Tailor, trevally and grunter action

Welcome to the last month of autumn!

This year has certainly flown by.

I must be getting old – I remember my father saying that a lot when I was young.

The hot weather started late in the season, but it hit hard and continued through to April.

Luke Stratford jigged up his first flounder when targeting flathead.

Finally, the cooler nights have helped to drop the water temperature slightly.

This will see some of the species that favour cooler water move into the rivers and creeks. Tailor and trevally will be the two main species that will begin to show up.

There have already been a few trevally feeding on the abundance of bait, and this month the quantity and quality should increase. Decent fish will move into the systems, such as the Pine and Caboolture rivers, and throughout Pumicestone Passage during the colder months.

Small jewfish have been eating lures in all the rivers around Brisbane.

Trevally between 5060cm are common and are lots of fun when hooked on gear normally used to chase flathead.

Tailor should also make an appearance during May.

They generally don’t push as far up the river as trevally and are more common around the mouths of rivers.

Grunter are another species that show up in good numbers during winter.

Ben ‘bream’ Monro jigged up a quality bream on a Pro Lure Clone Prawn.

There should be a few getting around this month, so they will be worth chasing.

Grunter love eating prawns, therefore a prawn imitation will work very well.

The Pro Lure Clone Prawn has worked very well for me recently.

These soft plastic prawns catch almost everything and I’m sure grunter will find them hard to resist too.

Trevally have turned up around the river mouths chasing bait schools.

Threadfin salmon and jewfish are another couple of species worth keeping a look out for. They can push well upstream during colder months, so there could be a few getting around in the deeper holes on the bends and anywhere there is plenty of bait.

Flathead have still been hanging around the river mouths and the quality has been outstanding.

Many fish in the 5070cm range have been eating lures, especially the Pro Lure Clone Prawn.

Small paddle tails have worked very well. A lot of flounder have also been around recently.

Luke Stratford and a decent flathead taken on a paddle tail plastic.

These little flat fish are very aggressive and will happily eat a 3-5” plastic.

They’re also very good eating, if you’re keen to try one.

The Brisbane River will have plenty of jewies around this month, with good quantities of juveniles throughout all the river systems, including this one.

Many fish from 3070cm have smashed plastics and vibes, but you might need to sort through the smaller fish to find the better quality.

Snapper is a species that can be in the river one day and gone the next.

Quality flathead were eating plastics recently.

I always look for bait schools because this is where I find better numbers of snapper. This time last year was some of the best snapper fishing I’ve experienced in the river.

The schools of big banana prawns were pushing out of the river towards the mouth and snapper and tailor were feeding underneath them, pushing them to the surface.

They were quality fish for the river too, with some reaching the 60cm mark.

That’s it from me this month.

Hopefully, you can get among some fish during May – I might see you out on the water.