Match the "hatch" saltwater style - field to flyvice birth of a fly

If time permits I love to have a quick fish after work , I find sometimes the quick sessions are often the most productive.Such a session back in Adelaide,South Australia got me my PB on Black Bream using soft plastics. The fish was a fat female that measured 39.5 cm and was released of course. Anyway having work up at Noosa,Queensland gets me close to some excellent water in the Noosa river estuary. One such place is the Woods bays up from the river mouth where the water is tannin stained from Weyba creek that flows out of Lake Weyba. Whilst stalking the shoreline on one afternoon session I spied breaking fish near the moored boats so tied on a 7gm searock metal slug and out it went, First cast had fish breaking behind the slug but no connection thinking they were small tailor (bluefish) I sent out another cast and had the metal dancing nice across the surface then WAM! I'm on. A small queenfish around 30 cm. - wishing I had the flyrod and some crease flies I noticed a white faced Heron repeatedly spearing a small pool cut off by the falling tide and went for a look. In the pool and all around the surrounding sand were these some type of anchovy. So I thought this must be what the queenfish was feeding on in the bay so photographed them and then created this fly to mimic them. The fly has very little inbuilt movement so must be animated with short jerky strips or flatout double handed stripping-just love the look of it. Does it produce - yet to give it a good work out I reckon our local Tarpon might like it.

Summer storm Kawana beach,Sunshine Coast

Here's a spectacular storm sequence moving up the coast along Kawana beach two years ago to the day. These type of storm front's are quite typical for this time of year and are generally accompanied by violent winds,thunder,lightning and destructive hail. Despite the hazards they are awesome to watch and experience.

Last weekends Mullet on fly catches

Caught some nice mullet on the flyrod last Sat. & Sun despite the gusty wind conditions. Landed several fish on Sat.with the best two fish measuring 38 and 41 cm respectively but I lost a much bigger fish that buried me in the weed beds. I gave the fish a little slack in the hope that it would swim out but as I use barbless hooks to facilitate a quick release the fish was able to shake the hook free and it was gone. I would have released it quickly anyway after a photo but he had other plans. Sundays wind was all over the place so had to fish with the wind at my back which really narrowed down fishing options (4 weight flyrods & wind don't go well together ) but still managed to land 4 mullet and a few spangled Perch. The best mullet went 43.5 cm and really had to be muscled out of the weeds I'll give the lake a rest for a few days and try and tangle with a Tarpon on the flyrod at another lake I have yet to fish. Hopefully my next post will be about Tarpon - I wish.

Sunshine Coast Mullet on Fly 2010

The latter half of 2010 saw me spending way too much time targetting both sand mullet (Mugil elongatus) and sea mullet (Mugil cephalus) in my local waterways (both estuary and landlocked lakes) here on the Sunshine Coast. Many people would wonder why anyone would spend so much time targetting a bread and butter species only good for (in their narrow opinion) as bait - what a waste of a good sportfish. Mullet have very keen eyesight and are more moody than any of my sisters growing up-believe me I've got six of them!---------Mullet will take various small flies representing aquatic crusteaceans and insect larvae e.g.seaweed maggots but the easiest way to tempt a bite is with various bread flies fished in a bread berley trail.-------------------Obviously white is the dominant colour but I have found my best producer to be tan rabbit fur with a white foam cap tied overhanging the hook eye so that the fly hangs near vertical this eliminates the common problem of flies being pushed away-especially deer hair creations.--------------------------------------------The flyfishing outfit I us is a Sage #4 weight rod,Ross Reels Evolution 1.5 reel,Scientific Angler GPX floating flyline and usually a tapered leader around 6 feet with the tippet varying from 2lb in open sandy areas to 8lb in one of the weed filled lakes I fish.------------------------------------------------------------------Most of the sand mullet caught are around 200-250mm but the sea mullet are the favorite catches with the best caught being around 500mm with a girth at the shoulders of a longneck beer bottle. A mullet of this size on a #4 weight goes hard and when hooked in weedy areas needs to be bullied to keep it's head up. Several fish have gained their early freedom (all fish are released unharmed) by burying in the weed and pulling the barbless hook with one fish actually breaking the trout hook at the bend. After that incident I upgraded to stronger saltwater hooks but if they get in the weed early usually they can shake the barbless hook free so you must react quick and strip hard until you have them in an open pocket free of weed. All in all its alot of fun Cheers Pat.

Singapore Peacock Bass & Tilapia on fly (part 2)

After the fly fishing session at lower Pierce Reservoir we returned to the flyshop to find several local flyfishers hanging out .Following introductions,stories and looking at photo's of the afternoons catch (all released ) one local Qwek invited me to go flyfishing the following day. It was to be a "dawn buster" coining a phrase from my surfing days with the plan to be at the Pandan reservoir before sunrise ;one so Qwek and Albert another fisho can go to work after and two to have a fish before the local ranger starts work. We arrive before dawn to a humid,still morning with the glassy smooth water reflecting a spectacular sunrise above the far off eastern shore.This time I used a #4 weight flyrod a clear intermediate flyline and a size 4 tan & white bead chain clouser.A mixture of Peacock bass and Tilapia were caught with Qwek catching the best bass around 40-45cm and my best catch being a 30cm specimen. The morning was topped off with a traditional breakfast at a "cafe" courtesy of Albert as Qwek had to head off to work. Plans were made for another session that afternoon this time Henry from Coho flyshop was to come along as well. The afternoon proved to be alot warmer with thunder storms building off in the east. Henry proved to be the quiet "master" landing 2 nice bass from his unusual squatting stance on the retaining rocks - no long casts here short cast parellel to the rock walls was the go.Fishing was interrupted by the ranger approaching from the north whereby we had to hide under a motorway overpass beside the reservoir until he drove away. We resumed fishing only to have to call it quits after the aforementioned storm clouds started throwing lightning bolts threatening to turn our flyrods into lightning rods-no thanks.Thanks heaps to Michael & Henry from COHO fishing and Qwek & Albert all for their hospitality thanks guys.