all the while I should probably mention I had my best nights sleep of the trip that night, didn’t wake once during the 3m+ seas, testament to the boat really, with only some superficial damage done to the roof, and a lot of people losing clothes that were hanging out on the top deck rails. The fishing was slow that day at Sykes, my mates got a couple of trout, and one of the other punters got a legal cobia which he caught on a prawn plastic, we headed to Lamont reef for a few more drifts before pulling the pin and beginning the journey back to reality. Having not caught a proper Gt on a stickbait yet, I feel obligated to do this trip, or a similar one again. Thanks for reading, and here are a few more random pics of the trip.

Sorry to leave you hanging benno, but I’ve been in therapy working on developing coping mechanisms to help me be able to fish the bay again, hahaha