Tuesday last week - Iluka - Woody Head

[Mullet Musketeer]

Tuesday

I am just back from a week of rock and beach fishing at Woody Head, in the Bundjalong National Park, just north of the town of Iluka, in Northern New South Wales. As is often the case here, the weather made the fishing pretty tough. Heavy rain freshened the mighty Clarence River and big seas, wind and swells conspired to limit access to the best fishing platforms.

But there were some good sessions and some good fish. To the north west of the Woody Head rock platform there is a sheltered bay that remains calm in all but the biggest gales. On the afternoon of our second day, there was a light northerly breeze blowing and the tide was running in. It had been raining on and off, all day and the water was murky and the sky, overcast. The birds were working furiously, diving into bait schools close to the shore. Just on dusk, I walked down to the beach with my heavy outfit – Daiwa 9’6’ Demon Blood rod, Shimano Stradic 6000 spinning reel loaded with 30lb braid and 30lb fluorocarbon leader. I tied on a 45g silver HALCO Twisty slug and cast it about 25 metres, towards the diving birds. After a couple of casts – bang - and line starts peeling. It was a solid fish and then it leapt clear of the water – an Australian Salmon. It did a couple of tail walks and even with the heavy rod, it was hard to subdue. I eventually got it to the beach and it immediately started spitting out mouthfuls small whitebait/anchovies (not actually sure which). This was clearly what had attracted the birds.

It was now dark and raining so, after a few pictures, I released the fish and went to dry off. I have never been able to make these fish taste good, so I have given up keeping them for the table. It may not have been dinner but it was a great fish to open the account.

For more reports, photographs and fishy yarns - read the blog at http://landangler.wordpress.com/

[frankgrimes]

Nice work mate - I was at Iluka 10+11/12...and yeah, weather did not play nice...beautiful place though, and Ill definitely be heading back there.

Mick

[alleycat]

Hi MM just wondering how dirty the river was, we are taking the boat down for 5 days from 28th december..cheers

[frankgrimes]

Hey Alleycat - Im (currently) working my way back to Goldie from Syd - Was at Newcastle(stockton), river was very dirty, but they were getting some decent jew off the rockwall. Im currently at Port Macquarie, river here is pretty clean(Going to throw some slugs off the rock wall here later this arvo), and heading to darlington beach on Wed for a couple of nights, and will probably call into Iluka for a day after that, so ill let you know what the rivers like.

Mick

[alleycat]

thanks mick, call into south west rocks if you havent been before, very nice place..

[frankgrimes]

I called in there on the way down(goldie->syd) - had a flick for ~20min on the beach when I arrived, then she started pissing down...stayed that way(rain!) until I left next morning had a nice meal at the pub though.

[Mullet Musketeer]

Not too bad on the top of the run in tide - it seemed to run pretty clear after a few days with only showers and then we had a big down pour and it turned murky again. It is always difficult to know whats coming from far up stream. Good luck

[HeadBanger]

Hey mate, I was in Iluka from the 11-18th and couldn't manage a fish of the beach or rocks. Ended up spending my time there in the Clarence chasing bream and flathead.

Cheers,
Kaidon

[sandbankmagnet]

I've had salmon in thai fishcakes and they are great. Fish, potato, little bit of onion, sweet chilli sauce and some coriander. Yum. You have to beeld the fish on capture and cut all the red out of the fillets though.

They are a very oily fish just plain though.

[sambino]

In new zealand we call australian salmon kawhai dont recall them being very oily though but are very good smoked or used to make raw fish with coconut cream and lemon juice throw in some tomato cucumber and capsicum a bit of red onion leave it in the fridge overnight and its b.e.a.u.t.i.f.u.l

[johnlikes2fish]

We were down Iluka from the 9/12 to 18/12 caught plenty of salmon on small slugs along shark bay and most other beaches, tailor and jew at night off the beach fishing the river side of the rockwall at slack water produced plenty of bream and the odd school jew as well as a few unstoppables. the amount of bait around was amazing with the whitebait everywhere although the fish were generally fussy and would only take 25g slugs, the river was thick with mullet and if we hadnt have been having success off the beach i would have fished the river side of the wall a lot more.
We head back down around the7/1 and hopefullly a few pelagics show so we can spin the wall and headlands for tuna and mackerel

[Mullet Musketeer]

Hopefully the weather will have calmed down a bit by then - we got plenty more salmon through the week and when they were thick - they would eat just about anything