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THERE'S ALWAYS TIME FOR FEEEEESH!!
Well February has been busy!! The girlfriend was here for 3 weeks so I didn't get out to fish much however I did take her acouple times and I think I might have gotten her hooked on fly. For her first outing I took her for a chartered trip to the Hinchinbrook where we spent 10 hours on the hour without landing a single fish. Not even Graham our guide could land one, but he did get one hook up that got off as he passed Sharon the rod. The downside to barbless hooks, oh well. No worries though, we had fun and Sharon didn't complain once!! After this trip she was very determined to get herself a barra so I took her to Aplin's weir which is where the salt and fresh sections of the Ross river meet. It is supposed to be a barra hot spot and I have seen them chasing bait there at dusk regularly. Anyways nothing our first trip or our second or third which I even bought a cast net for. It was kinda fun catching bait though and Sharon had fun playing with the shiners (what I call the baitfish I caught). Eventually I just said fuck it and I took her to the barra pond. Within second of her putting her bait in the water WHAMMY!!! Sharon caught her first fish. Right after she decided to try the fly, and even faster then the previous fish this next one smashed the fly like a bull dowser. After a 10 minute tug-of-war I grabbed the fish and pulled him onto the grass for a picture. By the end of the day we where both pretty beat but it was worth it.
Whose a big hungry barramundi??
With Sharon gone I was able to get out on the water with a fella named Sam from the saltwaterflyfishing.com.au forums. It was a great day, not much wind, clear skies not bad tides but unfortunately we didn't land anything but saw lots of fish and I learnt quite abit about the Maggie Island flats. Pretty much it divided into three main flats and there are lots of deep channels between them. We also saw a large black tip reef shark and afew other smaller ones. Tons of turtles were also spotted along with a small manta ray and large school of spotted eagle rays. The show stopper was defiantly Mr. Toad who is a resident massive toad fish responsible for biting straight threw quite afew hooks earning him celebrity status.
Two days later I went out with a member of NQ Fly fishers named Brad. It was a very cloudy day, with quite a strong south eastern wind which really dirtied the water. After four rather crap hour on the flats we decided to hit up the rocky area around kissing point however it was too windy and after 15 minutes of fighting the wind with our flies we decided enough was enough so we headed back into the ross to chase some barra. We took the boat about a km up this small drain until we got to some water pipes that formed alittle dam and had freshwater draining. We fished this whole drain but nadda. Right after we exited the drain we continued hitting the snags on the main part of the Ross river. I saw a fish jump so I threw my fly at it which ended up getting twisted around a branch. No worries, the little bugger have been hungry cause he jumped out of the water grabbed the fly and snapped the branch off!! I had been fishing a chartreuse bendback rattler fly and I must say I am impressed with how weedless it was very, few hangups.
At this point we were getting a alittle frustrated, with only 2 shit fish landed, (Brad had caught a small estuary cod on the edge of the flats) our luck needed to improve, and it did in the way of a large school of Australian tarpon!! The tarpon here are dwarfs compared to Atlantic tarpon in the states but without a doubt posses all of the heart!! They hit hard, jump all over the place and take of very quickly. Just look at there tail, very similar to a bonefish. They also just dont like to give up and fight you all they way to the boat and then sum. Most are between 25-40cm. We cast at them as they rolled throwing countless flies at them but nothing worked until, I tossed on a small weighted shrimp pattern and walla, Hookup!! Over the next couple hours we cracked the code and found that they we hitting right where the muddy water hit the incoming tide producing a visible "colour line" in the water. They were feeding unusually deep, as they usually feed near or on the surface. We dead drifted flies through he colour line and right as they exited the muddy water into the clearer water, acouple of small strips triggered the bite!! Brad landed the largest at 55cm and my largerst was 50cm. In two hours we had landed about 15 fish including a double header.
I have also purchased acouple "toys" that I have been playing with include the long awaited inflatable kayak but I'm tired and and its time for bed.
Before tarpon After tarpon, same fly tied by (taken from http://www.jonmakimflies.com/) Jon Makim
Chartreuse Bendback
