# NSW: Woolgoolga experiment. 25/26 March 2013



## sunshiner (Feb 22, 2006)

First time fishing in a new place is always a challenge. Include a kayak launch on a surf beach and a new dimension is added.

After consulting the knowledgeable members of AKFF a month or so back I'd chosen Woolgoolga as a two day stopover with the yak mainly because it's about half way to Sydney. Accommodation within a short yak trundle of the beach was secured, so it was great to find I'd cracked great weather with light winds and low swell.









Here's the situation. The location bubble is where our cabin sits.









Launch time 0700-ish. Beaches down here are afflicted with what looks like a type of kelp.

Getting out was dead easy and after setting up I immediately headed for the big bommie, as visible on the map above and a good place to start to look, I thought. I had no local info but I was aware from Trip Reports that some significant snapper had been caught from yaks at Woolgoolga. A young couple in a double yak with a fishing rod were also out, earlier than I was and we exchanged good mornings as they headed back in toward the beach, fishless, I understand.

I found that there was lots of structure east of the bommie in 12-14m depth, so decided to fish Noosa style here. Other than a shoal of small baitfish that I drifted over, I got and saw no action, so started to look around. About 800m east there was a stinky with a couple of blokes in it so I paddled over to find out why they were there. The water here was 20m or so but these guys were catching nothing so I decided to hang around there for a while and did so, for two drifts in about 45 min before I started to get the itch to have more of a look around.









The view from offshore.

To the south the headland you can see on the "map" above, just east of my launch point caught my attention so I headed out in a straight line across the bay toward it. All of the time I was paddling I had a lure out, just in case. On this track I came across obvious surface upwellings and at the same time began noticing the depth reducing from around 18m to 16m. Here there were also some faint surface actions and a few terns hanging about. After taking a good look around with the sounder I decided it was worth a try so pulled up and deployed my plastics. No action at all, and as my self imposed deadline of 09:30 was imminent it was time to head for the beach. My trailing outfit had been hanging out the back with a four inch SP on it and as I was retrieving this quickly it got slammed and I was on.

The fish seemed to me to have been probably a snapper around maybe 50cm so I was really stoked as I was clearly going to break my duck. Then the line went slack. Bummer; the hook had dislodged. Headed for the beach, tail between legs, cursing loudly.

Again an easy surf zone transit.

The weather continued to hold and by afternoon of day one I was keen to have another crack to see if I could get the monkey off my back. This time I at least had a known starting point, where I'd dropped the suspected snapper in the morning. This time it was a low tide launch and the kelp swirling around meant I embarked with several lengths of the stuff wrapped around my feet and legs.









3:30pm day one. I'd promised to be back about 5:30pm.

It was only a 10 minute paddle out to the spot I'd located in the morning. The light breeze was now from the SE, which allowed me to set up a nice drift over the target area. Of course, my GPS was critical in helping relocate this spot and I'd recharged its batteries while I'd been ashore.

The result was no fish, although I did get busted by one almost certain snapper, and had an SP picked up as it dropped toward the ocean floor but I struck too soon and pulled the SP out of its mouth. I was pretty pissed off at still not catching a fish but at least my wife Mary met me on the beach, carrying the trolley. And day two offered another chance.

---
Day two dawned and my luck with the weather held. Instead of charging down to the beach and launching at first light I decided to firstly partake of a leisurely brekky. This meant a 09:30 launch by the time I got going after giving myself a good talking to.

Fifteen minutes later I'm on my mark and now the drift was toward the south, propelled by a gentle NE breeze. I'd not changed my rigs from the afternoon before and deployed them Noosa style, with the trailing rig out the back carrying a 1/2 ounce jighead and four inch white snapback. The casting outfit was loaded with a 1/8 ounce jighead and 4 inch squidgee SP.

After 15 minutes of no action the headland about 1km south started to attract my attention. This caused me to abandon plan A (temporarily) in the hope of finding a better location among the wash areas close in to the headland. I thought better of this after discovering several bommies which reached up suddenly to 4m depth. Even in this low swell, occasional waves were breaking on them, so I turned back to Plan A and arrived back at my mark, adjusted for the planned drift, at about 10:25. As I had now only 90 minutes before I had to head back to the beach I resolved to stick with my plan. After all, I had found this spot, and I'd had some teasing action, and disappointment, here yesterday, so it had to be my best choice.

On arrival I deployed the trailing outfit and then turned my attention to changing the casting rig by upgrading to 1/4 ounce to keep it near the bottom (around 16m) for longer while drifting. In the middle of this process that sound, that glorious sound, of a squealing drag ratchet interrupted me. Clearly there was a reasonable fish on the trailing outfit, deployed less than a minute ago.

Up to this time, I hadn't boated a fish this year. This whole year, nearly 25% gone! This was mainly due to absolutely disgusting weather at Noosa. So, understandably, I was fervently exhorting the fishing gods to please let this be a snapper and let it not escape. There it was, after a short tussle, floating next to the yak, a snapper indeed. Not a big one but ideal for my purposes. At the moment I put it into the hatch I heard a splash and swear I saw a monkey swimming away toward the beach. Bewdy!!









My first snapper and first fish for 2013 (not for want of trying).

My shouts of victory were probably heard on the beach, only ten minutes away by yak. Now I knew where the snapper were and how to catch them.

It's amazing how a small victory such as this can change your attitude. Now I was keen to fish on and try for better. I had about an hour to go before I had to head back to the beach again.

It took all of that hour, but at 11:58 my casting outfit got slammed in typical snapper style. This confirmed that my location and techniques were sound. This was a better fish and was certain to put me in the good books with my daughter in law in Sydney who was hoping that we could dine on fresh snapper on the following night.









Snapper #2. By now the monkey was probably up a tree somewhere in the far distance.

Beach time, and I left immediately, without even a final cast. Again Mary met me on the beach, carrying my trolley. This time I had better news.









On the beach, Woolgoolga.

Interestingly, there were several fishing boats, mainly tinnies, arriving back at the beach at the same time as I did. I chatted to the occupants and learned that none of them had caught anything for days and that they have been going through a similar season as Noosa has just experienced, with dirty water and paucity of fish. Their water was now clean, to which I could attest and perhaps they will start to get fish, including Spaniards, soon.

With renewed confidence I fronted up for a last chance session at 3:30 pm on day two, even though the wind had got up and was a steady 10 knots, resulting in a short chop and whitecaps. On launching, at low tide, I left behind a couple of guys with a Land Rover and fairly big tinny who were unable to get their trailer out past a sandbank and so couldn't launch. The easterly was kicking up a wave and I did manage to get slightly wet on the way out, but nothing unusual.

Conditions looked good for fish, with light levels dropping and lots of roughened up water. Fifteen minutes later I was out at my spot and setting up a drift, now running from NE to SW, due to the combined wind and current. Nothing for the first ten minutes or so, during which I cast and retrieved my cast outfit about five times, letting it drift past under the yak as the wind carried me along. Next cast the SP was bumped immediately on splashdown in the rough water. Within seconds I knew this was no snapper as the fish went very fast and deep straight east, and just kept going with the reel spool spinning at a very uncomfortable rate. My 6kg casting outfit is not really suited to this sort of action and was beginning to look inadequate as the spool emptied and I put as much pressure as I dared on the fish to slow it down. After about five minutes the fight steadied into a slog-fest with the tuna-characteristic steady vibrations being transmitted to me through the braid. After another five minutes I had my first view, down deep, of a chrome-like shimmer as the tuna swept past. Another few minutes and I could confirm it as a mackerel tuna and gradually got it under control and could slip the gaff into the jaw and lift it aboard for a pic. As often happens with mac tuna, the fish had given its all and didn't quiver as I positioned it for a pic before removing the SP and releasing it.









I reckon it was about 70cm. Is that unusual for mac tuna that far south? Our Noosa Yakkers record for mac tuna stands at 82cm, and we get plenty of smaller ones, all year round.

Even though I got it back into the water pretty quickly, I think it was dead, so a pity really, but in my opinion not worth keeping for the table, especially when I already head two snapper. I turned for the beach as soon as this was over, as my allotted time was running out, and I was satisfied with my experience.

So Woolgoolga was an interesting experiment for me. I found that I could find likely fish habitat in an unfamiliar area I'd never fished before and extract targetted fish from it. What I found equally interesting was that my SPs attracted no attention from smaller, generally unwanted, fish.

Thanks for reading, AKFFers. Tight lines.

Post created on and posted with an iPad on 27Mar13 while a passenger in a car heading toward Sydney from Woolgoolga.

Kev


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## DennisT (Jan 2, 2012)

Nice work Kev,

Looks like a productive trip so far.

Enjoy the rest of the trip


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## Saltyyak (Feb 20, 2010)

Stoked you managed a few in the end mate.

The conditions look absolutely awesome.

All the kelp was recently dumped on our beaches by a series of large north swells.

Well done.


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## CLJB (Jan 8, 2013)

Great report, I find yours very informative and helpful - your Long reef newbie one helped me with my first trip to Longy a few weeks ago.



sunshiner said:


> In the middle of this process that sound, that glorious sound, of a squealing drag ratchet interrupted me.


 when I read that, I pictured one of the enormous rods on Wicked Tuna buckling over with a screaming reel :lol:


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## robsea (Apr 7, 2010)

Well done Kev. Bet the daughter in law was delighted with that catch and the stories that went with it. A definite tale of inspiration.

cheers

rob


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## Zed (Sep 18, 2006)

Just an observation:
From an outsider, across the Pacific standpoint. I notice in a lot of TRs that the SPs of choice are the stick variety with no action tails. I also notice you use very light heads. Kicking it up to 1/2oz in 50ft? Ever try a green bean or wax bean on a 1/2oz head. 

Our fishery is different in that we need some action. Swimbaits like Fishtrap, MC and BigHammer,










are the most common in 4in - 6in sizes as are single tail and twin tail grubs in the same sizes. We also use 3/4oz to 1 1/2oz heads in 30-80ft. 12lb test would also be about the lightest we would go for open water fishing --I never go below 15lb, personally. I believe I would actually see the fish laughing at me below the boat if I dropped a stick on a 3/8oz head.

For the record our main forage (bait) fish is sardine, anchovy, and mackerel with some smelt in the kelp. The ratios cycle as to what is most prevalent at any given day/year.

Thanks for the report. Feels good to have success at a brand new launch.


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## Sprocket (Nov 19, 2008)

Good on you Kev, looks like a nice spot.
Cheers,
Dave.


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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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## Wrassemagnet (Oct 17, 2007)

What Red said Kev and I'd add in that frigate and mack tuna sashimi is just amazing when dipped in 50/50 light soy/mirin mix with a touch of wasabi to taste stirred into the sauce.


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## Dodge (Oct 12, 2005)

Kev a great result at a pretty location, and a good place to see whales when migrating north/south is the headland above your launch site.


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## paulo (Nov 1, 2007)

Love your work Kev!


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## sunshiner (Feb 22, 2006)

Zed said:


> Just an observation:
> From an outsider, across the Pacific standpoint. I notice in a lot of TRs that the SPs of choice are the stick variety with no action tails. I also notice you use very light heads. Kicking it up to 1/2oz in 50ft? Ever try a green bean or wax bean on a 1/2oz head.
> 
> Our fishery is different in that we need some action. Swimbaits like Fishtrap, MC and BigHammer,
> ...


G'day Troy

That's interesting info and I'll take it on board. I don't know about your conditions, but we're fishing over very snaggy, reefy bottom so a lure that bottoms out quickly seems more likely to hang up. Also snapper are midwater feeders so a lightly weighted bait theoretically spends more time per drop in the visual zone. The do-nothing technique with slowly descending stick baits works well. I theorise that the gentle descent is enough to get the minimal tails wagging but I do often use a bait with a paddle tail in such conditions. The line weight is more to do with attempts to minimise line drag on the drop and also that snapper are generally clean fighters and unlikely to seek refuge under bottom structure. Also, as we are likely to encounter a variety of fish on a typical trip out from my home, and I can only carry and afford three outfits the 6kg outfit also handles small pelagics (such as the mac tuna, and spotty macs) when necessary.

I use the 1/8 ounce in waters up to about 25m, and go heavier in deeper waters.

Thanks for the comments

Kev


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## sunshiner (Feb 22, 2006)

RedPhoenix said:


> Good couple of sessions Kev, even if the fish were playing a little hard to get.
> 
> Could be worth exploring longtail culinary options a little more, since you're not currently in mackerel-heaven. With a bit of care an attention, they produce a good fillet when consumed on the day, an excellent 'canned tuna' as per Murd's recipe, and are pretty bloody good smoked.
> 
> Red.


Hi Red

Agree that the longtail makes good tucker, even if the proportion of good flesh is far less than many fish. I personally draw the line at mac tuna, however, especially when I am away from home, with minimal refrigeration, time, and cutting up facilities. Back in Noosa, one of the guys will take home any mac tuna we catch as his wife, who is skilled at fish preparation, loves them as a table fish.

Kev


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