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Port Douglas Trip - New Setups?


DatYams

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G'day guys,

Long time lurker, first time poster.

Im taking a week trip up to Port Douglas at the start of next month, super excited to get amongst some tropical fishing.

AFAIK our group will be a combo of Landbased and hire boat fishing in the estuary/surrounds. Hopefully get out to the reef for some bottom bashing etc.

Im in the market for a setup (or 2) to target the kind of fishing available in the area. At the moment I am looking at picking up a 4-6kg rod/3000 size reel/30lb braid setup for Hardbodies /Jigs and soft plastics. Im not really a baitcaster guy (no experience). 

I would like to use the setup to target Jew etc back home. 

If you had to take two setups to the area, what would you take and would the setup mentioned above fit the bill.

Cheers Raiders!

 

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A size 3000 reel would not hold much 30lb braid.

Example BG 3000 reel would only hold 190 yards or 173m of 30lb braid which is not alot of bottom bashing, spinning and fighting large fish that like to run. You would get spooled on a very large jew with that kind of line length. Still it would be fun :)

If you wanted a rod for spinning, jigging that could do large soft plastics for pelagics I would recommend looking at a 8-9ft Japanese / Korean spinning rod rated for 2-4PE (20-40lb) as a minimum. An affordable range would be the Daiwa saltist range of rods. Otherwise a Samurai, NS Blackhole etc would be the mid to high end alternatives.

I would pair this 8-9ft rod with a 6000 sized reel.

I might have miss understood the requirements though?

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Thanks mate this is good info, 

I guess its why Im kinda sold on taking two setups, the main setup I will be using to target the estuary stuff like barra, jacks hopefully threadies or blues. This is the one i was thinking of when I listed those specs. 

As far as inshore/estuary luring for these species will that setup fit the bill? Could probably go down to 20 lb braid but really dont want to get dusted by a bigger model Jack or Barra if I track one down.
 

 

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Firstly Jacks and Barra chew line. The toughest part is bringing a large fish in before they chew through the line. If you're using braid then you'll need to use a 30lb+ mono or FC leader. Using lighter braid like a 14-20lb braid isn't going to hurt your chancing of landing a big jack or Barra. just make sure your leader is long enough.

Setup wise, I don't know your budget but the following i what I use...

Nitro Baby Viper (7ft 2pc rod rated for 3-6kg with a casting weight of  9 -40g) - this rod does everything medium finesse for me. Large barra, jacks, snapper, bream and flathead. I use this as my multi purpose tool for fishing. The reel i use with this varies. For Barra I'll use a Stradic FK 4000 with 15lb jbraid and 20-30lb leader. Depends if i get busted off alot.

Daiwa Saltist hyper (9ft rod rated for 6PE with a casting weight of 60-150 gram) - this is my Mulloway, Shark, Kingfish  etc rod. I've also caught a small GT with it, so its a pretty powerful rod. I use a 6000 Saragosa or a 4500 Catalina on it depending on what I'm hunting.

Please note that most barra professionals will recommend a 5"6' - 6'6" bait casting rod. I have to much spinning gear to invest in a baitcaster... so no for me lol

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