Noosa River Fishing Report

Fishing Noosa & Tewantin - Hooked on Angling & Outdoors

2009 - 2010

28 December 2009

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FISHING KNOTS
Learn to tie your knots the right way so they won't break at a critical moment.

Mangrove jacks are a prcious fish at any size. Even small ones make you think you have a record size bream on the end of your line. And when you catch two on the same outing, you know you have really 'made it'. So cool, you have to wear shades!

Thanks for the photos, keep sending them in!

28 December

After our last trip to Sunshine Reef some weeks ago, my mate Toby Back and I were aching to get back into the reefies and, with a small window of perfect weather between an otherwise bleak looking week, the car was loaded and we were on our way from Brisbane in record time. Arriving sunday night, we set to work preparing the boat and gear for what we thought was going to be a mind blowing reefy session. How wrong we were!

Making our way across the bar at first light in our 3.5m tinny was childs play thanks to the mill-pond-like state the bay was in. Just when we thought it couldn't get any better, we popped out around the headland to find quite rough seas over Sunshine Reef. Extremely dissapointed, we decided to head back to the bay and try for some bonito and mackeral tuna that were rumored to be around. As we slowly idled along, a few lures were thrown out the back in the hopes that a pelagic would decide to make our early morning start to the day worth it. Not 10 minutes after our troll commenced, my lure was whacked with ferocity and after a resonably energetic few runs and some wild headshakes, a 85cm spotted mackeral was safely in the Enviro Net. Talk about happy! We had heard the mackeral were in season but didn't think for a second that any would come our way- how wrong we were.

After a delcious breakfast of fresh mackeral, we headed out into the bay again, deciding to have a bit of fun with the local bonito and mack tuna population. Giving 45cm a nudge, they weren't gigantic, but on our light 1-2kg spin sticks we had enough fun with them to kill a few hours before heading back for lunch. The afternoon was spent catching a few whiting and bream up Weyba Creek before heading into the bay to try for some mackeral on dusk.

We trolled the North Shore and Little Halls for the last hour and a half of daylight, myself managing 13 spotted mackeral upto 85cm to the fork and my mate Toby landing a beaut Spanish Mackeral pulling the scales down to 5.5kg and measuring a metre long! These fish were great fun on the light barra gear we were using - myself with a zillion 50th anniversary edition with 15lb braid and a 4-8kg G. Loomis Jerkbait Rod and Toby using his Noosa jack gear - a Calcutta 20 with 20lb braid and a 6-10kg Sic Stick Pro.

We were so addicted to the mackeral's way of fighting and those immensely powerful hits - we just had to have more! Tuesday morning saw us heading out at first light again straight to Little Halls, where we found good sized spotted mackeral averaging 85cm in their hundreds slashing up on the surface! For the next three or four hours we cast everything from slugs and hardbodies to plastics and even spinnerbaits - hell, we ended up using bare jigheads and found they worked just as good as the hardbodies and slugs! We were running a 30lb fluro leader so every fifth or sixth fish found its freedom but we didnt care - jigheads were a dime a dozen and we had caught between 35 - 40 fish by the end of our session we didn't care if one or two got away! We didn't keep any mackeral from this session, opting to release (successfully) every fish we caught.

After gettin sick of catching spotted mackeral we chased the small tuna again for a bit of light-tackle fun before heading in for a late lunch and a siesta before heading back out in the evening again to try and rustle up some more spaniards. This proved to be a smart move as during the evening trolling session I landed two (85cm;3.6kg and 86cm;3.9kg) as well as a few spotted mackeral. Toby, on the other hand, missed a huge strike from a presumed good sized spaniard and from then after only had a tiny bonito to show for his efforts!

We arrived back at home just on dusk (storms brewing to the north were getting so close our graphite rods began to vibrate and hum whenever we lwent to cast) and, after filleting our catch, we packed the car and made our way back to the city. Christmas, for us, had definately come early!

Cheers,

Tom Clancy

26 December Noosa Fishing Report

Mackerel in Laguna Bay

Suni with a great spotty mackerel

Hi its Suni.
Went out fishing on Tuesday morning and hooked up on this 70cm to the fork spotted mackerel with 6 pound braided main line and 12 pound leader. it was just luck that I hooked it in the right spot! I tried another 10 times and got bitten off! The spotted mackerel was just the small one in the group compared to all the other ones that where being caught. This all happened at little cove.

Thanks Suni, we think you did well to land it, good bit of angling skill!

Hi its Suni again

I hooked up to this 30cm to the fork whiting with a 'Savoy Shad' lure early in the morning on Thursday in Woods with my good friend Chris. I also caught a massive sting ray but i couldn't pull it upbecause it was so big. I only saw it when it came up to the surface for 2 seconds then it snapped me off - after a hour of playing it!
Chris - remora
hey its chris
on wednesday went out with my friend Suni all night, and early in the morning he hooked up to this massive sting ray and while i was pulling in my jig head with no squidgy on it because it just got pulled off by a fish this remora 50cm to the fork hooked just above the sting ray!

Barra Farm Option

Ben - whiting
Here's a 37 cm (to the fork) whiting I caught on tuesday. I caught it at the barra farm, and a few barra - the biggest being 75cm.
Ben Dorreen

A great option when visiting Noosa is to spend a day at the Barra Farm in Bli Bli. These barramundi still pull hard, and will test your gear and experience. There are some real big fish in those waters, as well as some very nervous whiting!

LAKE MCDONALD
Matt Cockram

Hey guys.
Went for an early morning fish up on Lake Mcdonald. I arrived to the rather loud noise of the resident cicadas, which got my expectations running high.

After the short run to Bass Bay, the fly rod was pulled out of the locker and a gurgler tied on to fish the surface. On the first cast I got a massive hit from a bass, but unfortunaly I missed the strike. On the very next cast I got another hit, this time the hook went in and I was connected after a spirted fight. A 36 cm bass graced the deck. Cant beat surface action, whether on fly or spin gear!

I continued to work the same bank and landed another bass on surface fly. While working the same bank I came across a school of active bass on the sounder, so I dropped a 'bass vampire' fly down on top of them. A few quick strips and I was connected again - another bass was on the deck.

At the end off the session I had landed 4 bass with 3 of them on fly.
Cheers Matt.

"THANK YOU" to all the anglers who have been sending in your photos with your reports. It makes this page fantastic! Real reports from real fishos.

Squid - great eating!

Paul - Snapper

Snapper from North Reef

Hi all.
Here are the photos of a recent fishing trip to North Reef (except the squid - which we caught at River Head). We found it very dificult to locate fish as the current was swinging all around. We could see them on the sounder, but postioning the boat to drop the baits on their heads took many tries and a lot of patience - and lead. Peter - Scarlet Sea Perch These fish were caught on bait as the jigs we had on board were to light. once you have caught your fill of mackerel, head out a bit wider and drop your baits deep. If you can see fish but are not catching them - don't give up! Have a look at conditions on the day, then check your rig to make sure it is suitable to the current circumstances. Just because the last time I fished North Reef and was successful with 1/4 ounce soft plastics, doesn't mean I will be next time. We had a ball catching these fish, and the only reason we were able to catch them was because we adapted to situation at hand. In practical terms, it means you need to carefully think about the gear you are going to take with you the day before you go. Believe me, a bit of careful planning can be the difference between having fun and wasting fuel!

Cheers, Paul.

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