south coast river trip

[Mr Mullit]

 

Got the river about midday Saturday. The place was looking great. The water was a lot  higher than usual but still running pretty clear and the place was just alive with bait. The water was black with gudgeon fry and a few mozzie fish plus small herring jumping everywhere. Threw out a surface lure and got a hit that failed to find the hooks first cast.

We headed down stream throwing surface lures and getting hits from quite a few small fish with a couple of fish in the high 20s, low 30s range. Things started to slow on top so swapped to 35mm diver which looked a bit like bait and got a 39cm( fork measure)bass. Not a bad start. Didn't get a picture because the camera was packed for travel and "it's not that big ,we'll get heaps more." from Ram.

That was the only half decent bass caught on the trip. We fished the next two arvos/nights and mornings casting hard for about 3 fish each. Fishing around camp was a bit better and we caught 10 carp during our stay and and dropped nearly that many too. Got dusted by a couple of crackers. The best fish went a bit over 70cm

Paddled out this morning just before the storms and only got a couple of half hearted strikes on the way. Even trolled and used celtas. Not sure why the bass were so shut down. Maybe low barometer, fish went further down stream with the extra flow or just too much bait. 

Aside from the lack of bass it was a great trip with good conpany in amazing surrounds. 

Matt

big lure small fishRam with the biggest carp.

[big Neil]

Great report Matt and some nice fish there. Those Carp would have put up a decent fight, for sure. Incredible that small Bass hitting such a large sized lure, too. If Bass are anything like Cod the low barometer would shut down their feeding a bit. Cheers, BN

[Mr Mullit]

You're probably right about the  barometer Neil. It just seemed there was something else to it. Heaps of  good casts to well known snags and rocks. Also small herring were smashing the leader knot on most casts. 

The carp were great fun on 8lb. I'll catch a metre fish there one day. 80s are pretty common and my best is 96 to the fork. Trouble is they don't like much heavier than 8lb leader. One day the stars will align. Cheers Matt