Fantastic flathead and jewfish . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . by Gavin Dobson

Above: Steve made the most of the good conditions catching quality reef fish such as this jewfish.

Fantastic flathead and jewfish

FINALLY, I’ve sat down at the computer and haven’t whinged about the weather.

And we’ve had sunshine over the past month and some good fishing with it.

August often brings a hint of warmth towards the end of the month and a slight change in some of the species.

Though, it’s a bit too soon to be looking for mangrove jack yet.

That’s not to say you won’t catch a jack, but they aren’t as mobile as they will be in a couple of months.

However, this month whiting usually spread through the Tweed River and, being a bigger system, the water temperature remains a little more stable and fish feed reasonably freely.

The Brunswick River is a different kettle of fish – pardon the pun.

Being highly influenced by ocean temperature and weather, the river water constantly changes temperature and while whiting are in the river, they’re often harder to catch until September-October.

Flathead on the other hand will lay up in the shallows and warm themselves with the sun and bite readily.

Speaking of flathead, there have already been good numbers in both the Tweed and Brunswick rivers.

Toby and Damien Hart have been catching quality fish on lures and live bait recently, with some undersized school jewfish thrown in for fun on the light gear.

In the Tweed this month, look for whiting up in the lake systems at Terranora and Cobaki, and from Chinderah to Condong, depending on how fresh it is.

Don’t let a bit of fresh scare you – it is surprising how our saltwater species can tolerate the lack of salinity for a period of time.

Bream are still on fire in our lower reaches, with bumper catches coming for those using light line.

The clarity of water is fairly clean, especially on an upper tide, so go as light as you dare because these fish are very shy.

This jewfish copped a shortening from a shark. Due to the trauma, the remaining flesh was as tough as an old boot.

Offshore has been great, with good weather and flat bar crossings.

In close, there have been jew and snapper from the local reefs to Black Rocks.

The morning bite seems far better than the evening bite for some reason, so get out there early.

Out wide, there have been good fish coming in.

The current hasn’t stopped this year, though it has slowed down to a fishable level.

Steve with a beautiful longtail tuna from the Brunswick local reef.

The 32-fathom line has been producing parrotfish, teraglin and small snapper, while the 50-fathom line has seen a few good pearl perch caught and slightly better-sized snapper.

Whether in close or out wide, sharks are getting worse.

Recently, I did a trip in close for jew.

At the first spot, I hooked two jewfish and sharks ate them both.

I moved nearly 2km away and hooked two jew at this spot… and a shark ate them both.

I snapped a picture on my phone in the dark of what was left of the second jew – I got the front section back.

It was a solid jew and what I recovered weighed 14.5kg – and the bite mark doesn’t have much curvature in it!

I came home after this session a bit demoralised because jewfish are too important to feed to sharks.

My most recent trip was out to the 50s and once again, I was sharked.

The big mongrel showed up on my sounder, holding slightly off the bottom.

And when I hooked a fish, it would lift up and follow the fish, not eating them at first.

Kristian Frey with a Tweed River flathead.

It wasn’t long before it got brave and ate a fish.

After that I couldn’t land a thing.

The picture of my sounder shows the shark following a good pearl perch I’d hooked on some flat wireweed country.

The perch felt about 3kg, but I’ll never know because about halfway up – as per the pic – the shark ate my fish and then returned to the bottom.

I moved down the reef and caught a couple more fish and then it showed up again, so I had to travel a fair distance in the end to get away from it.

This was a pain because apart from leaving biting fish, who wants to burn more fuel than they have to with prices the way they are?

Anyway, while sharks are the new normal these days, they are taking a toll on our fish stocks, that’s for sure.

A sounder shot of a shark following and then eating a pearl perch before returning to the depths.