By Jack Mangrove
OVER the last week there has been some quality fish landed in the Noosa River, the area around the Tewantin stretch and the Noosa Harbour has been a favourite for jack anglers.
Preferably, try and use live baits like herring, poddy mullet or live prawns. Using a snelled 4/0 hook set-up for the bait fish and a single for the prawns, Mustad Penetrators are great as they are very strong as well as being a lighter gauge so they do not damage the bait.
Using soft plastics like the Keitech Easy Shiners or the Zman Ez Shrimpz have also been seeing some success. In the low light periods surface lures will also attract the red devils.
Whiting have been in good numbers around the Frying Pan, Gympie Terrace stretch, Munna Point and the dog beach with the preferred bait being live worms and peeled prawns using a size 4 longshank bloodworm hook.
If you want to have some fun, have a go chasing the whiting on surface lures, the 65mm Fish Candy Skinny Dog from River2sea has produced the better elbow slapper.
Though the water is warming up there are still good schools of trevally and tailor present throughout the Noosa Sound and Woods Bays. Small pilchards, hardy heads and frog mouthed pilchards have been the go-to bait. Flathead still dominate the captures in the river and are in great numbers, for the bait angler small fish baits, or for the lure anglers soft plastics have got some outstanding results.
Though the wind hasn’t been in our favour for the past couple of weeks, the beach anglers have been getting some nice fish while braving the winds. Anglers are reporting quality tailor being caught fishing the deeper, cleaner gutters right along the Noosa North Shore.
Using mullet and bonito strips on a 4/0 snelled hook rig has been a prime bait. Good numbers of good-sized whiting, dart and bream have also been taken from the gutters along Noosa North Shore and the eastern beaches during the day using smaller baits like prawns and pippies.
The offshore reefs are producing some great fish like snapper, pearl perch, jew, sweetlip and cobia. North Reef, Chardons Reef and Sunshine Reef have been the prime spots.
The Reefs east of Double Island point in around 60m of water have seen larger pearl perch and the odd red emperor. Those hard fighting pelagics are really starting to come on with good schools of spotted mackerel and tuna taking live baits and floaters.
On the freshwater scene, bass have been active on the edges of Lake McDonald on weedless soft plastics. As well as fishing the edges, bass have been active in the open water, therefore fishing vibes like the 65mm Fish Candy Paddle Vibes will get you success.
On behalf of Jack Mangrove, best of luck on your fishing adventures!
