Autumn fishing

Howdy all.

My camera is still getting fixed if you can believe it... Olympus by the way, so if your considering getting one just know that if you ever need to claim warranty it might take a while...  rant over.

So Saturday morning broke and I find myself launching the yak into a meesly 1ft of surf at the Kings Beach boat ramp.  Even though i have a Hobie Pro Angler, not exactly the best ocean going vessel but I punched out over, not through the waves and made it out with nothing but wet feet.  Beautiful.  I lobbed out a Halco 120 lure in Quantas colours and an Atomic Plazo's soft plastic.  I paddled out around Brays rock and headed towards Moffat Beach when I saw a floatilla of kayak coming towards me.  I thought they might have the hot tip so I turned and took up position in the line.  Tuna was the hunt of the day and after a few reports of other kayak blokes getting into some during the previous weeks I thought it was my turn.  Turns out it was not my turn and after 3 or so hours tracking something like 6k's I thought I would give up and paddle home.  On the way back my Halco went off and I landed a nice little 40cm squire.  Dinner sorted.

After Saturday's dismal efforts I gave up on the offshore front and headed back to my secret spot once again.  I loaded up the Boathoist trailer with the PA and set out to be on the water by 5am.  It wasn't till about 7am when I finally hooked up a little, 40cm, Jewie.  I have been getting a fair few of these little guys around here and they definately are fun on light gear.  Anyway he went back to get bigger.  I turned a corner and lobbed my plastic at a pontoon and on the drop it was snaffled by something with some go.  The fish darted straight out into the middle of the channel and I thought this familiar behaviour would lead to me bringing up a trevally.  Sure enough about a 40cm trevor pops in to say hello.  He went back after a few snaps on the phone.  I turned to go home and tried the last pontoon and hooked up to another, much bigger trevor that gave me some grief for 5 mins on my 2kg rod.  Eventually he spat the hook and won his freedom so no pic!  I leave you now with some shots of the day on my phone, I might have to start taking out my SLR to get some quality shots while my waterproof camera is getting fixed...

Spot x turns it on again

Good afternoon all.

I have been out fishing a fair few times in the last few weeks but unfortunately my camera is off getting repaired so good pics are hard to come by.  Anyway, I braved the rains and wind on Sarturday morning and ventured out to my secret spot to find some fish.  I chose a different launch spot this time that gave me less distance to travel and a shorter drive.  I slipped the yak into the water at gentleman's hours with a slow 6.30am start.  The sky was still dark from the rain clouds but they were holding off dumping their fury on me just now.  I paddled past the first few pontoons flicking an Atomic Plazos prawn look a like on a fairly weighty jig head as it was a 5m drop and the run in tide was picking up quickly.  I slowly hopped the prawn off the bottom for 15 minutes gliding past the pontoons.  I sighted a pontoon located on the corner of the main chanel and the entrance to some canals and thought that looked like a prime spot to sit and wait if I was a jack.  Surely enough on the first drop the lure was smashed and my rod buckled but 1 second later the lure was spat out.  That's a good start I thought as I loaded up the second cast.  A bit further this time and I was hopping back directly under the pontoon when I could feel nibbles, like something was just having a bash at the lure.  Cast again and more bashing then bang off he went, I could feel the line rubbing on the oysters on the pontoon so I dipped my rod tip way into the drink to create more angle and pulled the sucker out.  After a short fight on 12lb gear this little guy came up to say hello.  I took some photos just as the rain started pelting down and chucked him back as I went to find some shelter under the nearest overhanging deck.

When the rain let up I was back in the same spot looking for more action.  There were another 4-5 big hits but the hooks kept pulling or they only had the tail of the plastic in their mouths so I only wound up with the 1.  Still very happy with that anyway!

On sunday my mate left a note for his wife saying "gone fishing - back at 10" and drove from Brisbane to my place for a 5am start.  He was a bit nervous the whole time as he knew the wife would blast him when he got back.  The sun rose early and the day was completely opposite to the one before without wind or rain.  This was my mates first time out fishing in a yak so I was pretty stocked to show him some spots, give him some plastics and eventually put him onto a fish.  The same pontoon I got the jack from he pulled out a nice little Jewie.  Later after flicking for a few hours he pulled a horse of a bream out from another pontoon.  It was an awesome morning hanging out and fishing with my mate.  Ill leave you with a few pics of the day.

Hooked Up Magazine Issue 15

Howdy all.  My fishing has been quiet sporadic lately but all the times I have been out I have landed some quality fish for a change.  Seems I have tapped into something here...  The camera I use has carked it and is back at the manufacturers getting repaired/replaced and will be about 2 weeks off.  I have taken out the video camera however so I might pull some frames from the videos and post up some puctures.

In the meantime - check out www.hookedupmagazine.com.au.  There is some ugly mug on the cover with his PB jewie.

Hope you are getting a few - and able to get some pictures of em!

3rd ever Jew and still not a keeper. DUO lures!

Saturday morning last week marked the only clear patch from both wind and rain for the last 2 or so weeks.  It was also the first time I got to give those magical DUO lures a swim.  I started out as early as I usually do, watching the sunrise as I paddle around flicking some gear.  I started out the morning with dropping a few lures under the motorway bridge in the Mooloola River without a touch.  I changed up between everything I had with me and not even a touch.  I paddled further down the river towards Minyama Island and to the little stretch where I had been lucky a few weeks prior with the trevally.  I snapped on the DUO Spearhead Ryuki 80s and gave it a few swims to determine the action and sink rate etc.  I gave it a real flick for a few times at some pontoons without any luck.  I drifted with the tide back upstream a short distance and flicked into a bridge pylon, after sounding some interesting structure and fish returns I let the DUO sink and gave it a few hops accross the bottom until it was graciously gulped by what I initially thought to be a bream.  After a short battle I called it for a Jew because of the sustained fight but I knew it wouldn't be huge.  Up came this little fella for a few photo's.  Unfortunately my camera let me down yet again so I had to fish out my phone and get snappy with that.  It swam off happily spraying me with a tail flick to say thanks.

Thanks for reading.  Hope your all getting a few.

Little bit of DUO lure porn

Hello everyone.  I've been flat out trying to find a gap in the weather to cast a lure over the last few weeks so I don't have any fishy photo's to share.  I recently picked up some new lures called DUO lures so I thought I would post up a few pics of what they look like.  They are a bit different to every other lure I have used from big name companies.  DUO lures are what you might call the slimfit or skinny jeans of the lure world.  Across the shouldures most of the diving lures are much slimmer, I'm not sure if this adds or subtracts from the action as I havn't had much of an opportunity to swim them.  I can say that they are definatley a quality build and the ones that are painted should remain painted for a long time to come.  So the lures turned up to the door without split rings or trebles - I like putting on my own gear.  I put single lure hooks on most of them as I find I'm getting less snags and tangles using these without jeapordising my hook-up rate, yet.  I ran out of the smaller sized singles so some of the lures did end up with old fashioned trebles.  I took a few snaps of the smaller TOTO bream lures, the Realis popper and the larger bullet.  I will post up some more in the next few days once I have been able to get them to pose properly for the camera and hopefully with some bloody fish!

The DC9 bullet

Realis popper 64

Realis popper 64



Tetra Works - TOTO and Spearhead Ryuku



Tetra Works - TOTO and Sperahead Ryuki

PB GT

Well, my only GT.

I went for a short paddle in the Mooloola River in between the heavy rain periods we have been having here on the Sunshine Coast.  I launched under the motorway bridges and paddled my way up the canals past million dollar houses and yachts, poor suckers were probably at work.  It was a perfect day on the water with zero wind and a nice dirty water line forming as the fresh water pushed against the salt on its way out to sea.  I followed this line for about 1km watching the sounder picking up lots of activity under me.  I couldn't pin anything!  About an hour into the session I saw some action next to the canal revetment wall and flicked my Atomic surface walker right where the boil was and started the retrieve.  Two twitches into the retrieve it was smashed in an explosion of water and it took off like a freight train.  I called it for a Jack but it didn't dive for cover like I would have expected.  Line was peeling from my small reel and my 1kg rod had the biggest bend I had ever seen in it before.  I built the rod on a Samurai blank which had plenty of stick in the butt so I tightened the drag and gave him some curry and up swam a fish I had never cought before.

going to 41cm it was my PB and broke a month long drought I have been experiencing.  My camera battery was flat from the day before and I wasn't too fussed about getting any photos so I leave you with the few I got of the fish on my phone.



I was initially concerned about swapping over trebbles for single hook but I am completey sold after how they performed and my snag up rate has dropped significantly.  Hook up rate hasn't declined, but that might be only because I have not been getting any lately!

Cheers

Dan.

DIY Hobie kayak sail kit

Hello readers!  As you may know I recently bought a Hobie Pro Angler 12.  They are pretty good fishing machines especially when travelling long distances.  I recently came up with the idea that I would really like to be able to sail the kayak when the wind is up.  I visit the Great Sandy Straits a lot and this body of water is perfect for both the PA12 and for sailing - why not add water and mix well...?  Enquiring with the Hobie dealer I was shocked (well not really I know Hobie like to charge a lot) to find it was in excess of $400.  This was something I would only be using in the Straits for maybe once a month.  I couldn't really justify the money.  So I thought now I have nothing to lose by making one myself.  I did a bit of interwebs research on DIY sails and discovered that most young budding DIY sailers use something called Tyvek - a DuPont product used for waterproofing houses.  So I bit the bullet and ordered the 10' X 9' sheet off ebay for about $30 delivered.  Once it turned up I could see why it's used for sails, it's tough as and light as a feather.  So the next weekend I got a sail-making.  First I doubled over the sheet, making about 9' in sail height and 5' in length.  Going off the sizes of the hobie sails, it was about 100mm shorter but about 200mm longer.  Negligible difference I though.

Next I marked up the shape, like the hobie version leaving a shape at the top where the batton would slip in filling out the sail.  I left 50mm around the edges to double fold and stitch.  The mast is a piece of aluminium tube that was once used as a rock fishing gaff handle.  The tube was about 20mm so I sleeved it top and bottom with some ag pipe which brought it out to about 25mm and made a better fit in the hobie mast hole.  the top sleeve was to give the sail some protection when it's slid in so the ali isn't rubbing on the paper directly.

Here is what it looks like on the inside.

Next I cut it out and got it ready for sewing.

Once sewn with a cross stitch along all the seams and eyes attached to the bottom and longest edges - where the rope is attached I made up a furling device out of some PVC pipe.  This allows you to furl the sail by simply pulling on the rope around the mast.  To unfurl you just pull the rope attached to the back and out she rips.  It worked really well especially considering it was my first attempt at both sail making and sailing.  I got up a good speed and didn't even need to use the pedals to tack.  I look forward to some better weather next time and maybe a few more hours on the water.  I might push my luck and see if I can make it to Fraser Island, some 8k's.  Ill leave you with some piccies below to show you how it looks full of wind.