It has been an interesting winter run on the Sunshine Coast with plenty of known winter species being caught. The weather was an issue with plenty of strong southerly gusts that totally closed down the fishing for weeks at a time but there were opportunities to enjoy snapper, pearl perch, mulloway and plenty more.

Of course, these species will be around for a couple of months yet, so there is plenty of time to enjoy them on the table.

Looking at the deeper areas of the Barwon Banks the night fishing out there has been quite slow with short but busy bite periods that you could easily miss if you were not on the ball. It has been a bit of a hit and miss affair through the remainder of the reefs, particularly throughout the day.

The 60m line and beyond on the southern end of the banks has provided lightning fast iodine bream bites and sometimes they take the bait away from the other fish because of their ferocity. They are named as a perch and officially they have a bag limit but it amuses me that they are in such large numbers. Other species don’t stand a chance against the iodine bream because of the aggressive feeding patterns, so we are obviously going to have an issue because of them. Sadly, the iodine bream have slowly reached the shallow reefs and it will only be a matter of time before they become king of another area.

The wrecks are giving up quality catches of kingfish and cobia with an odd mulloway and snapper also being taken. Fishing the top of the Hards recently rewarded us with some thumper snapper and good table-sized pearl perch. The area around Wide Caloundra has also been the home for big pearl perch and some cracker tuskfish and they will continue to hit the eskies for months to come.

The inner reefs like Murphys, The Gneerings Shoal, Coolum, Sunshine right through to Noosa have been alive with trevally, mulloway, coral trout, snapper and pearlies. So it has been good fishing when anglers have been able to get out.

The beaches are one of the best spots for families to enjoy. The kids can have all sorts of fun and still enjoy fishing on and off. The Noosa North Shore has plenty of medium size flathead and dart around and winter whiting in the smaller holes during the low tides. Pipis are by far the best bait to use and if you can catch them, beach worms will be a great backup.

There are some average pikey bream hanging around the holes along the beach from Wurtulla to Dickies Beach and whiting are the target nearer to Kings Beach in the early mornings or late afternoon.

Fishing the estuaries has been a tough ask as it seems to be a little like outside that the water is still too warm to enjoy a good run of the larger bream. A few have been taken but there are more reports of trevally still hitting lures and baits inside the Pumicestone Passage this past month. A few quality flathead have managed to pull a drag or two around Happy Valley and on the southern tip of Bribie Island.

Currimundi Lake has very few whiting and flathead and is now closed to kill off the sand fly hatch. The canals around Wurtulla through to Mooloolaba are the best spots to try for an abundance of bream. If you can’t catch bream in the canals you need another lesson.

Bells creek to the south of Golden Beach has a few mullet around and Military Jetty has given up some soapy mulloway recently. Live mullet has been the best bait to use. The biggest issue with fishing around that area are the stingrays, and the population has exploded over the years and they are certainly a force to be reckoned with.

The coming month will deliver a lot of pelagics for anglers to enjoy and may even bring in some early spotty mackerel as it did last year. The water temperature is around 21-22°, which is close to warm enough to see the first run of them. The live bait around Mooloolaba have been plentiful throughout the winter period. Yakkas, slimy mackerel and whiptails are in good numbers so live bait is the way to go.

Try the outer reefs this month will produce results, but if you stick to the wrecks, the cobia will come on in September and you will need livies to snag the bigger brutes. The humble pilchard will do but best results come with quality bait.

In the estuaries we should see many more trevally hiding around the pontoons and jetties along with the female flathead starting the breading cycle between now and November.

So all round fun across the Sunshine Coast this month, get out and enjoy it.