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Patient anglers are being rewarded
  |  First Published: May 2013



This is more like the Northern Bay we know! The past few months of stable weather patterns have kept our beloved Northern Bay alive with good fishing and rewarding anglers for their patience.

Constant southeasters have been our ally of late, resulting in bait being pushed up from the mouth of the Brisbane River and southern bay islands and landed them on our doorstep. Consequently, larger predators have been cruising our northern reaches following the bait schools making the fishing at its optimum.

Snapper

Juvenile snapper have been in good numbers around the bay with reports flooding in from the mouth of the Brisbane River, Scarborough and even the mouth of Pacific Harbour canals at Bribie.

Dusk and dawn anglers have been rewarded the most with baits, hardbody lures and soft plastics all reaping aggressive strikers; they are not fussy when it’s eating time!

The mouth of the Brisbane River has been fishing better in the deeper waters for small snapper with most anglers targeting fish in waters between 15-25ft and sounding around to locate bait schools as the fish have not being too far from them.

Claras Rocks has been a bit hit and miss of late but this month should start to fire, especially on the incoming tides. North Reef has been the pick of the spots on the peninsula with reefs outside of Pirate Park and Shields St also producing good legals.

Weekends tend to be quite busy around North Reef, so for the flexible workers try hitting the area during the week as you will pretty much have the place to yourself. In the busier times, don’t be afraid to be wide off the reef as bommies extend throughout the area quite wide and still hold numbers of juveniles on them.

It is also worth chasing these fish on the flooding tides up in the shallows, as lightly weighted plastics and deep diving hardbodies draw decent results. If artificials are not your cup of tea, keep your baits lightly weighted on a longer (50-60cm) trace where possible as the shallower waters will result in too many snag ups if fishing too heavy.

At the mouth of Banksia Beach canals at Bribie, or Ripples as known to the locals, waters move quite fast so when targeting juvenile snapper, heavier presentations are needed to counteract the tidal flow; unless fishing at the turn of the tides. I’ve been told that the top of the tide has produced the best here.

mulloway

Brisbane River has been the hotspot for the seasonal mulloway with keen anglers again chasing them in deeper bait-holding waters throughout the system.

Areas such as the dirty water lines at the mouth off the reclaimed wall, waters near the semi permanent dredger and off the pylons on the BP pipeline, have all been working a treat with numbers up to a metre being reported.

Good quality specimens have also been reported through the Pine River with deeper holes on the bends being a well liked option; hardiheads and prawns have been holding in these areas.

Also worth a try is the highway bridge at night with the lights from the bridge drawing bait and bigger predators to the area. Speaking of bridges, Bribie Bridge has also produced the goods at night with deep water, pylons and bait ticking all the boxes for a good mulloway session.

BREAM

As the weather starts to cool and the days get shorter, chasing these ever-popular, crowd-pleasing fish starts to change. Numbers become less widespread and more concentrated as bream start to look at spawning times in the thick of winter.

Bream quality has been exceptional over the past month with the increase bait schools fattening the bream up giving them a good lead into the winter spawn. There has been bream in all corners of the bay with fishing being more electric on the flooded tides at dusk and dawn.

The Pumicestone Passage has reported good healthy bream with Ningi Flats, the mouth of Poverty and Glasshouse Creek, Cooks Rocks and Tiger Rock producing good fish on flooding tides. At the Peninsula, try Drury and Osbourne Points, The Wells on the ebb, Clontarf foreshore, pylons of the Ted Smout Bridge and eastern side of Woody Point Jetty. Cranks have been the recipe for a good time for the lure fanatics with lures worth a throw being Atomic Crank 38 (in the clearer colours), Strike Pro Cyber Cranks, Ecogear CX35, Pontoon 21 Crack Jack 48SP and OSP Power Dunks. For the plastics throwers, Z-Man GrubZ, Plazos 2 3/4” Jerk Minnows and 80mm Squidgy Wrigglers.

All in all, the fishing in the Northern Bay has been excellent. We are definitely looking forward to the cooler westerly winds that should pop their heads up occasionally over this month and make the fishing days even better.

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