Tin Can Bay snapper sortie . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . by Craig Tomkinson

My 25-year-old crab pots – a good tip to make them last is once back from crabbing wash down with freshwater, leave to dry completely and then store somewhere out of the sun, such as a shed. This stops the mesh from going rotten.

To keep wooden oars from splitting due to sun exposure, paint them with oil-based paint a few times and let dry completely. HI, with November not far away, what can we expect to see in the Sunshine Coast area?

Well, more storms should start to come through and hopefully some coastal showers, and a lot of migratory birds such as koels and channel-billed cuckoos will come from the north.

Hopefully, the whales are headed south and, once they go, this generally indicates the run offshore has started to kick in – and when the run starts, so do the pelagics.

I will start crabbing the Noosa River system and working some of my 25-year-old pots – while they need constant sewing up, the 10mm galvanised rings are still in great condition.

For bait, I use old fish frames or chicken carcasses and if the crabbing is good, I check them every day.

If the crabbing is slow, I check them every two days.

I have a new second-hand 3.7m Quintrex tinnie with 15hp two-stroke Yamaha outboard, and it will be great to get a few hours in it to build my confidence with the motor, particularly for when I go north in April or May, and maybe head to Nhulunbuy, if open.

Fishing wise, I finally did an overnight offshore trip with my friend Ryan in his 5.56m Shark Cat with twin 90hp two-strokes on the back.

Now call me old school but I would rather go to sea with Ryan and his two older two-stroke outboards with separate twin fuel tanks, two separate fuel filters and a couple of batteries than in a boat with a single brand new four-stroke – but that’s me.

If the boat had a smaller auxiliary that would be fine but I’m not keen at all on single motors, even if new.

Ryan’s boat is well set up and we both fish with mono fishing line.

It was a shake down run because Ryan had recently built a brandnew alloy trailer with four-wheel disc brakes and breakaway system and he had only just registered the trailer.

Being a spur of the moment trip, we had no bait except for about 8kg of freezerburnt pillies, some old squid and a few ice bottles in my freezer.

We headed up to Tin Can Bay, fuelled up on the way, called into the IGA, bought a loaf of bread and a hot chook and off we went.

We logged on with the Coast Guard and crossed the bar as it got dark, and because it was blowing 10-15 knots eastly, we poked around about 11km off the bar to some rubble grounds that fish well all year round.

We did a line off drift to see which way we would anchor then we shot the pick out.

Ryan was tired as he is a fly-in fly-out worker and had just come off night shift, plus we both take anti-seasick pills that cause drowsiness, so Ryan laid down and I watched for about 30 minutes to make sure the anchor was holding.

I rigged up a running sinker rig with a double hooked snood of 6/0s and got a bite, but as the pills had kicked in and I couldn’t keep my eyes open, I went to bed.

I woke up at around 2am and had a drop, getting belted on the way down but didn’t hook up, so I woke Ryan and he dropped one down, hooking and landing a nice cobia.

I hooked and landed a nice snapper and we got our bag of snapper in no time.

We fished on hoping to get a few sweetlip and pearl perch with no luck.

We had to move because every drop was a nice snapper that were released.

By now it was daylight, so we pulled the pin and headed a bit closer to Double Island.

But the fishing was slow and after about an hour, we headed in.

If you are keen to see our trip, I made a little video – it’s on YouTube under Craig Tomkinson Productions.

There are a few there, so check them out.

Hopefully, I’ll get to do a few more trips with Ryan over the coming years.

Until next month, be safe on the water.

Noosa to Fraser Coast by CRAIG TOMKINSON