On Saturday, my wife was away so I thought I would take the chance to go fishing again at (you guessed it) Tinaroo.
The day was a bit of a gloomy one, and as my head was throbbing from self infliction from the previous night, I didn't head up till after lunch.
Arriving at the Tinaburra ramp I was greeted by upteen million waterskiers, so knew I had to go up the back creeks away from the noise and chop, and find some peaceful relaxing water.
I had fished a few areas around sticks and along lillypad fringed banks, before heading into an area where I had sucess on trips months earlier with small barra. It must was about(as I check the time on the camera) 4.30pm when I headed tight in against a shallow bank.
I saw the tail fins waving sub-surface of what looked to be a rather decent fish. First cast at it came up short, so in went another which was right on the mark. From touch down the fins looked like they stopped, and then all hell broke loose as the fish smashed the Gold B-52 as it twitched past her nose. I had hooked on, but was dissapointed with the fight, and I have had much better from much smaller barra. After a few minutes she spat the hook, however the Owner hooks grabbed her in the last section of her meaty tail. I thought to myself, coming in backwards was just as good, although don't stand much of a chance, and almost like clockwork the fish gave up and went onto its side. With a sigh of relief, I netted the barra, but got a big shock when I needed to put the rod down to lift it into the boat with two hands. Thats when it hit me that this fish had finally got me into the 120's and beat my previous best of 119.
The size and colour of this fish was amazing, so after a quick photo on my tripod that I already set up to go (just in case as I was by myself) I tried to release this awesome fish. As with the fight this fish was sluggish to release, and this worried me, as it took a long time for the fish to swim of.
My question is, what happens if a BIG barra does not release well, due to lengthy fight or just out of pure exhaustion. A friend mentioned that sometimes they get roe infections (I know they don't breed in fresh
). What should you do, as we all know they are rather ordinary to eat, and I personally would rather them swim of for someone else to catch, but I also hate seeing dead fish lining the banks....
But anyways I have (hopefully) attached some pictures. May she swim to fight another day!!!!
Cheers Matt