flathead

A FAVOURITE target species for many anglers, including myself, is the humble flathead. They love eating lures, fight well on light gear, are readily available, make great table fish for those wanting to keep a couple for a feed, and everyone is in the running to catch a trophy fish, whether fishing land based or from watercraft. Winter is a …

WELL 2020 has been one big rollercoaster but let’s hope things settle and we return to some sort of normality and can all get back to work. I’ve gone from not being able to work at all to finally being allowed to run my charters once more. We will see how it all goes, we’ve been changing techniques very quickly with …

WHEN it rains, it pours. And pour it did, with some parts of the Gold Coast shaken and stirred, copping 500mm or more. You can’t deny we needed it though, and boy was it good to hear rain on the roof. With all the creeks and estuaries in flood, the systems are receiving a well-overdue flush. The wet can really change things on …

EXPLODING in the US, the Ned rig is basically a stand-up presentation built around a mushroom-style jig head and a buoyant soft plastic, meaning in the water the plastic is either fleeing on the retrieve or rapidly standing up in a claws-up ‘defensive’ pose or tail-up ‘feeding’ pose on the pause. On the pause, the buoyant plastic moves around naturally …

HELLO all and welcome to this month’s edition of BNB and the Ballina fishing update. Over 600mm of rain was deposited in the Northern Rivers area and plenty found its way into the Richmond River. The discoloured water pushed out to sea for a couple of kilometres during the flood, but it has since cleaned up significantly, which will improve …

G’DAY everyone, as we discussed last month, the fishing was fantastic and it still is thanks to the record rainfall in February. In this month’s article I will pass on some tips for using vibration lures. They are both easy to use and of course highly effective. Three main styles of vibe lures include hollow plastic models with a rattling …

WELCOME to autumn. February definitely brought the heat and, finally, rain to most parts of Queensland, setting things up nicely for autumn fishing Gladstone style. Closer to the coast, rainfall has ensured the rivers and creeks get a much-needed flush of fresh water. Though I feel for the struggling farmers who missed out on relief from drought conditions and my …

“That’s why it’s called fishing, not catching,” I said with a resigned face after a quiet day on the water and not landing any fish. Fishing gets tough! For fishos, few things are more frustrating than fishing your reliable spots and coming away without a bite. It’s disheartening working hard to fruitlessly fish the same tides and times that have …

IF you’ve been on the east coast of Queensland in early 2020, it shouldn’t come as a shock when I say we’ve had a lot of rain, providing a solid freshwater flush. The southeast Queensland estuaries changed from the nice clear water we enjoyed for ages to a brown tannin colour as far as the eye can see. It’s not …

THIS month has been a bit of a mixed bag, with some days quite productive and others simply hard work. The better fishing has occurred on the lead-up to the full and new moons in the shallows. One thing I have noticed is even with the right tides, the fish have been rather finicky. All the little things such as …