Cobia rumour, 23Jan10

From: "Jim Thompson"
Subject: Fishing Report - 23Jan10 .... The Clayton's Report
Date: Saturday, 23 January 2010 9:42 PM

Hi Yakkers,

This is a Clayton's Fishing Report - the fishing report you have when there is (almost) nothing to report.

I arrived at the MG car park at around 0515 to find a kayak fisherman unloading who was unknown to me. After introductions I established this yakker was Gary G, who knew of "Sunshiner" (Kev Long) through being a member of AKFF, but didn't get out too often due to work/family commitments. The only other participant from MG appeared to be Ian Tagg who had no doubt launched much earlier.

Meteorology : Partly cloudy, steady warm easterly breeze 12-14 knots making the sea a bit lumpy on top of a low 1-1.5m ESE swell.

We trundled our kayaks down to the beach to be met with fairly easy launch conditions. My plan was to again target the area between the river mouth and Little Halls Reef which had been successful for me only two days earlier. I launched first and started setting up beyond the surf zone when I spotted Doug McDougall in his blue/white Perception Swing, who normally launches down near the Noosa Heads SLSC, already 300 m to the north heading in the same direction as I intended to go. Gary G soon joined me and together we headed for LHR, Gary by a more direct route generally following Doug, by now some 500+ m ahead, and I by a more circuitous in-shore route.

To bring this report to brief conclusion .... basically nothing happened. There was absolutely no surface activity, either from random feeding bonito schools (that have been prevalent for the last month or more), and hardly a bird to be seen. At LHR Gary told me that Doug, now headed back towards the river mouth, had boated "a nice cobia" .... this is the only positive I have to report. Doug, maybe you can fill us in on the details.

I dragged my Spaniard special lure all the way back to the river mouth and then across Laguna Bay to "Lookout Point" on the National Park with the same pilchard untouched all the way. I changed over to Jaro's favoured Halco hard bodied lure for the return to MG but still no strikes. I lost sight of Gary G and Doug after leaving LHR so don't know the outcome of their outings. Listening in on VHF Ch22 it seemed most of the weekend boaties headed to Sunshine Reef and it sounded like the charter operators also had a lean morning.

On return to MG at ~0830, Ian Tagg's car was still there. Ian, maybe you could enlighten us on the outcome of your outing.

Good luck for those who intend going out tomorrow (Sun) morning.

Cheers,
Jimbo