MrWobbygong

That's the go! Might be due to come have a look down south ... is there any camping on the islands in the bay? Hmm

That's the go! Might be due to come have a look down south ... is there any camping on the islands in the bay? Hmm

That's the go! Might be due to come have a look down south ... is there any camping on the islands in the bay? Hmm

That's the go! Might be due to come have a look down south ... is there any camping on the islands in the bay? Hmm

It is with a heavy heart that I tell the tale of a long lasting friendship that ended on Friday.
It was about 1982 I was introduced to GT270 and we became inseparable for nearly 43 years.
I dressed it up with all the nicest of accompaniments over those years and it served me well with many fine encounters of being triumphant.
Sadly on Friday it threw a tanty with the grinners around Mud...what a terrible way to go....topped itself about shoulder height is a most unexpected way...what a disgraceful way to go after being such a champion for so many decades.
Now standing in the corner with all the other dis-used, abused and broken, like a naughty child told to stand in the corner facing the wall....not a whimper at all.
Thank you Mr SnyderGlas for creating my prototype friend, he was an outstanding comrade for so very long.
My initial thoughts were disbelief and a hollow sense that grows within....thoughts of finding a suitable replacement to fill the void and then the realisation that nothing else could fulfill the spot in the rack.
To be honest, i don't think I could develop that amount of trust into something I could buy today...pure graphite just does not have the personality or the toughness of glass and graphite blends.
Anyway, enough of the dwelling on loss and time to regale the stories from Friday....6am launch....live baits by 6.15am....Mud at 6.25am.....Bloody bastard grinners within seconds ad they didn't stop.
So After several spot changes I found ourselves well east of Mud on a rubble patch i had not previously encountered in 12m of water. 1st cast was a small squire, then a few grinners....retie the leader and cast out again only to feel another grinner on the bait....ripped the bait away from it harshly and BANG...huge hit and peeled 30 odd metres from the reel then all became slack...reeled it in to find a lot of grinner teeth marks on the last 40mm of leader...dirty little shytes.
Oh well....came back to the rock wall and the water was filthy so went to the tripods for a quick look..not much there but in crossing the channel i spotted a school of jew so spent the next 30 minutes trying to coax some interest out of them....I left them sleeping and quietly motored away, defeated once more.
Into the river!!!!  I don't know why i got excited then, the high light was the biggest flounder I have caught in 30 years, and a couple of jumbo bream in the kilo class....snapper flathead and jew we encountered were all wearing nappies....
I ended the day with a leisurely drive from Pinkenba to Petrie that took 1.45 hours in the Friday afternoon Gateway traffic....so relaxing indeed.

Hey Vince. Welcome to AFO.
Its a good question but my answer is a bit lame sorry. Hopefully someone with better info will answer you soon. 
A bit more info would help too. 
Size of boat and how heavy?
4 stroke or 2 stroke?
Age of engine. 
The best I can do is say go for a good run with a full tank (with a spare tank just in case). Work out how far you have gone on your GPS or just on a map. Then top up the tank to work out how much you used. That is what I do as my fuel gauge is rubbish. 
Hope that helps. I ALWAYS have a small spare tank that is big enough to get me home from pretty much anywhere. They don't take up much room and it makes me feel better.
 

Just finished this spin rod for a mate. 7’5 graphite blank built for a 5k Stradic loaded with 30lb braid. All Fuji components. Loving how it turned out!
This will be used to chase snapper and trout on plastics up to 1oz, as well as tuna and mackerel on slugs up to 40g. Could even cast small stickbaits at reef edges too - proper Swiss Army knife!

My son spent some time fishing over at Amity Point without me. 
He wanted to target pelagics landbased and he certainly produced the goods. He was targeting bonito on small metals next to the boat ramp. He was  doing okay when a ripper of a Spanish mackerel grabbed the small lure. He wasn't fishing with wire and managed to hook it squarely in the mouth. He also didn't have a gaff. There was a big crowd of onlookers watching him land the fish and several boats returning back to the ramp with donuts. It could be a long time before he gets a bigger one landbased. 
 
 

Had today booked for a rare fishing trip with my brother in Yewgary after seeing the forecast earlier in the week. We kept a close eye on the forecast sites particularly BOM MetEye which showed very fishable conditions. Woke early and checked the observations. Wind, swell and a few showers but with the forecast promising we decided to go. 
well we punched out 1/4 the way there and it was gross. BOM totally smoking the reefer! We changed plans and stayed in close drifting some broken ground, waiting for the weather to improve. 
things were slow for me but my brother managed a fish on each of the first 3 drifts. I picked up a small grassy on drift 4 and then we decided to inch out a bit deeper. Well it was windier and rougher as expected and I wasn’t feeling great. Been crook a couple of times at work on boats but this was next level! Still managed to fish and got smoked out here before picking up another 2 grassies. Next drift my bro changed lures and got an instant hookup on a freight train - straight into the reef! Bruised battered and busted up we called it a day. Limped home with our tails banged up to our ears and a few fish in the box. Got back on dry land and the sea sickness remained. Battled the nausea home and into bed with a bucket, woke up 4 hours later with a cracking headache, aches and pains and still feeling like praying to the porcelain pisser!

Got away with the girls for the mothers day weekend.
Left Donnybrook boat ramp around 130pm on Saturday, boat packed to the gunnell , cruised over, set up camp.. 
Left the girls on the beach and dropped the pots in with some chicken frames, just on the edges of holes towards lime pocket. Pumped some yabbies to fish from mission pt campground. 
Got a few on the first soak, came back to camp to continue feeding the bream and Moses perch.
Second soak Got a couple more, had a flick and got a nice whiting and tested the trolling motor (it didn't fall off)
A mate that camped next to us caught a 53cm snapper and a 43cm whiting on yabbies while I was enjoying time with the fam. Some cracking fish for the passage.
The rest of the weekend was filled with camp oven lamb shoulder, toasted marshmallows and more crabs. Ended up with more than enough for myself, my mate, my mum and even the dog had a taste. 
Good trip. Keen to really give the trolling motor a workout soon.  

Got away with the girls for the mothers day weekend.
Left Donnybrook boat ramp around 130pm on Saturday, boat packed to the gunnell , cruised over, set up camp.. 
Left the girls on the beach and dropped the pots in with some chicken frames, just on the edges of holes towards lime pocket. Pumped some yabbies to fish from mission pt campground. 
Got a few on the first soak, came back to camp to continue feeding the bream and Moses perch.
Second soak Got a couple more, had a flick and got a nice whiting and tested the trolling motor (it didn't fall off)
A mate that camped next to us caught a 53cm snapper and a 43cm whiting on yabbies while I was enjoying time with the fam. Some cracking fish for the passage.
The rest of the weekend was filled with camp oven lamb shoulder, toasted marshmallows and more crabs. Ended up with more than enough for myself, my mate, my mum and even the dog had a taste. 
Good trip. Keen to really give the trolling motor a workout soon.  

Yeah he was stoked, heard him from 1km away, then redlined his 2 stroke all the way back to show off (both times he caught a fish) and put them on ice.
all in all perfect weekend, the forecast for Sunday was up to 15mm and we maybe got 2mm..
Back to reality..

Yeah he was stoked, heard him from 1km away, then redlined his 2 stroke all the way back to show off (both times he caught a fish) and put them on ice.
all in all perfect weekend, the forecast for Sunday was up to 15mm and we maybe got 2mm..
Back to reality..

Dohles was ok...Deckie dropped me off at the pontoon, I reversed down without waiting and deckie drove on and we were off the ramp in under a minute.
There were 4 boats being tied down and about 6 boats arrived at the ramp just after I pulled out....it would have been busier then.
Dohles ramp is pretty good being 3 lanes.....trailer parking is limited to about 30 trailers i guess...sorry 25 trailer parks....i just checked on google earth pro.  Best thing about it is there is a cafe that does great coffee at the ramp that opens at 5.30am every day.

Redcliffe was loaded with boats....like a regatta....hundreds of boats everywhere.....pine was the heaviest i have ever seen it too.
2 small snaps, 1 decent flounder, more than 6 tailor up to 60cm.....went into the pine for a look...found a pile of fish near the slabs with two big jew under them.....i pinned 1 jew on 8lb line.....that finished as soon as it found out it was hooked. Raef got done by something decent on the rock shelf.....boated several brassy trevally and small jew.....got about 2 litres of prawns for lunch.
All fish released....

Around 1986 I got to read a fishing journal from a elderly fellow that had recently died then. He lived at Shorncliffe and noted the fish he caught after work several days a week to feed his family from the late 1800's to about 1960ish. He seldom got days off work where he could go fishing for a day.
Snapper bream and mackerel were commonly caught...flathead were mentioned every week or so but not as common as snapper and bream. Mackerel were seasonal and he would exclusively target them when around, ignoring the usual fish. Mackerel were mainly 2 to 3 feet long.
Kingfish were a prized fish, probably because it was land based and handlined being a tough fish to land. Jewfish were known as soapies, he did not mention a large one.
Numbers of fish caught were generally about 4 to 6 fish...enough for the evening meal i guess.
Seldom did this man spend more than about an hour fishing and always land based with cat gut lines.
Baits were generally off cuts from previous captures, although he did use ox heart and liver at times.
Weed beds were thick right to the foreshore.
From memory he encountered sharks only in the summer months.
He seldom mentioned crabs....and if he did it was large numbers....potato sacks full.
Eels were commonly complained about.
Weather from what i gathered and remember reading was not unlike our weather now....droughts and floods / flushes, prolonged winds and hot or cold temps.
He noted captures declining as well.

I remember @Andrew_P telling us that Moreton Bay is a good place to raise the kids as it is full of nutrients, so that is why we find a few of the more northern species showing up here.
@crazywalrus has caught Nannygai in the Bay at least 10 years ago. I have been hearing of northern species being caught in and around the Bay for quite a while. I have a spot on the southern end of the Sunny Coast where we regularly get undersize Red Throat Emperor, although last time @benno573 managed a 46cm version.
Perhaps due to the extra people fishing, since every man and his dog bought a boat during the Covid years, and the proliferation of fishing pages on Facebook are combining to highlight more that these northern species are caught locally. From my observations of social media, Peel Island seems to throw up more than its fair share with crayfish, Coral Trout and Nannies.
Maybe these fish have been local in greater numbers in the past, but with less fishers and no real means to communicate the catch, or even a reluctance to divulge, we never heard about them. No doubt technology is playing its part also.

Good topic....leaves me with mixed feelings on todays fishing.
Most notable fish changes I have noticed are the following:
Bream....catching genuine 1kg bream used to be normal....fish in the high 30's were normal in the 70's and 80's....biggest one I caught was 47cm but skinny as anything post spawn. In the past two years I have caught two legit 1kg bream.
Yellowtail kingfish.....in the early 80's there were large schools of simply massive fish in Moreton Bay....1.2 to 1.5m fish. About mid 80's NSW had massive YTK fishtraps being used....almost wiped out the stocks migrating the coast....Have not seen one over 1.2m in decades.
Snapper....numbers have not changed much but average capture sizes are about 1/2 the size of the 70's is most areas I have fished. Interestingly snapper were either bait or trolled hard bodies back then and plastics didn't work well....plastics have taken over, but I have noticed a bit of decline in the past 6 years in two places that hold decent fish....bait is still catching the same amount.
Sharks....seasonal for me and I didn't target them too often but I don't see the numbers of sharks I used to in the 70's and 80's.....I remember seeing them in the hot water outlet of the power station in frightening numbers, dozens visible any time of the day or night.In the Bribie Passage we used to lose decent snapper and jew to sharks fairly regularly back in those days...I have lost fewer than 5 fish in the past decade to sharks. I know lots of guys have real problems with them these days, but I just don't have the issue enough to bother me.
Gold spot cod......they are bloody tiny these days on average. I could manage 80cm cod every run to the port in the 80's....a 50cm cod now is noteworthy.
The biggest changes though are fishermen and women.....numbers are simply massive now and lots of those are decked out with high tech sounders and GPS units....Sure most don't use them well but still quite a lot use them effectively and catch lots of fish.....and this brings forward the next point.
Fish education.....catch and release might be good for fish stocks but it does educate them about the lures or baits we use. The "in" lure to use today gets flogged in the faces of the fish so much they learn to not touch that lure. Now catch and release is essential for all undersized fish and I fish myself also selective of the size of fish I will harvest.....I will not take snapper under 50cm for example....so I am guilty of educating the fish with the lures I use too.
I recently dug out an old lure box from the 80's....I will be giving these lures a run heavily over this winter to see how they go.....will let you know.
Also of note here is the environment.....it has changed massively in a lot of places, some better and some worse. In the 80's Redcliffe tides ran south for the incoming and north for the outgoing all the way up to Scarborough reef and probably beyond....todays water movement is a slow constant southward current and no north movement at all....This occurred with building Fishermans Island at the Port. The reefs off Redcliffe are well silted these days as well.
Water quality of the Brisbane River is far better today than in the 80's up to Breakfast Creek....not much data outside of that though.   We had regular droughts back then as well....salinity levels were higher then than in the past 15 years with the constant flushes happening.....results show in the captures.
In the mid 80's there was a quite severe drought where we saw lots of fish that were normally offshore being caught inshore. Pearl Perch land based around the Tweed and on the sunshine coast headlands....spanish mackerel in Bramble Bay...cobia at Dohles Rocks....YTK at Shorncliffe pier.
 

Good report @MrWobbygong. Some nice catches there.

Thanks for letting us know. Hard to beat a camping and fishing/crabbing trip with the family.
I'm taking it that your mate was somewhat surprised to get a 53cm snap ! As for an over 40 whiting - well, that's just showing off. haha
Lucky dog.

Got away with the girls for the mothers day weekend.
Left Donnybrook boat ramp around 130pm on Saturday, boat packed to the gunnell , cruised over, set up camp.. 
Left the girls on the beach and dropped the pots in with some chicken frames, just on the edges of holes towards lime pocket. Pumped some yabbies to fish from mission pt campground. 
Got a few on the first soak, came back to camp to continue feeding the bream and Moses perch.
Second soak Got a couple more, had a flick and got a nice whiting and tested the trolling motor (it didn't fall off)
A mate that camped next to us caught a 53cm snapper and a 43cm whiting on yabbies while I was enjoying time with the fam. Some cracking fish for the passage.
The rest of the weekend was filled with camp oven lamb shoulder, toasted marshmallows and more crabs. Ended up with more than enough for myself, my mate, my mum and even the dog had a taste. 
Good trip. Keen to really give the trolling motor a workout soon.  

Got away with the girls for the mothers day weekend.
Left Donnybrook boat ramp around 130pm on Saturday, boat packed to the gunnell , cruised over, set up camp.. 
Left the girls on the beach and dropped the pots in with some chicken frames, just on the edges of holes towards lime pocket. Pumped some yabbies to fish from mission pt campground. 
Got a few on the first soak, came back to camp to continue feeding the bream and Moses perch.
Second soak Got a couple more, had a flick and got a nice whiting and tested the trolling motor (it didn't fall off)
A mate that camped next to us caught a 53cm snapper and a 43cm whiting on yabbies while I was enjoying time with the fam. Some cracking fish for the passage.
The rest of the weekend was filled with camp oven lamb shoulder, toasted marshmallows and more crabs. Ended up with more than enough for myself, my mate, my mum and even the dog had a taste. 
Good trip. Keen to really give the trolling motor a workout soon.  

Got away with the girls for the mothers day weekend.
Left Donnybrook boat ramp around 130pm on Saturday, boat packed to the gunnell , cruised over, set up camp.. 
Left the girls on the beach and dropped the pots in with some chicken frames, just on the edges of holes towards lime pocket. Pumped some yabbies to fish from mission pt campground. 
Got a few on the first soak, came back to camp to continue feeding the bream and Moses perch.
Second soak Got a couple more, had a flick and got a nice whiting and tested the trolling motor (it didn't fall off)
A mate that camped next to us caught a 53cm snapper and a 43cm whiting on yabbies while I was enjoying time with the fam. Some cracking fish for the passage.
The rest of the weekend was filled with camp oven lamb shoulder, toasted marshmallows and more crabs. Ended up with more than enough for myself, my mate, my mum and even the dog had a taste. 
Good trip. Keen to really give the trolling motor a workout soon.  

Nice stuff! 

Been a while between "drinks" ...
 
Life has swamped me of late, losing hair faster than I'm losing money but still kicking so can't complain..
Ended up picking up a second hand ACDC tig and some Consumables off the wifes facebook marketplace for $500... has dual pulse inbuilt which is nice I suppose... 350A unit so plenty of heat when it's needed.. compliments my dedicated DC pipe welder nicely. Perfect to stay in the shed for little jobs...
Picked up the 4mm plate and SHS from the local metal supplier on a Saturday which was nice... $130 
Anyway, made up the trolling motor mount today, enjoyed welding the fresh ally, enjoyed everything but welding upside down tying the mount into the dirty aluminium. Got it on, it's solid... 
Have booked a site at mission point next weekend with the family to celebrate mothers day (and also run the pots and flick some lures about)
.... good to have some progress on the boat, definitely made me think about the mods I'm gonna do in the future and how I can make the welding as easy as possible.