By JACK MANGROVE
WITH the offshore scene a little on the rough side, anglers tended to opt for the river last weekend with some great results.
Starting at the river mouth, there have been plenty of quality bream being landed around the rocks at the mouth. Most anglers using fresh strips of mullet, whole small Hardy Heads and live bloodworms.
Blackfish have also been on offer with the better fish coming at the top of the tide.
Expect to find tailor and trevally also around the mouth harassing the bait schools as they move into the river on the tide.
On the other side of the river the Frying Pan has also seen good bream, tailor and trevally.
This is the time of year you’ll find some very large tailor in our rivers and they are not afraid to take a lure off the surface – medium size poppers and walk the dog lures are a good option and provide plenty of entertainment as you see the fish crunch the lure. Some of my favourites are the larger Bassday Sugapens and the River2sea Bubble Pops.
Woods Bays and The Noosa Sound have had mixed schools of trevally, including golden, diamond and big giant trevally. Early morning and late afternoon have been the prime times but there are still plenty of fish taken through the day especially when there is cloud cover.
Micro jigs continue to be one of the standout lures for chasing trevally throughout the river and allow you to cover a lot of area and fish the entire water column. Soft plastics are another consistent producer with a good mixture of baitfish and prawn imitations producing the goods. Take the time to rig your plastics nice and straight to get the best results.
Up on the ski runs, the odd jewfish has been coming from the deeper holes as well as large flathead up to 80cm – live baits have been the go with the good old herring doing the trick.
As the weather improves this week, a trip out to North Reef and the Barwon Banks may be on the cards – you should see some snapper, cobia, pearlies, sweetlip and amberjack.
Using Micro jigs and soft plastics has seen anglers scoring some nice fish and are a great way to fish the bottom, using a lure the bait is not picked to pieces by the smaller fish and you tend to catch more legal fish.
Sunshine Reef should also be firing and we are still see some good pelagic action on these closer reefs. Spanish and spotted mackerel are still cruising around and seem to take a liking to a lightly weighted large pilchard or yakka.
On the beaches, tailor are still moving up the coast, with good schools reported around most of the coastal headlands.
Most gutters along the coast are holding bream, dart and the odd flathead. Fishing flesh baits like mullet and bonito fillets has resulted in some good captures.
So on behalf of Jack Mangrove, best of luck on your fishing adventures.
