Moon Phases and Imoundment Barra?

[Big_Ren]

SeekingBarradise, Interesting what you say about barra being caught in temps considered low enough to kill barra, because a neighbour of a friend who lives at Dalby put 20 barra in his dam a few years ago, and not a very big dam at that, as they only have half an acre of land, and he put his boat in the dam and checked his sounder and found 18 of them still alive. Some have been caught and were a good size.

Now, if you don't know Dalby, it is COLD. Lots of frosts with a layer of ice on top of any water containers, etc left outside in the winter. I was very surprised as I thought they didn't live south of Gympie because of the cold.

Cheers Eleanor

That's quite interesting Eleanor, because as Lyndon said, JM caught fish in water cooled to 14.9oC. (surface temp I imagine).

It is not that far above the generally accepted mortality threshold of water temperatures dropping below 13oC.

Having said that, it is also reported that mortality due to disease outbreaks and other stress-related factors incrementally becomes a more frequent event in water slightly warmer than that.

Cheers
Paul

[NAGG]

My understanding is that the fish kills occur when the barra venture into the shallows to warm themselves during the day & then you have a cold snap that chills the shallow water to close to air temperature. The barra who stayed in the shallows ( usually bigger fish) basically get hypothermia.
I think the fish kills of last August occured during around a week long cold snap .

Chris

[vet]

Yes Paul, the study of barra is definitely better than work. cheers scott

[Big_Ren]

My understanding is that the fish kills occur when the barra venture into the shallows to warm themselves during the day & then you have a cold snap that chills the shallow water to close to air temperature. The barra who stayed in the shallows ( usually bigger fish) basically get hypothermia.
I think the fish kills of last August occured during around a week long cold snap .

Chris

That's my understanding too Chris. Bit like that Elvis number...."....caught in a trap, can't walk out" Without having the capacity to interview those captive fish, it seems to me they found themselves in a nice position, thought it might stay that way, it didn't because of the rapidly fluctuating thermal variations of shallower bodies of water...and bingo...hypothermia/lethargy triggers a fatal turn of events.

Remember that fungal type growth on the backs of many of those bigger fish last year...almost like they were sunburnt.

There is still the potential this year but the "snap" effect of a sudden plummet in temperature does not seem to have occurred thankfully.

Having said that, if temperatures deeper within the core of a lake reached those same life-threatening temperature thresholds, then we would undoubtedly have a much bigger fish kill on our hands.

Rambling a little bit, sorry.

Cheers
Paul

[Big_Ren]

Yes Paul, the study of barra is definitely better than work. cheers scott

Too right Scott. You are a lucky bugger in your line of work. Barra are just an extension of that for you.

Cheers
Paul

[vet]

Hello Paul, last year the overall water temperature was colder by now by about 2 degrees ie it would warm up to 18 degrees after getting down to 16 overnight. so far the dam is still around 20 degrees in the afternoon so the barra are still sitting out a bit deeper and don't feel the need to come into the shallows to warm up yet. Last year every bay you drove into had hundreds of barra storming out of the shallows where they were warming up. This year this isn't happening yet, you can drive up the back of the bays and nothing comes rushing out. If you sound around in 15 odd feet you can see piles of barra piling up in the creeks than just on dark they move into the shallows to feed for 40 minutes than they drop back. It is looking good so far this year but 2 weeks of sw could still change this, so hopefully not. The full moon doesn't seem to have any effect on this.
cheers scott.

[Big_Ren]

Hello Paul, last year the overall water temperature was colder by now by about 2 degrees ie it would warm up to 18 degrees after getting down to 16 overnight. so far the dam is still around 20 degrees in the afternoon so the barra are still sitting out a bit deeper and don't feel the need to come into the shallows to warm up yet. Last year every bay you drove into had hundreds of barra storming out of the shallows where they were warming up. This year this isn't happening yet, you can drive up the back of the bays and nothing comes rushing out. If you sound around in 15 odd feet you can see piles of barra piling up in the creeks than just on dark they move into the shallows to feed for 40 minutes than they drop back. It is looking good so far this year but 2 weeks of sw could still change this, so hopefully not. The full moon doesn't seem to have any effect on this.
cheers scott.

Lol Scott. I forgot this was a thread about the moon.

That is good news so far though. Although last year made many of us feel bad, it was just a drop in the ocean to the amount that survived...some impoundments faring worse than others...granted.

Cheers mate and might catch up again soon. We seem to see the good doctor a fair bit these days. You should venture 90 minutes south down the goat track some time.

Cheers
Paul

[NAGG]

Keeping off topic If we can get through the next 2-3 weeks without a prolonged cold SW blast ....... The fish kills should be avoided. (we actually have very good weather forecasts for the next week or so)
Seeing that its been a fairly mild winter & some more favorable weather due (North winds)....... I reckon we might be in for some cracker barra fishing during Sept
So all I want to know now is - When is the full moon

chris

[Big_Ren]

So all I want to know now is - When is the full moon

chris

Stevo is an ardent student of The Moon Chris....he will be able to tell you

Cheers
Paul

[SeekingBarradise]

SeekingBarradise, Interesting what you say about barra being caught in temps considered low enough to kill barra, because a neighbour of a friend who lives at Dalby put 20 barra in his dam a few years ago, and not a very big dam at that, as they only have half an acre of land, and he put his boat in the dam and checked his sounder and found 18 of them still alive. Some have been caught and were a good size.

Now, if you don't know Dalby, it is COLD. Lots of frosts with a layer of ice on top of any water containers, etc left outside in the winter. I was very surprised as I thought they didn't live south of Gympie because of the cold.

Cheers Eleanor

Hi Eleanor thanks for the reply.

Yep i know where Dalby is for sure, i used to kick around that region and lived in areas close by, played some sport, camped, fished and hunted N,E,W & South of there. We used to duck through that way heading west to hunt Roos, Pigs and Goats. I remember some long shots with the trusty old Tikka .222. The areas North & East of the area we had Red Deer country basicaly from Bunya mountains to Crows Nest to Esk. Good people and nice country everyone should check out one day.

Dalby: They breed them big out that way, i saw a whole 16 year old team bigger than Paul Sironen playing league where they were running over kids like Semi' Trailers crushing kangaroo's at night. Some ate whole chickens for lunch.

Barra: We used to skip through the back way to Dalby then up to Wuruma Dam which was stinking hot in summer and freezing in winter so i know what you mean by cold. The session i described where the bite got later each night was at Wuruma Dam.

We had a ball on barra there before the cold smashed about 2000 barra just when the fishery was booming. Sadly it's never got back anywhere near where it was before the kill & when they let so much water out which didn't help matters.

The 14.9 is fact it's recorded on DVD in the Fish Awoonga DVD.

It's great to hear the barra in the dam are still alive, they did well and if fish could buy lotto tickets i'd tell them all to buy plenty.

Thanks for posting & Jogging treasured memories.
Cheers Lyndon.

[Steve B]

Ren, The moon is here mate!!

Speaking of moons (in the sky), Spudly and I went out Thurs for a bit of a fish. We were working a bay up in D, and a couple of blokes were camped right up the back. They had seperate boats, they were working towards us, and had a double hookup! it was great to watch....shame we didnt get into the action at that time too. Unfortunatly 1 fish was lost. very happy campers!! got a few good tips of these boys...they were trolling plastics over submerged trees in a creekbed in the bay..interesting technique that worked.

For us, nothing until sunset..Spud got a 105 just on dark, then the moon rose about 6pm...I said 'look the moon is poking its head over the horizon' then 'bang' I was on, dropped it...got 1 about 3 casts later 90 odd cm, had a double hookup five casts later again, both got stitch up, plus a few more belts etc on plastics after that. I think we had 8 solid hookups/fish in 40 min post moonrise....and the weather was a bit ordinary too, cold SE wind. Last night would have been even better I reckon, but we we not allowed to go! couple of interesting notations...the birds appear to be returning...didnt see any fish shallow at all, spooked 1 fish in a weed bed as we ploughed through it to get into a bay. Didnt see any bait activity..mabey 1 or 2 flicking surface just after dark...simultanouesly with fish biting...no surface boofing.

cheers Steve

[vet]

Hi Paul, yes it would be good to catch up again. I don't think I'll be doing the 90 minute drive too often though, I actually like to catch fish when I go out and it doesn't happen for me too often in monduran. It has 1 advantage over awoonga, Isis is only 30 minutes away.

Hello Steve B, I bet you were suprised to get a bite period at sunset with the moon rising. Who'd have guessed that would occur. Judging by only 4 boats out on awoonga at that time, not too many people. There was me, trev, lochyand someone from nsw, after talking with trev who spoke to everyone on the dam that night it seemed that everyone caught fish at that time.
Hope you keep catching them, scott

[tednted]

Great Thread fella's
This has been a fantastic read for me , heading up to awoonga early Oct. & doin a guide session the first day we get there with Johnny
Coincidently we arrive just before the full moon in Oct & this will be the 2nd time I've trekked up from Vic.
With only the 1 barra for 7 days last year ,I thought the guide idea would be the way to go . I was lucky enough to catch 1 on the troll last year ,but I still didn't know too much about barra fishin by the time I left to come home !!!! Hopefully with what I've been reading & help I've been getting of sweetwater & doin a guide with John !! I may learn a bit about this caper
Keep up the good read guys
Cheers AL

[Steve B]

Great Thread fella's
This has been a fantastic read for me , heading up to awoonga early Oct. & doin a guide session the first day we get there with Johnny
Coincidently we arrive just before the full moon in Oct & this will be the 2nd time I've trekked up from Vic.
With only the 1 barra for 7 days last year ,I thought the guide idea would be the way to go . I was lucky enough to catch 1 on the troll last year ,but I still didn't know too much about barra fishin by the time I left to come home !!!! Hopefully with what I've been reading & help I've been getting of sweetwater & doin a guide with John !! I may learn a bit about this caper
Keep up the good read guys
Cheers AL

Not maybe Al, you will learn something from Johhny thats for sure!! Best move you will ever make, short of moving to QLD from Vic is getting a guide. I reckon you will get heaps in the period your coming, and you will go home knowing heaps more too. Good luck with it, and cant wait for the reports.
Cheers Steve

[Steve B]

Bumping this up for Louie!!

Just read it all again. Its a good read!

Cheers Steve