Offshore looking good
HI everyone, hope you are all having a nice week, it’s certainly been a mixed bag of weather on the Gold and Tweed Coasts this week with extreme heat, strong winds and a big swell making conditions difficult to get out on the water and chase a feed.
Good news as we head into the weekend with a break in the weather seeing lighter winds and a drop in swell at the time of writing, giving fishos the best weather window we have seen for a while.
Just make sure you have the most up-to-date forecast before planning a trip. Let’s check out a few options for the weekend and the week ahead.
The weather this weekend is looking favourable to head offshore in search of a feed.
Given the current shallow state of the Seaway even a small swell may see waves breaking on a run out tide, just use caution and common sense if you are planning to go offshore. The recent swell would have stirred up the closer reefs, fingers crossed there will be a few nice fish on offer.
The 18 and 24 fathom grounds off the Gold Coast will be well worth a look.
As always try to get an early start and take advantage of the sunrise bite time, have a good look on the sounder for signs of fish and bait holding in the area. I prefer to anchor up and get a burly trail going and try to pull any fish down current closer to your boat for you to target.
The main species to target will be Snapper, Spangled Emperor, Moses Perch, Tusk Fish, Trag Jew, Silver Jew and Cobia.
Inshore the warmer weather and humidity has seen the feisty Mangrove Jack being caught in better numbers the past week.
When looking for an area to target you are basically looking for somewhere that has some current flow, a bit of structure for the Jacks to hide in and a supply of baitfish to feed on.
Areas that have bridges, pontoons, moored boats, rock walls, rock bars, snags and fallen trees will all be worth a go.
Some good spots to have a look are the Tweed River, Nerang River, Currumbin Creek, Tallebudgera Creek, basically all canal systems, Runaway Bay, Paradise Point, Coomera River, Jacobs Well and the Logan River.
For the lure fishos try a mixture of soft plastics in paddle bait around 4 to 5 inches long rigged on a heavy-duty jig head, shallow diving hard bodies and surface lures will also do the job. Live baits like herring, mullet, pike, garfish, silver biddies and winter whiting either unweighted or weighted depending on the structure you are fishing are very affective when the jacks are switched on.
My favourite dead bait is mullet fillet or half a small poddy mullet lightly weighted – the jacks just seem to smash these baits well with a good hook-up rate.
My normal outfit is either a medium to heavy rod, size 4000 spin reel spooled or bait caster with 30lb braid and 40 lb leader with a size 5/0 or 6/0 hook depending on what bait you are using.
You will normally get a bit of by-catch such as bream, trevally and cod in the same areas. Brad from Brad Smith Fishing Charters reports fishing was difficult this week with the low barometer and high temperatures typical of February. Cyclone Gabby is quickly moving away from the East Coast, thankfully we won’t be influenced much, apart from some bigger swell and moderate wind.
He said they still managed to catch whiting on MMD splash prawns at Tallebudgera creek, and Flathead on Ecogear ZX40 and breamer vibes in the deeper areas at Tweed River.
If you have any great catches or photos you would like to share, please email us and let us know how you went email brett@coomerahouseboats.com.au