cabbage tree ck mystery brutes!

[Billo]

cod with bite marks on a 10cm biddy that pulls hard? right!

FYI , i have pulled cod from cabbage tree creek previously using 10-15cm potty mullet and siler biddies

I have cod drop the bait from the pressure on the line and have come in with bite marks and guts hanging out and tooth prick holes all through it ...

i have also had estuary cod bite through 40 lb flurocarbon in seconds, and come back for another bait 30 minutes after ...how do i know ? cause i pulled 2 sets of my own bloody hooks out !

If a cod takes a bait in open water , he will go flat out towards his burrow the second he feels tension in his jaw
If you have pulled estuary cod , you will know it does not take a big cod to give you the heabies .

We have some places where we chase LARGE estuary cod on 80lb line with 250 mono trace and whole mud crabs ....and guess what , we STILL get done in , i have hung on to my brother as he has locked the drag , and the boat gets pulled !

Don't criticise other peoples comments mate, especially if YOU are none the wiser ......after all , i am talking from experience with cod AND these waterways....and i have had plenty of experience cod fishing in tight waters... i can tell you pound for pound a cod will tear shreds off a jack in the pull department , and is more likely to shave the line , is more likely to come to a stop in a run and " two very sharp snaps " could be the cod sucking the bait up from the mud

The problem with cod is their run doesn't usually last long , once they get in their hole , they flatten their fans out and lock themselves in place ....only reason why they are not as sporty as a jack !

It could also be a jack , or a shark or numerous other things ....but without being there and seeing the terrain he was placing his bait , the strike and the run one can only go off information shared and experienced had ...so what experience have you had with estuary cod in tight muddy creeks that you could discount my thoughts ??

[fishingnottake]

i'm going with scuba diver

[fishingnottake]

but seriously with all respect to kingtin (if anyone would recognise a stingray's modus oprendi..) my experience with stingrays are they don't tend to strike hard at the bait like bite, they more just hoover it up and go like the buggery and whenever i've got a bait bac after one's had a go it's been more crushed/mashed up, not really defined bite marks, and sharks are similar in their hit it hard and just go, i donlt know the area at all so naturally anything i say will be supposition, but it'd angle either towards eel but eels don;t tend to let go of anything be it bait, lure or foot maybe a jack, or jewie.

[cuzzamundi]

gday all,

i went down again last night with very different conditions. managed a small diver witing for bait .within minutes i was on - though this time i knew it ewas a ray. pulled bloody well, and dug in til the very end, but got him in. gave me nowhere near as much curry as the ones the night before, and i'm still not sure. then cut his flaps and went to sgate pier for a go at a shark. was stunned when i saw two 12yo fellas at the end fishing. they came over, and i asked if their folks knew they were out, and they said they always come down til dawn! by themselves!!! anyway they were good kids, and one of em was an absolute guru!!!! i mean guru!!! he knew everything about rigging, knots, bait, species, you name it!!! so he leant me some balloons and we drigted the bait out, then broke em off. the little tacker couldnt keep still and insisted we bring it in every halk hour, but i just let him anyway, he was having fun. come dawn there was still no hit on the ray, so i called it a day. but yeah, couldnt belive these boys were allowed out, and the scope of knowledge this kid has!!!

gday kev,
i dunno if the ray i got last night was a blue spotted one or not. was about 70cm wide and bloody thick!!!! looked like the ones we get in the pine. that's unreal how they get big tigers so frequently at the pier! bloke at s'gate tackle showed me a photo of a 2.5 metre tiger (was about that length i think) caught two weeks ago just out from the bloody swimming pool!!! so yeah, couldn't believe they'd bother around the shallows there! plenty of rays to feed on i suppose. thanks heaps for the hekp again!

thanks for the help everyone - your suggestions are always helpful to a boffin like me! keep em rolling!!!

cuzza

[bidkev]

Cuzza, you can't miss a blue spotted ray.........it's got blue spots ;

The spotted shovellies sometimes have white, as opposed to blue spots. I don't know if they're one and the same species though but they are "definately* not sluggish when it comes to running with the bait.

Fishingnottaken is on the ball with regards to baits being more likely to be mashed than bitten as these buggers jaws are made to crush shellfish, but there's not many fish make a "clean" bite such as tailor, shark, or some pelagics do. I'm not questioning your observations, but some of those that do make a "clean" bite would not leave evidence of it or drop the bait. their teeth are faced inwards to prevent food escape, and they couldn't drop it if they wanted to. I also agree that if it was an eel. it would be highly unlikely that the bugger would let go. The other thought that's come to mind is a pike eel, their mouths are somewhat harder and they aren't as easily hooked. There's plenty of them around, both in the Pine and Cabbage Tree, and I've even caught a stray hair tale in the pine at the same time my mate was murdering them outside Sea World a number of yrs ago..

Once you've had a few big shovellies or rays, their bite becomes unmistakeable. The first indication is invariably a slow pulling down of the rod tip before the fish moves off. This is caused by the fact that having underslung mouths, their nose or wings invariably touch the line as the fsih settles over the bait........they literally smother the bait with their body to prevent it escaping. I reckon that when they *do* move off, slowly, they don't even know that they're hooked...........the ones that run fast obviously do though

cheers

kev

[morty103]

i can tell you pound for pound a cod will tear shreds off a jack in the pull department

Other way round mate, a jack is far more powerful pound for pound. Cod are still very powerful fighters, but seeing as a jack rarely doesnt reach more than 3 kilo in an estuary before going offshore, i cannot see a cod pulling more than a jack pound for pound. Thats my opinion anyway
Morty

[chanquetas]

Good thread. Im watching it with interest. Whatever it was I want to catch it and post photos!

[cuzzamundi]

yeah gday kev i'm really starting to lean towards a massive ray being the culprit. just too odd to be the other species. got bad eyes so couldn't see the blue spots, but if theyre abundant in the pine, then it was the same species! but yeah, great flaps for bait anyway.

i gotta agree with morty 123.. although cods run bloody well, i'm yet to catch one that matches the jacks i've caught (and haven't!!!!!) lol. my biggest cod went 60cm in the baffle, and although he went straight to the bottom and gave me hell for five minutes, it wasn't as intense or brutal as the jacks. just my opinion too.

hope you get something decent chanqetas - lemme know if you do! thanks all.

cuzza

[cuzzamundi]

then again ive never caught a cod in 'open' territory, so i guess i can't comment comprehensively. ah, they're all bloody great aren't they?!!!!!

[bidkev]

then again ive never caught a cod in 'open' territory, so i guess i can't comment comprehensively. ah, they're all bloody great aren't they?!!!!!

The 42pounder I caught in the channel was a *huge* dissapointment. I actually commented when I was pulling it up, that I thought I had someone's old anchor. It came up like a wet towel Didn't taste like one though

Go here http://photobucket.com/albums/b182/b...urrent=cod.jpg

kev

[MidgieFood]

I would say that it was a Jew Fish. Not that I have caught one of a size large enough to pop your leader like ya said it did. But I have caught enough juveniles on the flats just out the front of that creek to know that Ma and Pa must be around somewhere.GoodLuck.

[Woodsy]

yeah i would think that it was either a big cod or a really big eel but then again it could of been a bully to its a tuff one it has me stumped keep the posts coming

[noluck]

I think is snapper

[Billo]

[quote author=Billo link=1128836673/15#15 date=1128915894]i can tell you pound for pound a cod will tear shreds off a jack in the pull department

Other way round mate, a jack is far more powerful pound for pound. Cod are still very powerful fighters, but seeing as a jack rarely doesnt reach more than 3 kilo in an estuary before going offshore, i cannot see a cod pulling more than a jack pound for pound. Thats my opinion anyway
Morty
[/quote]



The problem with Jacks is they have spirattic bursts of energy and quick directional changes .
A cod on the other hand does not move far at all and is relatively a lazy fish , it only has one interest , grab bait and go for burrow

When i first moved up here , i spent several summers chasing Jack and Cod and for several years before that i chased a lot of cod down the NSW central coast

Whilst a Jack will give you a longer fight , with faster bursts of energy , and more irratic turns , this does not mean they pull harder ....if you had a 3 kilo jack on one end of a line , and a 3 kilo cod at the other , the cod would tow the other ...they may not be fast , but they are BRUTES

I have never had an issue with trying to pull a jack to a stop ...more or less , problem is trying to keep them clear of mangroves , rocks and other snags .

A Cod however you do not play with , it does not give you runs on every which angle , it does not give a crap about trying to throw a hook ....it simply finds a hole and sits

Depending on how you battle them , if in a boat and drawing up , then they are relatively easy to conquer as their strength is in lateral movement, but for land based and having a flat line it is a different story .

To say they are stronger a stronger puller , lets get the context right .

Jack has the acceleration advantage ....Estuary Cod have ' torque '

It's like comparing an RX7 to a Landrover

Sure , you would prefer to be on the end of the landrover as it does not screem off at a rate of knotts , but which would tow the most weight ?

When i say more pull , i mean torque .....i agree a jack has a better and more erratic and fast fight , but no one can convince me a jack has more torque then a cod

We are talking about chanqetas saying he WAS DRAGGED A FEW METRES
How big would a jack be in a water way to be able to pull a guy off his feet ? ,....you say a jack rarely gets above 3 kilo in a water way .....can you see a 3 kilo fish pulling a guy off his feet ? or even a 5 , 6 kilo fish ? no way , may rip a bit of drag , but if you lock up on heavy tackle , you could stop him

I have seen estuary cod to 20 kilo in tight water ,.....a 20 kilo cod WOULD and COULD pull a guy along quite easily ...may not scream off like a bat out of hell , but has the ' PULLING POWER to be able to do it

[morty103]

Whilst a Jack will give you a longer fight , with faster bursts of energy , and more irratic turns , this does not mean they pull harder ....if you had a 3 kilo jack on one end of a line , and a 3 kilo cod at the other , the cod would tow the other ...they may not be fast , but they are BRUTES

A 3 Kilo mangrove jack would absolutley sh#t all over a 3 kilo cod, mangrove jacks are the hardest fighting fish in an estuary pound for pound without a doubt, and around structure will give an angler far more stick than a sluggish old cod.
Yes, what your saying about cod is true in regards to their 'Torque' but a jack will dust up an angler in no time, whilst a cod will inhale a bait and cruise slowly back down under a snag for dinner time. Although a cod is a reasonable fighter, you'd have to say a jack around the 3 KILO mark would do over a cod in most peoples books.
I have no doubts that a cod around 20 kilo would definitley pull someone around in a canoe very easily, but just imagine if a mangrove jack could reach that size , although its not possible as the bigger specimens move offshore and the record for one is around 15 kilo from memory. But if a jack was physically able to reach that size in an estuary it would probably be the most feared fish by any angler
Thats my opinion anyway
Cheers
Morty