With all the good calm weather predicted let’s get the kids out and get them a fish. All the estuary species that you would expect to be there are there. Bream, flathead and whiting are around in good numbers and I will point out the best spots for each fish.
Whiting – boat
When boat fishing for whiting, the best spots are the cockle banks for winter whiting and any of the sand banks around the southern end of the passage for summer whiting. If it’s larger summer whiting you are chasing the mouths of all the creeks in the middle of the passage are producing some quality fish.
Whiting – bank
For land based fishing for whiting it seems that the best spots are all south of the bridge and over on the eastern side of Bribie. Red Beach is a kid friendly beach with nothing nasty for the little ones to get themselves into trouble. It is relatively shallow and usually relatively calm (unless it’s a howling south easter) and produces good whiting. It is an easy beach to get your kids to catch a fish as you don’t have to cast very far.
Bream – boat
Bream can be taken from most areas of the passage with a boat but a couple of the better spots are in the canal system at Pacific Harbour, and the ripples at the entrance to the same canal. The canals have great cover for the bream with most canal properties having pontoons and all of those have growth under them which is a good source of cover and food for these hard fighters. The Ripples is a group of rocks that are 50 meters diagonally into the passage towards the Avon wreck just off the red beacon that marks the entrance to the canal. This structure holds more than just bream with moses perch also a regular catch and the occasional snapper.
Bream – bank
Buckley’s Hole just on the inside of the passage from Red Beach is a great place to catch bream from the bank. They like flowing water and with the tidal flow down that area and the drop off that is in casting distance helps with that. The jetty is the most popular place to catch bream as the jetty itself is the best structure to hold these fish.
Flathead – boat
The passage is full of flathead at the moment with the flats at the mouth of Ningi Creek being one of the better spots to drift over. The weed beds mixed with sand patches make an ideal place for the ambush predators to smash bait coming down the creek. The drop off at Buckley’s Hole is also a wonderful place to fish for big flatties. Don’t forget there is a maximum size on flathead of 75 cms.
Flathead – bank
Turner’s Camp Road is the best place to fish for flathead as the banks mentioned in the boat section comes right up to the bank and you can cast along the edge of weed banks.