Soft Plastics (hinchinbrook)

[cdg81]

the biggest markus we got was 83cm, i had 18 casts with 50 gram cromies and lost 14 slugs and landed 2 (smalish)trevelly, got some new gear this year so hopefully huey is shining on us and get some good weather. other wise the mj's are going to have sore mouths.

[NAGG]

A little further north (Tully area) I've had some success using 100mm SP's in white with pink head for barra recently (Squidgy's). More importantly ... bury the barb just beneath the fin of the the SP and get it in the snag as deep and dark as you can... work any decent snag over 4 or 5 times.

Good luck!
Omulloway

White & red (Drop bear ... I think) ..... Got some of those ... Nagg

[NAGG]

My advice is don't use barra gear at the end of the jetty. daytime use heavy jigging gear and metal jigs 40-50 pound line will still be busted off. at night bring a squid light and drop livie squid down on 100 pound hand lines if you use a rod make sure it is 50 pound and don't put it in the rod holder as you wont get it out.do not give them a chance to run or it is over
live squid is the go
Stuie

Sounds like fun I'll redefine my barra gear (Impoundment ... 50lb braid on a 24kg black bass rod) ...... Nagg

[kingkev]

Heading up to Innisfail tomorrow for 3 days of R&R. That means fishing. Probably try and extract a few jacks from the Johnstone. Do not have any plastics but will persevere with a few hard body lures and possibly try some poppers and silver slices. Not too sure where to go but will be looking for eddies that could hold a big jack with my name on.

Good thread and I will look into getting some plastics just incase the livies arn't working

[whiteman]

Whiteman, Not everyone is out to fill freezers. some of us enjoy the sport side of things.Dont get me wrong, we will live bait too, But we also love the challenge of catching fish with plastics an other lures...It is often more satisfying, and if you know what your doing, can often outfish livies

Hinchinbrook is greatly overrated for the novice. I've only fished it about 50 times so I'm just starting to find some productives holes. The guys that clean up with lures know the place like the back of their hand and throw the lures into the timber real deep - this takes skill, guts and sponsorship deals. I read plenty of reports on this forum where southerners do a week or so in the passage and they don't catch much cause they can't figure out which lure or sp to use. If they used the abundant live bait they would have much more success. There is no less fun dropping a live prawn next to a likely snag than dropping a prawnstar in the same spot except the prawn will have a much better hook up rate. You've still gotta get the jack/barra out of the snag.

80% of my fishing is with lures cause I like that style but Hinchinbrook has provided the most unproductive fishing days of my short angling career in NQ. And while we are bragging Hinchinbrook FM's, here's mine .. http://www.bbbalc.com/News_Events/Ph...rmarkNov06.jpg

[kingkev]

I must agrre with the live bait. A cast net and away you go. Live prawns, poddy mullet and live herring will outfish plastics majority of the time. Especially up N QLD way.

wait for my reports

he!he!

[cdg81]

whiteman, overrated for the novice fisherman, or the novice to the area, cos i have been fishin for a while, alway seem to catch something, my first trip there, we boated heaps of shit, and you dont need sponserships to lose lures, i do alright at that, losing gear its part of fishin, in fact i reckon gettin cleaned up is one of the best parts of fishin, look back on your fishin trips, you always seem to remember gettin wiped out, or loosing that big fish at the boat.

and i am sure some time during our trip a live mullet will be dangled over the side,
most of my fishin here for barra and jacks i use livies, so i am going there to do some thing different, have a week of work, and enjoy (plenty of) beers with my mates,

[Steve B]

Whiteman, Nice pair of fingermark there. No doubt you are extremely familiar with the area and have a lot f fishing experience. Everyone knows live bait works well in pretty much all styles of fishing. As I said we will be doing a fair share, especially around the jetty.

The post was about SP' not live bait. thats it. Us so called inexperience southerners successfully fish soft plastics for extremely finicky fish like bream, bass, snapper and Jacks in areas which are consistantly and heavily fished and cop way more boat traffic and noise than hinchenbrook. From my experience, The principles here are pretty much the same the same as they are up north where i have fished alot too. Just need a bit heavier gear and a better sponsors Like you said you need to fish your lure deep in the snags, we know that, cause we do that!! The blokes posting on this thread arent fishing mugs. As CGG81 said 'maybe novices to the area...not novices to fishing'. Like you said it is very thrilling getting a live bait drilled into structure at a rate of knots!!!! We love doing that too.

All we asked was what plastics people were using. Just to compare notes. If you have had any success with them, please share. It would be much appreciated and we'll give them a go. If we get smashed in the snags..all the more fun. If we lose all our gear or our casting arms fall off, then the cast net will get dusted off and CDG81 will be using it...Ill open his beer for him.

cheers

[NAGG]

Whiteman, Nice pair of fingermark there. No doubt you are extremely familiar with the area and have a lot f fishing experience. Everyone knows live bait works well in pretty much all styles of fishing. As I said we will be doing a fair share, especially around the jetty.

The post was about SP' not live bait. thats it. Us so called inexperience southerners successfully fish soft plastics for extremely finicky fish like bream, bass and snapper etc in areas which are consistantly and heavily fished and cop way more boat traffic and noise than hinchenbrook. From my experience, The principles here are pretty much the same the same as they are up north. Just need a bit heavier gear and a better sponsors Like you said you need to fish your lure deep in the snags, we know that, cause we do that!! The blokes posting on this thread arent fishing mugs. As CGG81 said 'maybe novices to the area...not novices to fishing'.

All we asked was what plastics people were using. We'll give them a go. If we get smashed in the snags..all the more fun. If we lose all our gear or our casting arms fall off, then the cast net will get dusted off and CDG81 will be using it...Ill open his beer for him.

cheers

GO ..... STEVEB ... you tell em ..... Seriously though !.. Its no doubt a finicky area to fish (lots of water , snags , creeks & flats) .... But I reckon the key to it is flexibility ! ...... So while my morning & early afternoon sessions will be mainly SP & HBs up the creeks & on the flats My afternoons & evenings will be more relaxed... fishing live baits / baits & maybe a little troll off the loader I'm pretty confident over 5 days (12 hour + days) we'll manage some decent fish
Back to the original question . While I'm happy with my HB selection for the area .... I'm not so sure about SPs ... Nagg
PS ..... The fun will be in the trying

[Nomad62]

Hey Steve B,

I'm going up there same dates as you, only i'm staying at cardwell.
Ive fished the area quite a few times productively over the last ten years with lures and reckon its a great place.....great scenery....great wildlife.

I haven't done much fishing there with SP's....mainly HB's but plan to this time round.

I have stayed and fished from Lucinda as well as Cardwell in the past, both are good places to launch from. Weather permitting i will make the run down the channel to fish the jetty at some stage, plenty of good spots to fish along the way as well, might see you down there. I've got a Navy blue 5.0m Seajay Nomad with a 100 4stroke yammy on the back , if ya see me come and say G'day!!

Cheers Nomad62

[jackextracter]

The place can be a hard place to fish but when you get it sussed it produces the goods, last years trip we cleaned up and not a day that went passed on the holiday were we unsatisfied,we got told the place was fishing crap at the time we were there but we still cleaned up, so it pays to know what your doing like right time of day and tides,I found picking the right tides are the main part i found you want the biggest tides as possible, an most people go overboard and want to use 100pound leader and so on, we were useing 30pound to 40pound leader on the big fingers and that was enough sure you get smoked still but wouldnt you rather hook up then have the fish look at it and swim away cause there scared off from the leader any way good luck looking forward to your report.cheers.

[poppers81]

boys i just got back from hinchinbrook, liverpool creek(innisfail), and the daintree.. based in cairns a had a week of treking about with boat intow.. fishing was really slow for up there but we stilled managed to get into some nice fish......After a week we noticed that all good fish were caught on prawn imitation lures (prawnstars, berkley prawns, atomics).. hardly got a fish on hardbodies despite throwing to our arms fell off....Fished with my cousin who is more then accomplished up there and he too was surpised at how slow it was for the time of ther year...full moon played a part and the weather affected us in a big way .. was as cool up there as in brissy so hopefully by the time you guys get up there it is a stinking hot...Noticed in the clear water ther white coloured berkleys prawns were the best in dirty water, same again or prawnstars in green, blood red or pink....only in juniour sizes though... big ones no luck at all.... hope this helps... poppers81

We had heaps of fun on trevally and queenies on poppers as well.... reccomend it...

[Steve B]

Poppers and Jackextractor.

Thanks for your valuble advice. Hope it hots up too. Apparently a bit of run off would help too. the crew I am going with have been there several times and have had good success. I hope there form continues putting me on to fish. Thanks for the advice in prawnstars. I have a stack of juniors. I just changed the trebbles to owners just in case!!! Do you do that poppers?? I love the idea of increase hookups with 30lb leader at the loader with big angry fingers or trevs. Landing them would be a bonus. I might give it a go! If I loose too many, I might go back to the good old 100lb handline and live squid!

Nomad 62, We will definatley keep an eye out and catch up with you. We are in a 5m purple makocraft side console ( has some sponsors stickers on side ) with 90 Mariner optimax. We plan on fishing a bit half way up the channel to hinchenbrook so we should run across each other somewhere. If not, we are at lucinda somewhere. Definatley catch up for a beer and a chat.


NAGGS, I just read where your from!! When I said southerners I sort of meant Southern QLD, not cockroaches... LOL. That changes everything in fishing terms. Maybe you guys SHOULD stick to livebait. save you tackle! Leave your Tooheys at home too, and get some XXXX. seriously good luck and I hope you have a good trip. FNQ is the best place in the world .

steve

[NAGG]

Poppers and Jackextractor.


NAGGS, I just read where your from!! When I said southerners I sort of meant Southern QLD, not cockroaches... LOL. That changes everything in fishing terms. Maybe you guys SHOULD stick to livebait. save you tackle! Leave your Tooheys at home too, and get some XXXX. seriously good luck and I hope you have a good trip. FNQ is the best place in the world .

steve

Forgive me But I am apparently allowed to cross the boarder once or twice a year to pay Homage to the mighty Barra ...... Bait (maybe) , save tackle (nah .... part of paying homage to Barra & his mate Jack) , XXXX (I can spell beer)
Thanks for the wishes ...... I just reckon its a magic part of the world ..... Nagg

[Steve B]

Good on ya NAGG Have a safe trip. Look forward to you report. Sent you a PM.

cheers steve