# Flathead Tactics - Something different please.



## Ado (Mar 31, 2008)

Worms - Gulp 5" sandworms in natural, camo or newpenny. Use them whole. I don't use a stinger and flathead inhale everything.
Gulp Alive 5" Crazylegs. I use Chartreuse Pepper Neon. Amazing action on a slow roll.

Proper good technique for the crazylegs is to cast, rod tip at 30 degrees to allow you to strike, watch line on the drop for any twitch, pause for a few seconds after it hits bottom, then a couple of rapid (but not violent) lifts of the rod tip with a pause in between, roll line in to take up slack, let it drop, pause, slow roll, pause, repeat. This gives a combination of injured fish and fish swimming over the sand, which seems to get the best results for me.

With the worms I just drift and let it follow me with a couple of gentle flicks every 10 seconds or so.


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## Junglefisher (Jun 2, 2008)

I avoid deep, fast flowing water and target anything with a drop off.
Had good success casting a stiffy minnow in a brown colour up at Mackay.
Tend to use softies in prawn colours here though. Gulp 5" jerkshads in banana prawn being my favourite.


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## imnotoriginal (Jan 13, 2008)

From reading some of the reports online, there seem to be a few crews in the Flatty Classic who specifically target big flathead near areas of broken reef and fast water. From what I've read, these guys go through dozens of lures a day due to the snaggy country and their using heavy jigheads near structured bottom. This seems to be where a number of the big girls live. Sounds like a bloody expensive way to target a fish that doesn't fight much, not to mention hard work with the heavy jigheads they use and lose.
Joel


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## bungy (Jan 1, 2008)

Hi ya Indie
I normally use strike pro poppers and as junglefisher said the stiffy minnows and have a good success rate.
I don't fish deep water just in the shallows around the yabby beds in about less than a meter of water. The bigger fish have been taken right at the edge of the water where it meets the sand.My method is to cast lure/plastic/popper on sand and start working them at the waters edge,And of course this may vary from location...
Good Luck and let us know how you go...


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## grinner (May 15, 2008)

brad, the pins a bit of a special case as it is a bar that probably drains 4 estuarine rivers which have flatties all thru them (logan,albert,coomera, pimpama).

as such round full moons you may get a build up of spawning females and often with smaller males around them.

they may be on the chew , they may be more interested in finding a mate, they may be arriving or departing.

some blokes do get massive females down there but i think they are transitory.

it also runs at a pace that is almost like a set of rapids in full flow, 
the deeper sections have a lot of timber and it is thus a pretty difficult place to fish.

ive rarely done much good there. i think a very good sounder may help you guys.

like imnotoriginal said, i know a guy who lost over $200 worth of blades there in one session,

i'd be trying the turns of the tide when the flow slows for the deeper bit.

i think flatties hold where the flow, depth, water clarity are just right for them to hunt.
so if the flow is too fast, or the water is too deep or it is very clear or very turbid, you mite have to adjust your technique.

really , you couldnt go wrong just prospecting with a 5inch pumpkinseed shad on a fairly heavy jig and then adjust accordingly.

if you find one, other will be about. they seem to hunt in packs.

should be interesting.

at night, they seem to like to attack little baitfish silhouetted against the moon or suburban street lights (none of them at the pin) so worth a little chuck then as well.


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## ArWeTherYet (Mar 25, 2007)

indiedog said:


> Something I used to have great success on flathead with is a gangie using 3 x size 4 hooks on a frog mouth drifted on the bottom. Might go get some hooks to get some gang action happening.


Bingo!
Thats what the old bloke down at the caravan park in Iluka use to do and others to. I think he was using 3/0's or maybe even 2/0's and he use to bend the eye of the hook down to get the gag to sit flatter. Reckons you need to fish right next to any rock wall. Anyways they always seem to clean up on them. 
One of my mates usually goes down to the Pin at certain times of the year to catch the big mothers and they'd use live Pddies, but the arse hole wouldn't tell me where, I think its somewhere near the mouth as he mentioned a bit of swell.


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## foxx1 (Jun 3, 2012)

I plan on bringing a variety of SP's to the Pin after recieving, what I percieve as, credible advice from the guys at Joneses Tackle on what plastics to use and what technique. As many of you know I have not had much success in catching department, actually none to be truthful but I am determined to work it out and have been practicing my technique in the neighbours pool which is not as silly as it sounds. Looking forward to some more advice on the trip if it's on offer Indie, I am even prepared to procure such advice with the sharing of plastics ;-)


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## kayakone (Dec 7, 2010)

ArWeTherYet said:


> indiedog said:
> 
> 
> > Something I used to have great success on flathead with is a gangie using 3 x size 4 hooks on a frog mouth drifted on the bottom. Might go get some hooks to get some gang action happening.
> ...


Paul,
Try the last three hundred metres of the estuary (now don't say the old bastard didn't tell you), but as Brad & Pete said, the currents are viscious. Much of my flatty fishing in that region was land based, though I used to go right through and out to the bar for tailor, and sometimes caught a flattie in deeper water well out. The swell can also do you in if kayak fishing here.

The 2/0 & 3/0 gangs work well with pillies, gar, and poddies. For mullet, use a 3/0 single pinned twice only through the very end of the mullet strip. I have caught about a dozen 70 -80 cm specimens with bait, and 1 X 98 cms on bait.



indiedog said:


> ArWeTherYet said:
> 
> 
> > Bingo!
> ...


"I could give pillies a go but they'll only last for a day or two." 
Brad, not so with salting. We used to go on sea kayak trips for up to 2 weeks in the Whitsundays, Keppels or Moreton Bay. Before each trip I would heavily salt individually frozen pillies and a couple of gar, and allow them to make their own brine, a bit of which you can pour off for storage for the trip. They always last way beyond the 2 weeks, even in tropical temperatures (September).

One more suggestion for HB success is to troll 2 HB's, one deep on a short leash, but picking up the bottom occasionally, and one shallower. The hookup is often on the shallower one (I have caught 2 X 70 cm ones via this method).

trev


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## kayakone (Dec 7, 2010)

indiedog said:


> Trev, how did you go about salting them? Shallow plastic container with a bed of salt and lay them down in layers with heaps of salt between and then a good covering? Then put the lid on and keep them in a cupboard?


Near enough Brad. You need a container a bit longer than a take-away/ice cream container. I use a small plastic lunch box. Thin layer of cooking salt, then a layer of pillies, more salt, layer the next bed of pillies _the opposite way _(saves space and gets more salt in contact). With big gar you might have to cut them in half.

trev


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## munro91 (Oct 18, 2011)

Mate I'm no expert by any means but I have had success on squidgy fish (the ones with the paddle tails on them) in the evil minnow colour as it matches the shimmer of the white bait. Also the squidgy slick rig is highly under rated but I find that they are heavy enough to stay on the bottom and they have their own action so can be trolled or flicked.

Anyway those have worked well for me in the past

Munro.


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## jayman (Feb 7, 2010)

Hey brad my brother and a mate bagged out just the other day on flatties at the pin from what he told me he was using sebile lures he didn't tell me which ones tho but the koolies are good. A setup he uses is to troll three lures one deep and two shallow troll the deep one in the middles of your spread with no hooks making sure its hitting the bottom have this lure closer to the yak and have the two shallow ones further out. he has had good success using this method in his boat. Something a bit different to try.

Cheers jay


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## Guest (Aug 21, 2012)

Indie,

My grandfather and i nearly always wade for flathead, spinning the weedbeds ahead of you as you go. Flathead are structure oriented. Even though you will find them in the middle of no-where, you'll catch more in close to structure and steady food sources. Weed patches are king. The fish will sit in or near a weed patch in an open expanse of sand. And the opposite in weed, ie they'll sit on the sand patch. If you can put a rock or log in the mix, even better. When it comes to lures... Big lures catch big fish but little lures catch more fish. A genuine croc will engulf small baitfish just as readily as a big lure. If i had to pick one lure to catch flathead on for the rest of my life, it would be a silver Outback Jindivik Jerk from Kmart/BigW i cant remember which shop sells it. Dives to about 4ft and is dynamite slow rolled or worked with a light jerky action and oh so cheap. If you are going to plumb the depths, i'd go for a plastic with lots of in-built action and just lob it and slow roll it back. Ribbon tailed plastics, mister twisters or paddle tails probably in that order.

i probably haven't shared anything you don't already know but i found these videos interesting to watch the way a flathead stalks the lure and strikes from the side. It's also worth going through to youtube and have a read of the helpful comments posted by the OP.


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## jayman (Feb 7, 2010)

indiedog said:


> Jay, that's interesting. So the deep lure has no hooks and is really just a teaser? Could you get the same result dragging a sinker? Maybe that's why the gang hook arrangement works well as the sinker is puffing on the bottom and the bait comes behind by a metre or so.


Spot on brad yea it works like a teaser. I think alot has to do with the puff of sand that attracts them and a sinker would give the same effect maybe a lure would work better because it includes vibration.


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## jayman (Feb 7, 2010)

Sounds like a good variation I could see it working with either a plastic or ganged bait while drift fishing but would having the extra weight of the sinker affect the action of a lure while trolling? I agree with having too many lines out a tangle is inevitable :lol:


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## foxx1 (Jun 3, 2012)

Something differant I heard off was to take two chux wipes place inbetween a big slice of cheese then heat in the microwave so that the cheese becomes inbedded in the wipes, once cool cut into stips and rig. The idea was that the chux would add the colour and the odour of the cheese act as an attraction agent. Sounds silly enough to work.


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## foxx1 (Jun 3, 2012)

indiedog said:


> Bought some gear and looking to test out a new rig or two this Sunday at Cabbage Tree and maybe as far down as The Pin. Will let you know what works. I won't be testing cheese out though.


Time to smell the cheese Indie or maybe camp a little further away from me at the Pin :lol:


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## Guest (Aug 27, 2012)

You may have to run some form of chin sinker to eradicate spin if you are going to use pillies...


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## Cresta57 (Oct 30, 2011)

indiedog said:


> nezevic said:
> 
> 
> > You may have to run some form of chin sinker to eradicate spin if you are going to use pillies...
> ...


I've tried a similar tactic to the one described. I first tried a simple dropper loop & tied a fluro leader to the loop & a sinker to the end of the mainline. It worked but kinked & I had problems with twists if the water was deeper than a couple of metres. I experimented & found hammering a small snapper lead flat [like the spoon lead you describe] stopped a bit of the twist. I then bought some small "T" swivels that stopped the twist, the flattened small snapper lead then worked a treat. I found that if the leader was 1.5 times the distance from the swivel to the lead it worked well. I've never tried it since I bought the yak as I've only really fished lures & soft plastics from it.


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## Junglefisher (Jun 2, 2008)

I assume there's no bottom stucture where you are fishing?
If I tried that at my flatty spot, I'd be losing rig after rig to snages on the bottom. Even SP's snag up often enough to make it a trial using them.


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