Tweed Action II

Another trip with Steve Wilson this weekend, saw us hit the Tweed again. the plan was to sneak out to the close reefs early to see if we could find some quality snapper or kingies, and then come back into the river to have a play with some bream.

Conditions were pretty good with light north westerlies early. Steve was the first to register a bite and quickly had a decent fish under control, but the hooks pulled half way through the fight. Fortunately next cast he was on again and this time a good snapper made it to the net

The current and wind were running in the same direction, speeding up our drift and making it slightly more difficult to get the 5" Jerkshads down on 1/4 Oz heads. I was just about to change up to a heavier head when my Sardine Jerkshad got hit! The fish immediatedly peeled line and instead of heading straight for the bottom, it turned eastward and headed out to sea at increasing speed. I had no control at all as 30lb Sten Superbraid melted from the spool of the ABU Cardinal 806 at an alarming rate. Within about 20 seconds I guess, I was into backing and calling on Steve that we needed to chase this fish - NOW! Fortunately, Steve got the electric up quickly and we took chase with the bottom of the spool starting to show.

The fish didn't ease up as we gave chase and although I got a lot of line back it was still taking serious runs. After about 5 minutes, the afterburners had run out of fuel and the fight turned into a slug fest, and the still unidentified fish, pulsed away in the depths. At this stage we ruled out snapper, kingie, jewie, and were thinking GT or Tuna. As the fight pushed past the twenty minute mark, we were pretty sure we had a tuna on.

We saw him shortly after, and I thought that I had him under control and we would have him in soon. How wrong was I! It continued to slug it out for another 10 minutes or more circling just under the boat. My right arm was aching severely as I worked him painfully closer to the boat. Finally Steve had the chance of a good gaff shot and made no mistake.

On the brag mat the Longtail tuna went right on one metre to the fork of the tail and we guessed his weight around 15kg. Thats my first Longtail and it was very satisfying to catch it on one of my own jigheads. A great fish, I just couldn't believe how tough it was, and how long it slugged it out for!

After a few pics it was back to the fishing. We'd just lost half an hour or more of prime bite time, and it seemed that our window of oportunity had closed, as we couldn't raise another decent bite, despite trying several areas and seeing plenty of good shows on the sounder.

After a couple of fruitless hours the wind started to pick up from the North East and we decided it was time to hit plan B.

Back in the river, the big rods were packed away and the bream rods rigged, with Gulps, Blades and other lures to test. We found bream on the sounder fairly quickly, but it was hard to get them to bite. However, as the incoming tide increased, they slowly came on the bite and we ended up getting a few decent bream, with plenty of small bream and flathead getting in on the act.

Although the action was generally pretty slow, I had some encouraging results on some new lures that I'm developing. The most interesting encounter involved a big flathead that I hooked in pretty deep water. I was fishing 4lb vanish straight through. Right from the start there was heaps of weight with big head shakes, but no big runs. At one stage it headed into the rockwall and came nearly to the surface and we both saw that it was a BIG fish. After about ten minutes the fight was progressing very slowly, but suddenly the fish seemed to change direction and I quickly gained line, and then wound in a 30cm flathead !??!! On close inspection the flathead had been roughed up severely and was missing a lot of scales.

My lure was firmly in the top jaw of the small flathead. So obviously the big girl ate the small fish at virtually the same time I hooked it, as I never felt a small fish early. Pity it didn't hang onto it a bit longer so we could get a closer look, because that in that first glimse from a distance it looked HUGE. That's the second encounter I've had with a big flathead eating a small one and then spitting it - quite amazing!

Anyway we pulled stumps shortly afterwards, happy with the days' results. We covered a few options in one session, landed some decent fish and successfully tested some new designs.

Sharp hooks, smooth drags, tight lines,

Matt