Reply With QuoteA few more pics, including Mondy ones
The first one is just before it slapped me in the side of the head.
Check out the fine form of barra anglers preparing for a comp, especially Motty.
Still recovering from a nine day trip, which was an absolute blast! I fished with Ian Baker (Baggersace) as Team Berkley Nitro R& D, and yes I actually did a fair bit of R&D! There is certainly a wealth of information to take away from this trip.
Here we go, I'll break it down!
Day 1, Friday 27th Nov
We leave Brisbane Northside early, check into the Awoonga Gateway just after lunchtime, unpack, rig up,
On the water we go about checking a few locations, and running into a few other teams to say G’day. Most teams had already had a couple of days prefishing and had been doing ok. We get just one onboard for the arvo which was an 87cm I got on one of my prototypes. We spend most of the time sounding around with a few casts here and there.
We did manage a few other hits, but no hook-ups. I think we were in about 9pm.
Day 2 – Saturday 28th Nov
The night championships start at 4pm (and go till 8am the next morning).
We go straight to a point in the main basin, which we named Karma Point, thanks to Vossy on the Debacle trip. We didn’t get a hit for over an hour, so went looking for another point, unfortunately they are all occupied. We fished a couple of spots for no results, so headed back to Karma just before dark. Luckily we had it to ourselves still.
We didn’t get our first bite until well after dark, I think I got the first fish – in the nineties, we got a couple in the next hour between 93 and 106cm, then it went quiet, then we had another bite period around 10.30pm, I was pretty buggered by this time and was fishing sitting down on the back of the boat when i hooked my last three fish.
One spat it on the first jump the second went high 90s and the last bite I had was just after midnight. It crunched my Hollowbelly and just shook its head, then woke up and went for a big run. I called Ian to throw the anchor, but then she stopped and I got some line back before she took off again. Luckily she didn’t take too much line, but it was enough to confirm she was a big girl. I backed the drag off and played her out for quite a while. We got a glimpse in the headlight, then she made a big jump near the anchor rope, and I thought holy sh#t, this is big! A few more nervous moments were had before Ian got her into the big net.
Whoo hoo! It was a two man lift to get her in. On the mat she went 120cm, and I remember saying something like, I can’t imaging what a 126 or 130 would like like, ‘cause this thing seemed huge. Anyway I’m calling her my PB now, as my previous was a big Tinaroo fish caught when filming Dam Hot 2, we never measured her officially, but I’ve been calling her a 120cm.
The reel was stuffed after that fish, it had had a tough life previously , and was getting a little rough, I tried to give it a clean and re-lube prior to the comp, but it didn’t work, and the gears were stuffed.
We fished on till about 1.30am for now more bites. Our tally at this stage was 5 to me and 3 for Ian. We set an alarm for 3.45am for the sunrise bite.
Day 3 Sunday 29th Nov – still in the middle of Night championships
I woke up before the alarm, freezing cold and seized up a bit, from trying to sleep on a wet deck in a tracksuit. We recommenced fishing, but had no more bites, so left Karma at about 6am looking for fish.
Interestingly another boat fished about 80m down from us all night, and we were going camera flash for camera flash all night. In the morning it turns out it was Mike and Kerry (Team Etec HO) and they also were at 5 and 3 for the session.
We headed up Iveragh Ck, and fished a few spots identified on previous trips, and Ian pulled a 90cm fish, to bring his tally up to 4 for the session. That was it for us.
There were stories emerging at the tag mat, and boat ramp of some awesome results. Some teams absolutely cleaned up! I thought I was doing alright with 5.08m, but in the end that barely put me in the top ten. Daniel Gretch had a massive 5.83m, followed by only a cm by two of his mates including Jason Crofts with a 126cm fish!
Still some teams struggled, but overall it was a hot bite, and many ABT records were rewritten. We ended up 7th team with 9 fish for 866cm, so we were pretty happy with that.
Tactics - Our tactic on Karma was – anchored in 12 – 14 feet of water fishing into the weed edge at 8 – 10 feet, slow rolling 5” Hollowbellys. We were experimenting with stingers mounted forward of the main hook. And we only dropped two on these jigs all night, both on first jump before we could back off drags.
We finally got home to sleep, and opted to not fish Night 3 of the trip.
Day 4 Monday 30th Nov
In the morning we headed into the Hatchery at Gladstone, Kurt was in full barra production mode, he had a batch of 20 – 40mm fingerlings, and another batch at only 6-8mm long, and was in the process of getting more eggs, finding the girls with eggs on board then injecting them to lay, and injecting one of the boys to do his job. Then it was a matter of refilling the tank and skimming the eggs off the surface and taking them to the next stage. Sounds simple, but obviously there is a hell of a lot to it, hopefully he will get to release another big batch into Awoonga this year.
We then dropped into to Scotts (Vet) to borrow a couple of rods and reels. After the night before, I was fairly convinced spin was the way to go, and he had some Berkley/ABU combos he could spare – thanks Scott.
The Awoonga Evening championships kicked off at 3pm till 10pm. We had a bit of a look around at a few spots for no result before finally anchoring on Karma. Kerry and Mike were already there. Not long after arriving I hooked up on a 5” Power Mullet that had only just hit the bottom when it was engulfed. I managed to land it and it went 109cm. Ian then hooked up, before I had started fishing again, but it spat it first jump. After that I struggled big time, and never got another hookup.
Ian was going well though, he did drop another one, before keeping the hooks into his 3rd and 4th, I snapped some shots off of him in action, and the look on his face shows how much determination he was putting into getting that fish on board. I’m not sure if he appreciated me completely destroying any night vision he had!
The bite improved (for everyone else) from 9pm, but with check in at 10pm, everyone left them biting. Our night one result was – one for me, two for Ian.
It seemed retrieve speed was a definite trigger, and I just couldn’t crack the right speed to get the bites. After the comp, it clicked that Scotts spools were much fuller than mine from the previous night. Same reels, but it would have meant different retrieve speed,..?
Mike and Kerry kicked our butts that night, and figured well up the board.
That night, It was great to have a few drinks with other crews at the Gateway, The Engel boys were next door, we headed over to their joint, and were joined by the Bundyites, Team Halco and Nagg, and we told stories for a few hours before we turned in. The Halco boys were coming up with some interesting poses for the ABT officials to digest!
Day 5 Tuesday 1st December
Fishing again commenced at 3pm – 10pm, for the second session of the Awoonga night Championships. We had to make up for the previous days efforts, and Karma pt hadn’t been firing till late, so we headed up Iveragh. Which did produce a 93cm for me, my back was playing up so I was again sitting down fishing a weed edge while Ian was on the electric. The hit was out of the blue, and it came in with the usual barra fight of several jumps and laps around the boat. The funny thing about this fish is when I was holding it up for a pic , I did a sideways hold, and it must have had enough because it tail slapped me in the side of the head, leaving my left ear ringing for several minutes.
We tried a few more spots up Iveragh with no more action, so decide to head back into the basin. It was the windiest night by far, the wind had changed direction as well, so we took a few goes to get the anchor to hold, and to get the right position. On the last attempt, we couldn’t even make headway against the wind, on electric, so had to start the main motor. Unfortunately we ended up swinging closer to Mike and Kerry than we expected, but once it finally held there was no way were going to try and reposition again.
That night, was again fairly tough for us, I managed two more, and Ian got one, but it was very tough in the wind. We ended up with seven fish for 675cm and placed 15th.
After the comp, we headed back out after Trev, Nagg and Team Halco. They headed back to a spot were they just started cleaning up at the end of the session.
We got there 10 minutes after the others, and Nagg already had one in the boat, and Jason Erlich was hooked up to a fish that turned out to be a 116cm. Then Tim got a 114cm. I had two hits on prototype lures that left scuffing 8 -10 inches up the leader but didn’t hook up. They were BIG fish there. The bite then shut down, and we all headed in.
Jason Wilhelm took out the Evening Championships with 10 fish for 1010cm, another record.
That was it for Awoonga, Unreal to see it fire up for a comp like that, just great to see it producing so many big fish.
Day 5 Wednesday 2st December
Off to Mondy, check into the Choice Servo/Caravan Park, to the dodgiest cabin in the joint! I suppose you take what you can get when you book in late.
Southerly change kicked in big time, we drove through storms on the way south, and this is the day Awoonga copped the massive storm.
A couple of teams stayed to try and fish that night, but said they witnessed the full fury of the storm, one bloke was trying to retrieve his boat at the ramp, and it was getting hammered, so they just hooked it up to a car and dragged it up the ramp.
We fished a few hours on Mondy that arvo, for one hookup and spit and a couple of catties.
Day 6 Thursday 3rd December
Mondy Prefish day, we did a big day on the lake, had a few bumps here and there, but only hooked two fish. Both to me in thick timber, I’ve got very little experience on this, and I tried to go too hard on them, and busted them both off at the leader knot.
Day 7 Friday 4th December
Mondy comp day 1
We only had one plan, one spot, so we went there and spent all day in the timber covering an area about 300m long and 100m wide. We got all our bites on 5” Hollowbellys in the prefish, so what does Ian tie on – a 5” Mullet. We pull up and electric into casting position, I start ragging him for tying on a Mullet.
He says I’ll just give it 5 minutes, first cast Bang! On! Bullsh*t, Ian’s going hard on the fish, I’m driving hard on the electric. It was frantic heart in your mouth stuff, but somehow we got him to the net, and it went 99cm! Not a bad effort first cast, his Mondy pb.
Ian went on to hook another shortly after, we chased and fought it again, had it up a couple of times, before it found a log to wrap itself around and bite through the leader. Damn! The Mullet got another 2 bites for Ian, but the other two jumped off first cast.
I threw the Mullet a fair bit as well after Ian’s results, but only got a couple of bumps. My only hook up came on the Firetiger 5” Hollowbelly, again in tight timber. This time I used a lot of free spooling and then light drag settings, Ian was chasing hard on the electric, we knocked down three small trees in the fight, at times the fish was jumping about 30 to 40 metres away, while we still had 3 or 4 trees to negotiate to catch up. Finally we get a net shot, and she goes 103cm, a Mondy PB for me as well.
So only one each day one, but enough to put us in 11th and 13th, Ian was cursing his missed opportunities. I was stoked to land my one and only in the circumstances.
We headed to the pub that night, and had a pretty big night, it was great to socialise with a few of the other teams and meet more barra anglers. Long walk back to the choice at 1am.
Day 8 Saturday 5th December
Mondy Comp Day 2
Straight back to our spot, but the action was a little slower, along with my reflexes I think!
The Mullet didn’t fire for Ian, but I managed five bites for the day on the Firetiger 5” HB, somehow three didn’t stick – they were fair dinkum thumps. The other two stuck and after the tree dodging routine, complete with passing rods around trees, and smashing Ian’s Nav lights. I landed a 99 and 100cm fish for the day, everything from Mondy for me was on 20lb fireline in the timber!
Final result was 3 for 3m neat, and an 8th place, after Scotty got me on a countback. In a tight comp, it could have been anyones, but Cy Taylor did it again, Narrowly holding out Carl Jocumsen. Just about everyone in the top ten lost fish that would have won it for them.
The presentation at the pub was a great way to finish the tour, it was great to have a feed and a beer and meet a few more people and share more stories of the trip.
I’ve done the two Awoonga events for the past two years, and it’s been tough. This year Awoonga fired, and I did Mondy for the first time, and it fished ok.
Fishing with Ian was great, we fished well together, even though it was his boat, we shared the captains role, fortunately he put up with my taking over. As a team we ended up placing 6th at Mondy and 6th in the Southern teams AOY, so we were pretty happy with that. I've got to thank Trev for all his coaching and teaching this year and last. Without him sharing his hard earned knowledge, I wouldn't know half of what I do.
All in all it was a fantastic trip, lots of fish, I caught 12 fish in the tournaments for 1195cm - average of 99.5cm. 11 on 5" Hollowbelly, and one on a 5" Mullet. We met a lot of top people, and had heaps of fun whilst fishing and inbetween sessions. There were lots of antics going on, we'll be taking some water ballons next year or maybe a water canon.
I just fished the Bream Grand final at Sydney Harbour a few weeks prior and the barra tour simply left that trip for dead. There is talk about more barra events in 2010, spaced throughout the year, so I'll be all over that hopefully - bugger the bream and bass.
Plenty of pics taken, here are a few,
Cheers,
Matt
Last edited by matt fraser; 07-12-2009 at 04:44 PM. Reason: edit
A few more pics, including Mondy ones
The first one is just before it slapped me in the side of the head.
Check out the fine form of barra anglers preparing for a comp, especially Motty.
Great report Matt - by our measure you and Ian had a cracker of a trip catching at least a fish every session for the entire southern leg. You can't ask for much more than that.
Mondy was a tough bite and you managed fish on both days with this being only your third trip there! Bloody well done to you both...
Regs
Pete & Kyle
Another great read from ABT, tihs is starting to get a litle "motivating", for lack of a better word.
Well done Matt, and congats mate.
I could have read your report for hours Matt. Fantastic results and your reporting style is very easy going and tantalising. I loved all the "other" pics as much as the barra ones.
Congrats on a wonderful tour mate.
Cheers
Paul
Ranger 188VX - "Sweet Chariot"
Good read & great result Matt ....... you both fished well
It certainly is a good tour & well worth participating in.
Some pretty good piccys there Matt ...... & thankfully no nudie ones
Chris
PS ..... congrats on the 120 girl
Give a man a fish & he will eat for a day !
Teach him how to fish
& he will sit in a boat - & drink beer all day!
TEAM MOJIKO
matt..thats a good read, congrats on your results...it is very good to see some good reports of everyones experiences in this tour, it sounds like a well organized and enjoyable comp.
good to see you all share it with all of us,thanks..and as brian says, gets one thinkin bout next year...(nath
thanks again...you alll done good...
deano.....
God put me on earth to accomplisha certain number of things,right now i am so far behindi will never die.
Great report Matt
It was absolutely fantastic to do the tour with you, I learnt so much and loved every minute.
Well done to all who did the tour, Naggs an absolute gentleman and pretty good fisho to boot. Trev was a bottomless pit of knowledge and help. The great thing about the trip was the people and the exchange of information, everyone was willing to help each other catch fish.
People asked where you were fishing not to take your spot but to ensure they didn't interfer with your fishing area, that's great sportsmanship.
I highly recommend those who are thinking about doing the ABT tour next year, to take the plunge, you'll learn so much in such a short amount of time and make some great friends.
P.S. Don't let Matt book your accommodation, he sucks at that stuff.
Nice work there Matt.
Some awsome pics as well.
Well done.
Chees
Lee
Great stuff Ian. I take it you boys scored the dongas at Choice....without air con?????Originally Posted by baggersace
P.S. Don't let Matt book your accommodation, he sucks at that stuff.
Cheers
Paul
Ranger 188VX - "Sweet Chariot"
Congrat matt on your success well done goodreport great photo's
shane
Matt great report mate, and it was good to share a beer and few stories, and tips from you over the mondy section. You guys did awesome over both comps, so really well done for that.
Ian, your so right, there was plenty of info shared, even by the gurus and leaders of the comp at the time. I meant to say something about the general ettiquette and sportsmanship on and off the water...I thought it was superb...well at Mondy anyway!! It was also good to meet you too mate. See you both next year,,,or sooner!
Cheers Steve
Thanks Pete, top fun, a lot of hard fishing! but great times, and a bonus to get a few decent results.
Cheers,
Matt
Thanks Paul, I love to get it all down while its still fresh, took a little longer than I expected. But its good to be able to report a quality trip. I'm wrote to Santa for a new camera for christmas, as some of the pics could be better quality.
Cheers,
Matt
Thanks Chris, it was great to catch up with you over a few beers on tour. The tour was very positive this year, and I like the idea of a few more events next year.Good read & great result Matt ....... you both fished well
It certainly is a good tour & well worth participating in.
Some pretty good piccys there Matt ...... & thankfully no nudie ones
Chris
PS ..... congrats on the 120 girl
The big girl was a real buz, I've now caught about a dozen metereys this year with 115, 117 and now 120 being the biggest. She was massive, like I said, its hard for me to comprehend anything bigger, she blew me away! Can't wait to see a bigger fish!
Cheers.
Matt
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