# Lake Conjola, 17+18 Feb



## Squidder (Sep 2, 2005)

A few of us from Canberra ventured to Lake Conjola for a weekend of fishing and beer. Lake Conkola is a huge estuary system which is open to the sea, about 20 mins south of Ulladulla, and has opportunities for yak fishing, land-based estuary fishing, and there's a great beach to surf fish from. Redphoenix kindly gave me the loan of his redfin Espri, which meant that I could take my mate Steve out in the Fish n Dive - cheers Leigh, your yak rocks 

OUTING #1: Prawning Friday night.
It took us a while to get the hang of it, but there are lots of prawns in Lake Conjola. We ended up with a few dozen (bait size) after a couple of hours wandering the shallows with nets and torches. We found out the next day from the people in the camp site next door that all netting activities in the lake are banned, due to the likelihood of spreading the week Caulerpa Taxifolia (there is no signage whatsoever informing people of this).

OUTING #2: Yak fishing the lake
We quickly found out that Lake Conjola is extremely tidal, at least in the lower reaches. Paddling with the tide was fine, but paddling against it (and the wind) was pretty trying. There were HORSE sand whiting everywhere, which showed no interest in any SPs I threw at them (GULP minnows, sandworms and fry, Squidgy Wrigglers, Ecogear grass minnows, Berkley 1" power nymphs). I could get them to follow (but not hit) an SX-40, and also had no luck with poppers. Some of the popper gurus may have had more luck, but these whiting drove me to distraction. After an hour or so of frustration, we decided to chase flatties instead, and I was proud to see Steve catch his first fish off the yak, a 25cm flathead. I managed a 43cm fish soon after on a 3" GULP pumpkinseed minnow, and also lost a much bigger fish next to the yak (est. 60cm). We paddled back to camp and had a well earned bowl of nutri grain. 

OUTING #3: Land based afternoon fish
We used our prawns caught the night before to fish the estuary land based in the afternoon, and enjoyed an amazing session, catching bream, tarwhine, luderick, toadfish, flounder, whiting, snapper, and a silver biddy (most fish were well undersized, but a few keepers). Some of the better fish graced our table that evening. 

OUTING #4: Surf fishing at night
We used octopus bait to try and tempt some tailor at night off the surf - I hooked and got bitten off by something sizeable on 20lb leader, after quite a few good runs, and spent the rest of the night spewing about it. I think it was either a good tailor or a small shark. Steve landed 2 lovely bream.

OUTING #5: Yak fishing the lake again
Rather than do the sensible thing and chase flatties, I refused to believe that I couldn't tempt one of those big whiting on a SP. Well, to cut a long story short, I couldn't. :x But I'll be back.

Overall, we had a ripper of a weekend. Something that I'll be taking along next time is a good anchoring system - this would allow you to maintain position in the flow and cast to likely spots, rather than try to fire casts at fish as you rip past them :roll: The lake system is extensive, we only had time to explore the lower reaches, but were told of big (5kg+) flatties that inhabit the upper parts....already planning the next trip


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## Squidder (Sep 2, 2005)

A few more photos:


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## aleg75 (Dec 20, 2005)

Nice report! makes me want to hit the salt water even more! might venture down for a day trip in March (during the comp week of course)


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## Davey G (Jan 15, 2006)

jase, good report mate.

I spent a long weekend at conjola a couple of months ago and agree there is some great potential for yak fishing.

I found the best spot in the lake was at the 'steps' which is where the shallows drop off into the lake proper, although i did catch a good flatty and bream closer to the entrance (but boy does the tide rip through there!)

I also agree re the whiting - there ust be 10 million over those flats but I'm buggered if I could get them to bite anything (they even turned their fishy little noses up at freshly caugh live nippers)

better luck at barlings!


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## Milt (Sep 2, 2005)

Nice report Jaz,

I've never fished Lake Conjola but I have heard about the big flatties in the system. Good to see you taking advantage of your Canberra stint. It may be a quiet crappy place to live  "just kidding Red" but fishing wise the south coast excells offering many options and species to target.

Look forward to catching up for a fish over Easter if your about.

Milt,


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## Peril (Sep 5, 2005)

Great report Jason. A fine weekend. Sorry to hear you had trouble with the whiting on lures. Did you have a light leader, no more than 6lb, preferably 4lb of at least 2m. They are very wary in the clear water. Let's see if we can't pull a few out of the Tomaga River this weekend.


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## Squidder (Sep 2, 2005)

Cheers guys.

Ash, I'd certainly be keen to hit conjola again soon, even just for a day trip (but I'm also keen to camp, and hit the surf at night). One tricky part about fishing near the entrance was the number of oldies floating along with the tide, using pool noodles for buoyancy. They were oblivious to anyone fishing from the bank, so as they drifted past in packs, you could see everyone pull their lines in, wait for them to drift past, then cast out again. You know how some towns are full of retirement homes, and are referred to as places where old people go to die? Well I reckon Lake Conjola is where old people go to annoy young people :lol: We had one old fella snorkel up to us (we reeled in our lines), say "there are plenty of mullet and whiting down here boys", then snorkel past again * 4 more times * in 10 minutes!

Davey, I'm glad I'm not the only one who struggled to tempt those whiting. We got quite a few on bait, but on lures it was a different story :roll: I also hooked both my flatties on the edge of the deeper water, and spooked a few nice fish which were lying on the edges of weed beds.

Peril, I'd never considered that my leader was too short, and too heavy. I was only running 50cm of 8 pound fluoro. I'd love to pick your brains about luring whiting at Barlings :wink:


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## RedPhoenix (Jun 13, 2006)

Unfortunately, due to the change in ownership of this web site and the lack of response by the owners to my requests to remove my email address from all administrative-level notifications and functionality, I have decided to remove my posts on AKFF. Thank you for the great times, the fantastic learning experiences and the many many fish. If you are desperate for the old content of this particular post, it is available below base64 encoded and bzip2 compressed.

Red.

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## Y-Knot (Sep 26, 2006)

exellent report there Jase and by the sounds a rippa mixed bag... nice looking whiting,and great array of SP's trying to catch them.
Fishing the lake with fresh prawns caught from the same lake is always going to be dynamite, my mate in Berrmagui has had some great fish caught from using prawns from the same body of water being fished.


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## paffoh (Aug 24, 2006)

Great report mate and nice photos ( Beware the satanic roo ).

Shame about the Prawning not being sign posted, I cant understand how they would not inform people with signage indicating the dangers of spreading weed into other systems but I do understand the importance of keeping the waterway pristine and free of pests no matter what shape or form.

Your getting too many fish again, back to Molonglo reach for you!


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## mattayogi (Feb 11, 2007)

Squidder!

I have many fond memories of staying at Lake Conjola as a boy and was lucky enough to visit there 3 years ago. You know what, it has hardly changed. The old house we used to stay in is still there. Good on ya mate! It's a special place!

That fish that busted you sounds to me like a jewie. Next time take a yabby pump with you too cos whiting are a sucker for them every time. That's all I use up here!

Matt


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## Squidder (Sep 2, 2005)

Cheers Matt, and thanks for the info  The bust off could have been a jewie, do they often bite through leaders? My leader (approx 60cm) was bitten/sawn through about 30cm up :?:

Conjola is a special place, I can't recall ever seeing so many big fish swimming around happily, even amongst all the bathers. The lake has got a really pristine look and feel about it :wink:


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## Milt (Sep 2, 2005)

[quote Milt: Easter up this way? Excellent. I'll pencil it in.]

Sorry to dissapoint Red I won't be venturing up this year to sunny Canberra :lol: , what I meant was hopefully Jason is venturing down south and has a spare morning or afternioon to show us a few more tricks of the trade :wink:

Milt,


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## Squidder (Sep 2, 2005)

Hi Milt, I will be back down for easter, hoping to take 4 days off, giving me about 10 days in Melbourne with weekends/public hols included. I'll be fishing as much as possible (especially on the days when Squidette will be at work), and the yak will be coming down with me too   Stock up on squid jigs mate, they should be firing by early May :wink:


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## Milt (Sep 2, 2005)

Awesome stuff mate!!! Highly looking forward to catching up for a feed of good pinkies and squid 8)

Milt,


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## mattayogi (Feb 11, 2007)

Well there are a couple of clues - but I could be wrong. Firstly, you were fishing at night for tailor. Jewies love the night and tailor is one of their prime targets. Secondly, they make several good runs before they settle down. And thirdly, they are full-on head shakers hence the probable saw off. Might need to go a bit heavier on the trace.

Now I must say here that the esteemed Jewie is one of the few surf species I haven't caught, but I've done a stack of reading and it won't be long before I'm rewarded - I hope.

I can't wait to go back one day.

Enjoy!

Matt


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