Toga Huntin 05.12.09

Hit up the local again this morning in search of the australian arowana.
On the water by 5am to hinze in all its glory, mist covering the water and clear sky showing the mountains.

We went straght to one of our new haunts and within 10mins i had a nice bass onboard,
around 38cm and caught on the black Sammy. We kept plugging away but seemed like the fishing was slower than first expected. After an hour or so Sarah hooked a saratoga on the berkley popper, she managed to get it within a meter of the boat where i was waiting with the net before one last jump set it free.

Casting, casting, casting and eventually i had another one on the line, not for long though. the fish winning its freedom as they so often do. Well we persisted and whilst sarah stopped for a nap i managed to hook up again, this time the hooks stuck and we landed another beautiful fish.

Not long after i lost my black sammy........arghhhhhhh, thanks to the Castaway braid i have spooled on my Daiwa Luvias. Definately wont be buying this stuff again, wind knots in the slightest breeze and lost a couple of lures to line issues.

anyways called it quits early as Sarah had to work, off the water by 8.15am

Toga Huntin 29.11.09

Had an early session this morning,
managed to get on the water by 6.30.
the challenge of the day was to chase Saratoga rather than the ever willing bass.

We motored straight to a likely looking bay i knew in the upper reaches,
within a few casts my lure is monstered by a good fish but was off within a few seconds as it swam towards us and i couldnt keep pressure on it.

Spend the next hour or so rueing what could have been,
but kept plugging away and was eventually rewarded with another fish.
this time a smaller fish but still a nice one,

Fished for another hour or so and was off the water by 10am.

always nice to land what you are actually targeting,
looking forward to getting among them again soon

NTH NSW RIVER BASSIN 21.11.09

A change of plans saw us back at one of our favourite spots late sat afternoon,
We launched the boat and were on the water soon after 5pm.
threw a few surface lures around the submerged timber and it wasnt long before we had a fish,
a really careful battle saw us land the first bass of around 42cm.

the action seemed a little hit and miss so we mooved to the weedbeds,
slowly the bass started to play the game, over the next half our we landed a few more nice fish.
Sarah managed one of our bigger bass on my newly acquired SK POP.

Having a few nice fish under my belt i decided it was time to break out the wand.
I finished the session landing around 7 on fly.

Cheers,

Canal Hopping 20.11.09

Decided to hit up a few local hanuts the other night,
arrived at our first spot, no run so off to try something else.
Got down to another spot and within 5 mins was getting hits on the top,
half an hour of missed hits and thrown hooks i finally landed a nice tarpon,
followed it up with another soon after and then lost my lure on a brute that must have known my drag is about to die, DAMN! heard it jump 4 or 5 times after it busted me off.

Went back to our first spot, plenty of run now and Tom lands a nice 75cm flathead,
he then followed up with a 45cm model, things went quiet after that and we called it a night.

NTH NSW RIVER BASSIN 14.11.09

Hit up one of our haunts again yesteday,
fished from about 4 onwards and was very tough going,
I suspect it was due to the rise in waterlevel we had,

We changed over to surface lures at 5.00pm and wasnt until about 5.30 before the first fish came aboard, we managed a few more over the next hour but nothing like the session last week.

I even got the wand out and had a crack at them,
surprisingly i was getting hits nearly every cast on the fly but being a trout cicada i couldnt set the hook. Ah well, il have to tie up some better cicadas for Bass,

Looking forward to the nest session!

HINZE DAM 07.11.09

Managed to seak up to Hinze for an afternoon session,
Upon arrival we decided to chase Saratoga for the session, thus we concentrated our efforts around the smaller bays and inlets. I began throwing a bassman spinnerbait whilst jac opted for a Berkley Powertail on a 1/8 jighead.

Fishing was hard and it was an hour or so before I managed to nail a couple of fish in as many casts. Both bass around the 25cm mark were caught on a Evergreen Littlemax.

Fishing was again slow after that and it wasnt until an hour or so later before i had another fish, this time a nice yellowbelly around 43cm. This fish was really fat and high bodied, not to mention its awesome colouring. Definately one of my favourite captures of late.







We fished for another hour or so where Jac managed to pull a bass (33cm) from the back of a small bay. Heading back to the ramp we noticed a lot of surface action but failed to tempt any.

NTH NSW RIVER BASSIN 08.11.09

Around lunchtime on sun we decided to hit one of my favourite spots the upper Tweed River. This spot has been producing the goods for us of late and last time saw some good surface action just on dusk.

Arrived at about 3.30pm and launched the boat heading downstream for a change.
The first couple of hours saw things quite slow on the fishing front. I did manage a good fish (41cm) from behind a submerged tree on a bassman 1/2oz spinnerbait. The next couple of fish were smaller (25-30cm) and came from a deep rocky bank on evergreen littlemax blades. We noticed the weir was flowing over so stopped off for a quick flick, no fish saw us back in the boat fairly quick and off to the next spot.


By this stage it was about 5.30 and we thought surface action couldnt be far off,
well what an understatement! Sarah's first cast saw her hookup on a good fish in the middle of the river. She hadnt even clicked the bail arm over before that tell tale sound of a brick getting thrown in the water occured. The fish turned out to be 42cm.

The next hour was possibly the best surface bite ive ever experienced on anything,
we were getting hit on almost every cast and set ourselves a target of 20 fish before the sun went down. This was our only option we hadnt a torch onboard.

I started out on the Lucky Craft Sammy and was amazed at how many fish seemed to be around us, we were hardly moving yet cast after cast our lures were getting hit. After a few fish i switched to the Tiemco Tiny Noisy Cicada, this lure has an amazing action and wasnt long before fish were all over it. I found this lure to be a little less successful at converting bites, possibly due to the smaller trebles. After a couple of fish including a 42cm that inhaled the lure i went back to the sammy to finish off.


Sarah stuck with the same lure all through the session (r2s bubble pop) and managed 5 or 6 great bass on the top. Its safe to say shes well and truly hooked on surface bassing now.

Just on dark we managed to hit our target of 20 bass, this was a great achievement and to get them all within such a short time frame really shows how these fish can turn it on. We both began to question how late we started using topwater lures as they may have bitten all afternoon.

Looking forward to our next assualt on the river!

(forgot the camera so all shots on phone camera)