Change of season is a great time!

NOOSA

Peter Wells

This is the amazing time of the year where we get the last of the pelagic run and the start of the winter snapper. For pelagics, some of the favourite hunting grounds are the reefs off K’gari, Double Island and Sunshine Reef but with the amount of bait around at the moment anywhere you see bird activity is worth a look.

Tuna have been in the mix with plenty of mac tuna for a bit of fun with the sortafter long tails holding that bit deeper. Most of the bait seems to be hardyiheads and frog mouthed pilchards, so larger slugs 30-40g will match the hatch.

From the bottom there is plenty on offer.

The closer grounds have been giving up some nice snapper along with sweetlip and tusk fish. Around Noosa, anglers in smaller craft have managed to get over the bar and head for Sunshine with some great success; coral trout, mulloway, snapper and some solid cobia have come from the area.

Snapper numbers will increase as the waters cool.

Some anglers think that the fish move up from down south, but this is not true as they tend to move in and out to deeper cooler waters.

First, the better fish will come from the eastern side of the Barwon Banks, the Hards and Caloundra 12 Mile before making their way closer to places like the Gneerings and Sunshine.

For the bait anglers, fishing on a floater rig with a pilchard or large squid is a popular way to target snapper.

For the lure anglers these fish respond well to soft plastics and jigs. A couple of options are coconut ice and nuclear chicken in the ZMan 7” jerk shads and the Flipper Jigs