Townsville Winter solstice unseasonal magic

[Mozza]

Well guys,

The Gods have answered my prayers with a 3 good returns on the last 3 trips. I thought the doz. doggies was good but little did I know what was to follow:

Last weekend I took my 10yo son out for a fish off West Point and what does he get on his first 'serious' trip; out? Yep, that's right a 10kg fingermark! STUFFED IF I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING WRONG!

This Saturday, with apologies to Ron, I did manage to get out to spot X and found unbelievably these beeeeeautiful critters. They went 80, 83 and __ cm... better let Mudge fill you all in with the details because as you can see he's rather happy.

Gotta keep it short 'cos like Dan, I'm grass cutting here and the F/M story has been reserved for the F&B mag.

To get in early: please don't ask where it is guys.

G'night

Mozza

[Kendall249]

well done Mozza, truely unseasonal, but a bloody good fish no matter the season.

kendall

[Mozza]

Thanks Kendall,

Looks like Herald in the backround in your photo page....

Cheers
Mozza

[Kendall249]

You have a good eye there mozza, those trout were speared just on the inside of bramble rock, facing toward Herald.

Can't wait to read about your outing in FnB.

cheers

Kendall

[Scott nthQld]

deleted....Ausfish does not own my thoughts and opinions

[Fishin_Dan]

Nice one mate! Couple of very nice fish there!!!

[Mozza]

Thanks guys,

BTW the fingermark went 82cm (as well) - it went like a train - I thought it was a spaniard. Poor bugger! I left him with it until he started going pale. Gave him a quick hand to get it near the boat. First colour, I gave the rod back and did the net duties. You could imagine my reaction when I saw what was in the net....

I'm really sorry Scott, if I told you I'd have to kill you...

What was critical I think, was the fact that Wed, Thurs, Fri were fairly warm days with less wind and with the smaller high tide in the morning and a long, gentle runout, there was plenty of time to warm water over shallow mudflats. So, if you know a spot where you have warm tidal water flowing off mudflats into deeper channels, try there.

Cheers
Mozza

[ronnien]

mozza mate, u told me that it was going to BLOW UP! lol. very nice finger u got there & i dont belive that they are season fish it's just when things cool down u gotta try different things, instead of going to marks out deep like in summer u fish for them in the middle of the day, troll deep divers up aganst headlands or live bait them. fingers are all year round fish, cant say about the barra (never got one) & they are a solid looking fish well done mate! i took the family to the ross yesterday & got a f$#%ed up steering i new 1 is needed,what did u catch the finger on (bait).

ron.

[Mozza]

Ron,

Cheers, yeah sorry about that. The wind was blowing its @#$! out early Saturday am. than proceeded to settle out so the call was made to check out my barra spot.

The finger was caught at ~6 a.m. last saturday on live herring with a frickin' cold s'erly blowing!!

Mozza

[nuggstar]

ya gotta be happy with that bag of fish

[levinge]

Mozza, I know your secret, Exploding bait, thats the only way you could get a Barra with the weather the way its been lately.

Just kidding, top effort and hope you made the young fella gut and fillet that monster, looks like some good chewing there.

Again Top Effort. Look forward to more reports (horizon in the background would be good, give us a chance to find out where you went???)

[Curmudgeon]

Who is that fool in the photo?

I'm still grinning like the cat that swallowed the canary.

Regarding the location: Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies.

Brace yourself. This'll be a long one.

Prelude

After much umming and ahhing, I bought myself a Penn PinPoint rod last Saturday morning after having read some very good reviews here-abouts.

Got home in time for a late lunch, but first things first. I had to mount my Cruxis on the new stick (mmm, poor choice of words perhaps). In the process of making myself a sanger, the phone rang.
It was Mozza.
"I'm going fishin'!", said he.
"When?".
"Now!".
And so the adventure began...

Chapter 1 (just kidding, it's not THAT long)

We approached secret spot X with every intention of having a troll, but for some reason, Mozza pulled up short and began fanning casts about the place. Caught unprepared with my new rod not yet rigged, I grabbed my little spin stick and starting throwing a flick bait in no particular direction. Minutes passed, and I heard a grunt from down the back of the boat followed by a splash. Expecting to turn around and see Mozza floundering in the briny, instead I found his new rod in the process of being christened by an 83cm barra! After doing my level best to knock it off the hooks with the landing net, the fish was safely boated. Much yahooing, back slapping and hand shaking ensued. We were both very happy boys. Then we realised that we didn't have a beer on board to celebrate the occasion.

We have put an awful lot of hours into this spot this year for very little result. But persistence pays, as they say.

We lined up on the troll run. My new rod still needed christening. It didn't take long. First lap, and I was into a barracuda. That wasn't in the script! Another hour passed with only a couple more barracuda to distract us from the monotonous drone of the outboard.

Then BANG!!! I was on! The fish got almost airborne. A beautiful barra! My heart was racing. My knees were shaking. My ears were ringing with frantic instructions from Mozza, trying his damnedest to confuse me and make me drop the fish. Onya Moz. I will give him credit for some excellent boat handling and a sure footed net shot. Couldn't have done it without ya, mate. To say I was elated might be somewhat understating things. For the life of me, I can't think what I was doing different on that troll run, compared to the thousand other unsuccessful troll runs along that same stretch. Sooner or later, I guess ya just gotta get lucky.

So there we were. A matching pair of 80cm barras on ice (ok mine was 3cm shorter than Mozza's). I sat out the next two laps of trolling, just drinking in the ambiance. What a feeling. THE most fun you can have standing up. No question.

After some judicious re-bending of a straightened treble, I put my lure back in the water for another swim. "That will not be topped today", were my exact words to Moz. I couldn't have been more sure of that at the time.

Half an hour or so later, Moz wasn't even breaking from the troll run to deal with yet another little barracuda on his line, when my lure stopped dead. But this was no snag. "Ahh, I'm on. And this is big", I said to the captain. Now grasping the wriggling barracuda, he cast a dubious glance in my direction, then out the back, then chose to continue on trolling regardless! Several seconds later, the big girl (the fish, not the captain) must have decided that she'd had enough of this game. She tore twenty metres of line off and got airborne. Fully four feet in the air! Illuminated by the last rays of the setting sun. That's something that will be burned into my brain forever.

That convinced Mozza that I wasn't pulling his leg.

Fearful of straightening the dodgy standard trebles, the fight was conducted under minimal drag pressure. She got airborne several more times. Spectacular stuff. I just don't have any more words for it. It got dark before we got her to the boat. An absolutely bloody perfect net shot by the Moz, and I had a new pb of 98cm!!!

At this point, I refer you back to the photo in Mozza's post. It probably sums it up better than mere words.

An amazing end to an amazing trip.
One of our briefest excursions to that location, too.
Every barra hooked was landed. Our normal conversion rate is not even close to that.

Thank you once again, Mozza. You've always said that spot had potential. I will be eternally grateful to have had the opportunity to see that potential realised.

Enough of my dribble. Thanks for reading.

Cheers all,
Brian.

ps. The rod performed flawlessly. It was a revelation to discover how easy it was to cast lures into the wind. She loads up nicely, too.

[kingkev]

Top effort guys...............great read.

Its been a long time since I caught a fish.......................I am jeolous as

Check the forthcoming reports......he!he!

This is proof that those (MOZZA and Mates) who put the effort in will surely be rewarded

well done

[ronnien]

mozza,
i have just had a read of your story in the july f&b, mate top story! it is the stand out read of the paper. after i finished it, it was then just a quick read of the rest, well done.

ron.

[Mozza]

It's already in?

Geez, now I have to go and get myself a copy!

Moz

PS Glad you enjoyed it