We have had some very high winds in June, up to 40 knots, which has seen many people swop a fishing rod for a golf club.

Nevertheless, the cold weather has brought the mackerel on the chew so there will be some great action on the outside of the sand island. When heading out, try anchoring up with a berley trail as it should give you some reward within a couple of hours. At the same time, send out another bait to catch the grunter that move through and if you get lucky you could be attacked by metre-plus queenfish that light up the water.

Trolling is also a good option but please keep clear of the anchored boats. Run a spread of shallow lures out the back and try around 6 knots. Make sure you include a popper as well.

The shallow water at Normanton is a great place to catch fish but the rock bars can be dangerous. I’m working on an article on roughly where they are to help in the near future. Try the bridge over the Norman River at night with live bait. Be patient as they can turn up at any time to feed.

Please note that it is an offence to travel too close to anchored boats so give them a wide berth. This will make life a lot easier for the people in the anchored boats and will not cost you any money – the fine is $300. One tourist was complaining about others going too close to his anchored boat one week but then fined $300 the next week for the same offence.

Mud crabs are hard to catch at this time of year so do not expect to see many, but try the deep holes in the river if you’re feeling lucky. Our grunter have turned up in numbers and you can catch them up near the powerlines in the Norman River.

Mack attack! Sweers Island is firing with Spanish mackerel, attacking anything that we throw at them – lures, poppers, spoons and trolled garfish – and we were catching specimens to almost 20kg.

Our regular groups that visit this time of year, are all here: the Wellings group from Whitecliffs (Lindsay Wellings, last year’s winner of the biggest mackerel award, is still the leader in this year’s award with an 18.8kg mackerel); the boys from the Isa; and Brian the pom has made his annual pilgrimage from England to go out with Mick on Salomon, the charter boat, to bag a few decent macks, red emperor and nannygai.

The Mossy group, all the way from Western Australia, made the trip recently and despite the windy weather, managed to bag a few nice fish to take home.

All the usual reef varieties are being caught in numbers, with flesh baits and soft plastics the go.

The water has cooled down a lot, bringing out the bait balls and tuna, with cobia and macks having a feeding frenzy; giving our guests some good sport action!

All in all, a good time is being had by all on Sweers.