XD351 Posted December 3, 2022 Share Posted December 3, 2022 Fished my usual haunts around patonga and flint and steel , the water still has this grey colour to it and the surface temps averaged mid 19s . Arrived at the ramp just after 5am ,there was a high tide at 5.30 and I was greeted by a light westerly which swang around to the east around 9 am or so . lobbed out to the gun emplacements to see if there were any yakkas there but there were already a pile of boats there and they were getting plenty. Started drifting the south side of lion island and got two small flounder so I moved west to the Northside of broken bay opposite flint and steel and picked up the flathead , some more flounder , the two trevalley and a couple of small Mulloway . Then I went and drifted around flint and steel , east side first but couldn’t turn a scale . I ended the day drifting from flint and steel across to the fitness camp and got the bigger Mulloway, I tried the middle ground but got zilch - the tide was just turning to run in so maybe that is why everything shut down . Ended up with 3 flathead 38- 42cm , a couple of flounder ( let them go ) , two trevalley ( let them go ) and a few small Mulloway - the biggest would have gone maybe 50cm ( these were all released while still in the water so I didn’t measure them ) . Someone got at least one big Mulloway as they left all the scales on the cleaning table 🤬 Just what I need - clean the table before I can clean my fish - thanks guys 🤬 I think the next trip will be a beach fish ! 16 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yowie Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Something to take home, a few flatties is better than nothing. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jenno64 Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Happy fillets! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bluebenbomb Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Well done on the session, at least summer is coming (and more reports from raiders as well!). Good to see many people get out especially as the weather is starting to warm up. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XD351 Posted December 4, 2022 Author Share Posted December 4, 2022 I reckon that when that warm water finally hits Sydney the fishing will go nuts ! 4 hours ago, Yowie said: Something to take home, a few flatties is better than nothing. You’re not wrong there ! One of those flatties was todays dinner ! looks like it is back to studying the weather patterns and tides then plan my next trip ! Just been watching a YouTube video of a guy fishing Swansea channel and I might pay that a visit very soon ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rebel Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Top Haul. Well done. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bessell1955 Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Sounds like you have had a successful days fishing. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pickles Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 Great report @XD351 - I’m heading out on Wednesday, hope things improve a bit😙 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XD351 Posted December 4, 2022 Author Share Posted December 4, 2022 3 hours ago, Pickles said: Great report @XD351 - I’m heading out on Wednesday, hope things improve a bit😙 Are you going to fish up river or broken Bay Area Pickles ? Also watch out for logs floating down , I spotted a couple just out of the boat ramp at parsley bay - not massive but big enough to do some damage ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pickles Posted December 4, 2022 Share Posted December 4, 2022 5 hours ago, XD351 said: Are you going to fish up river or broken Bay Area Pickles ? Also watch out for logs floating down , I spotted a couple just out of the boat ramp at parsley bay - not massive but big enough to do some damage ! Cheers for the warning. Not sure where we’ll go yet, but might try offshore for some blue spots and then headlands for kings - bit depends on the seas. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XD351 Posted December 5, 2022 Author Share Posted December 5, 2022 6 hours ago, Pickles said: Cheers for the warning. Not sure where we’ll go yet, but might try offshore for some blue spots and then headlands for kings - bit depends on the seas. Hope you get good weather and plenty of fish ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XD351 Posted December 5, 2022 Author Share Posted December 5, 2022 1 hour ago, Obsessed Fisherman said: That is one heck of a session though, even if half the catch are throw backs. And to top it off, you got to take home some flatties, flatty, flathead, flatty mcflat fish (just seeing if I can summon someone if I mentioned those words a few times). Flathead in the Hawkesbury are not that difficult , you just need to understand how the current flows and find the areas where the water is being funnelled into deeper water . The map below is a screen shot from navionics . This is the area I fish and the white areas are the deeper spots - some are only a few metres deeper but water will always flow to the deeper spots . Drifting along the edges of these deeper sections is the key to finding flathead in the Hawkesbury . When water is flowing towards these deeper sections it Carries things like prawns along with it and the flathead set up station waiting for the tide to bring dinner to them . So let’s look at the white spot between patonga and lion island , the water on the run out swings around from Elanora bluff towards flint and steel where it gets pushed up by the reef and the water accelerates ( Mulloway use this to hunt as the bait fish are now helpless in the fast current ) then it flows north off the reef into the deeper section. It now has to do a hard right and this makes the water back up and slow down ( you can see the current line here most days ) , the water on the southern side or the deep section is still moving fairly quick but the north side has slowed down considerably and this is where the baitfish and more importantly the prawns get dumped . Also anything coming out of patonga creek gets caught up in this as well so the fish line up along this edge waiting for a feed . Same thing happens where the deep section that runs past Gunya beach meets Cowan creek - there is usually an eddy here on the run out tide and the fish sit there . Basically you are looking for anywhere the current is forced to abruptly change direction as this creates a dead spot where fish can sit without expending any energy and wait for the food to come to them . HTH! 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookwa Posted December 5, 2022 Share Posted December 5, 2022 Possibly the best , most informative post I’ve seen ! Thanks heaps!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bookwa Posted December 5, 2022 Share Posted December 5, 2022 Wish I’d thought of saying that first— followed by what I did say! 😁 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XD351 Posted December 6, 2022 Author Share Posted December 6, 2022 Not much different to basic stream craft that a trout fisho would use - just on a much bigger scale . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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