Over closures
reigns
hotspots. Queenfish, golden and diamond trevally are all line burners, a bucket-load of fishing fun and susceptible to any number of fishing techniques including lure casting, flyfishing, jigging, trolling, and bait fishing.
Not only are queenfish a revered sport fish, treated right – bled and iced quickly after capture – they prove good table and barbecue fare.
Expect queenfish and the trevallies to be active at popular hotspots including Salamander Reef and local headland and island spots.
SILVER LININGS
THE closure won’t disappoint some topwater fisho’s who love nothing more than throwing large surface lures in pursuit of GT’S or giant trevally.
The big pelagic predators won’t stop feeding on the protected fusiliers and that’s precisely where these anglers will cast poppers, chuggers and stickbaits to draw the most dramatic strikes.
Reliable numbers of GT’S will be found at most inner
reefs while the Palm Island group is home to some enormous trevally, the same surface fishing tactics used to draw fish from treacherous shallow water reef and bommie structures.
BARRA WINDOW
TIDES generally suit anglers chasing barramundi this weekend, just 10 days of the 2022 Queensland east coast barra season remaining.
Barra, mangrove jack, salmon, flathead and most other species encountered within local creeks and rivers (Moses perch and similar excepted) will not be impacted by the fin fish closures.
Luke Neill from the Fishing Warehouse catches perhaps more than his fair share of salty barramundi and come November 1, when the wild barra fishery slams shut for 3months, Neill will just migrate his barra efforts to local weir waters – just like he did earlier this week.
Neill was tight lipped about which of Ross River’s three weirs he fished, but he did admit to using a large paddletail soft plastic lure during the evening hours to hook several thumping barramundi, the largest measuring a whopping 122cm. “I hooked it close to a weed bank and when I got the bite, said.
“My line pointed straight at the weed… I could feel it on the line and then I heard the jumps way out to the right.”
I thought oh, no,” Neill
The gun angler said the big barra pretty much wore itself out with several jumps as it tried to rid itself of the lure.
“It wasn’t a difficult fight and after the jumps I just had to steer it from the weed before I could land it,” he said.
Stretching beyond the magic 120cm mark, Neill was keen to quickly return the big barra to the water.