FLATHEAD TAKE BAIT OR LURES
HI everyone, hope you have all had a good week. We were blessed with some fantastic winter conditions for hitting the water on the Tweed and Gold Coast this week giving anglers an opportunity to head out for fish. With the swell easing offshore conditions were much more friendly to venture out for a look. Let’s see what’s been on the bite.
Customers have been doing well in the Broadwater and around Jumpinpin this week scoring some nice flathead on a mixture of bait and lures.
Some good spots to try in the Broadwater are Wavebreak Island, Paradise Point, Brown Island, Aldershots, Coomera River, Never Fails and Tipplers Passage. Around Jumpinpin try Cabbage Tree Point, Jacobs Well, Tiger Mullet Channel, Pandanus Island, Crusoe Island, Cobby Passage and Kalinga Bank.
Zman soft plastics in the 3-4” sized range have been producing some nice fish, my favourite plastic is the 4” Streakz Curl tail rigged on a 3/8 3/0 headlocks jig head fished on 12lb trace.
Trolling hard body lures like Zerek Tango Shads, Rapala, Storm, Manns or Tilson lures in the shallower areas has also been working well.
If you prefer your bait fishing try drifting bait, it’s a great way to temp flathead that tend to be lazy and wait for a feed to come to them. WA pilchards, white pilchards, mullet fillet strips, prawns or yabbies are great bait. Flathead are ambush predators so keeping the bait on the move to cover more ground increase your chances of finding better numbers of fish.
Good catches of bream have been taken this week. The recent rain has made them extremely active during the winter breeding season.
If you are keen to get the kids out for a fish over the weekend chasing bream is a great option, there are so many spots on the Gold and Tweed Coast to try land-based as well as from the boat. Land based just try your local jetty, rock walls or bridges is a good place to start looking, get a burly trail going and hopefully you will come up trumps.
If you can get out in the boat try the Gold Coast Seaway, Wavebreak Island, Paradise Point Bridges, Runaway Bay, Coomera River Bridges, Dux, Crusoe Island, Tiger Mullet Channel, Short Island and Logan River are worth a look.
Clint from Brad Smith Fishing Charters reports fishing a few days after the rain in the Broadwater, conditions were tricky with southerly winds, water temps, and air pressure all up and down. The good news is the rain and wind cleared much of the snot weed. The fishing hasn’t been great but there are a stack of big bream around the Seaway and Southport main channel markers.
Otherwise there has been scattered winter whiting, flathead, tuskies, flounder, tarwhine and school mackerel.
Gavin from Sea Probe Fishing Charters reports out wide on the shelf there has been marlin , dolphin fish and yellowfin tuna up to 50kg. On the 36 fathoms grounds there has been a lot of trag jew, tusk fish, moses perch and blue spot flathead on the chew.
Hope you all have a good week and stay healthy and safe.
If you have any great catches or photos you would like to share, please email us at brett@fishotackle.com.au and let us know how you went.
Stay up to date with all fishing regulations in Queensland https://www.daf.qld.gov.au/business-priorities/fisheries