Happy Micks Fishing Report

Shimano & Squidgy Tackle Talk Night

Guest Presenters 

  With the change of seasons from dry to build up, increasing humidity and dropping winds, we are rapidly approaching that time of year we call “whoopee!”

The resident barra population in the harbour and inland waterways will be getting edgy, wanting to feed up before the first showers of rain. The big female barramundi will also start showing up to feed in the mouth of big rivers and estuaries. A  great time of year to be fishing for barra. Now I may be getting a few weeks ahead of myself with the mornings still nice and pleasant,  but it is not as cold as it was. Last week’s tides were big –  massive tides,  and they were under the metre mark during the day. Not really known a pelagic tide, but some very nice size Spanish Mackerel came from Lee Point last week. Fish around the 110cm mark,  and l heard of some around 120cm mark being landed around the Bottle Washer area. The afternoon sessions were good,  with mackerel chewing the sinkers off as they came off the bottom. One fisho took one of the barrelled sinkers and shined up both sides with a knife. He sliced a sliver of dull lead from the side, threaded the line through the sinker,  and tied the a treble on. It started started hooking mackerel up as soon as he dropped it down, winning some and losing a lot more,  but had a blast in doing so..

 Around the Harbour l’m hearing stories about barra and blue salmon, but there are a lot of people missing out. There are some quality fish coming from West Arm and Little West Arm throwing plastics and Classic Just Under’s around gutters and the smaller rock bars as the tide flows out. Another spot that has had barramundi hunting bait was down the Elizabeth River at half tide. They were active in a lot of the creeks and gutters. We saw some barra booffing along a stretch of river for a good hour as the tide slowed. Bombers and plastics seemed to be the go and some folk had success on live bait toward the mouth of the river system.

Inland water like Coroborree it’s only a matter of time before the barra start to get more aggressive,  and really start belting lures. Some good friends were out on Monday and got into eleven good size barra,  biggest was 79cm and the rest were in the 60 plus size. Mary River Bridge has also come into its own with some bigger than average barra coming out of it. Its one of the easiest places to get to, a nice easy drive. The biggest in the last couple of weeks has been 94cm of prime silver fat barra.  l like this system, it has a lot to offer, and you have to stay sharp around the many logs and snags that clutter the banks. Black Bream and Saratoga can be also caught there as well. The barra fight hard and know where home is,  so be on your toes when trolling the timber as they strike quickly and head for home. Nilsmaster Spearheads are king here!

 The Daly River has been fishing all right with live bait the main ingredient for a barra,  but the lures have been doing well on the change of tide. With massive tides over the weekend Browns might be a go. It had the best coloured water and some good fish according to fisho”s that spent the weekend. He said they were very silver and fat,  great fighting fish. 

The Four Mile Hole and Two Mile are still producing barra and saratoga and they are mainly small,  but lots of them.  Soft plastics, Little Lucifers and Bombers in the early mornings and late afternoons. With the moon on the make again and warmer evenings a night fish might be the go for a good chance of tangling with a barra or too.

So with some more angler friendly tides this weekend ( Sunday has hardly any movement) and if the weather stays good it should be good to go for a jig or even to soak a bait. Shoal Bay will be worth a fish for a barra and salmon,  even crabs. With the weather warming up make hay-ste while the sun shines and take what cooler weather we have left to get away for the weekend.

Darwin Harbour will be my pick out of the lot with some good barra starting to show up in all the likely spots.  Little West Arm,  West Arm and East Arm will have nice clear water, and it  should be a great flats fishing tide around these areas. Crabs have slowed in the Harbour,  but they are still getting them.

The weekend is looking good for all sorts of fishing. Remember - play it safe on the water,  be sun smart and with the hotter days take heaps of water. From the team at Happy Micks have a great week…

Come and join us for the CMAX Blokes Night featuring Brad Pitt in his fantastic new movie INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS.(MA 15+)

You are invited to join the Happy Mick’s crew for drinks and nibbles before the movie at 6:45pm on Monday 24th August, and then settle back to enjoy the movie.

Check out the trailer here.

During World War II a group of Jewish-American soldiers known as “The Basterds” are chosen specifically to spread fear throughout the Third Reich by scalping and brutally killing Nazis. The Basterds soon cross paths with a French-Jewish teenage girl who runs a movie theater in Paris which is targeted by the soldiers

Inglourious Basterds begins in German-occupied France, where Shoshanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent) witnesses the execution of her family at the hand of Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz). Shosanna narrowly escapes and flees to Paris, where she forges a new identity as the owner and operator of a cinema. Elsewhere in Europe, Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) organizes a group of Jewish soldiers to engage in targeted acts of retribution. Known to their enemy as “The Basterds,” Raine’s squad joins German actress and undercover agent Bridget Von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) on a mission to take down the leaders of The Third Reich. Fates converge under a cinema marquee, where Shosanna is poised to carry out a revenge plan of her own…
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Cast: Brad Pitt, Cloris Leachman, Diane Kruger, Mike Myers, B.J. Novak,Samuel L. Jackson, Eli Roth, Samm Levine, Til Schweiger, Michael Fassbender, Julie Dreyfus, Daniel Brühl, Rod Taylor, Mélanie Laurent, Jacky Ido, Paul Rust, Omar Doom, Ludger Pistor, Christoph Waltz, Michael Bacall
Duration: 162 minutes, approximately

 Dawn Carne and her crew were in the shop during the week getting fitted out with some very nice rods and reels. Dawn was really keen to get here first barra. Apparently she followed our instructions to the letter, landing this fiesty 45cms on a Scum Frog fished over the lillies. She was so happy she cried! on ya, Dawn, wish you many more!

Why do the ladies catch more fish? I don’t know! But they do!

For more details

I guess the weather has been pretty good to the boating fisho for this dry season. The winds looks like dropping agin for the weekend, and the blue water will be the place to be, with the afternoons calming down to an acceptable 5-6 knots. However, the sudden increase in humidity and a couple of early showers around will surely spark the interest of those patiently waiting for the billabongs to fire. Tough choice!  

A few stories have filtered through about some good sized mackerel caught around Lee Point and North Gutter,  as well as some Golden Snapper,of size. Trevally were on the chew with some spots so thick that you couldn’t get a bait or a jig down with out catching one. They pull hard but you really want to catch other fish like snapper or the odd trout if you need a good feed.

The charter  boats have been doing well,  in between the rough days,  with nice hauls of Goldies and Tricky Snapper. Jewfish have also been coming aboard,  with the odd mackerel in the mix of things. The estuaries around Darwin Harbour have produced crabs, and with bream and goldies on the rock bars, there is the makings of a nice old feast for those prepared to put in the effort. During the last neaps there were alot of barra sighted cruising along the banks and coming out of the snake drains when the boats got to close shooting off like a lighting bolt cloud of mud and there gone. This weekends tides are pretty good for a spot of sight fishing on the flats, or even up in the mangroves at high tide. Check out the tides

 Some nice barra were caught by casting under the mangrove trees in the shadows. Look for mangroves with a good root system that is half under water. That makes it easy for the barra to ambush bait fish,  and get back into the hiding place after they done the damage. Its very visual and exciting doing this, but you have to be on your game as they head back to where they come from at a rate of knots,  and it can all be over in a split second. The top of West Arm is great for this. I know some guys who had drifted off a gutter and cameacross a mangrove lined bank where the water was just starting to fall out of the trees. Thats the ideal time to do this kind of fishing, using Bombers and Fizzers in particular.

The crabs were about at Leeders Creek and Blue Salmon prolific around the mouth. Saltwater Arm had some good crabbing with another fisho coming in saying they had picked up 16 in the first pull!

Still out the Mouth of the Adelaide River the Narrows has some snapper and jewfish action. Nothing huge but kept fishos on their toe’s at the change of tide.  Its not a bad place to get out of the wind if it comes up. Shame about the road,  sometimes its rough enough to rattle your back teeth, and it sure gives the trailer a work out.. 

Nothing really get away from Marian. Here she is at Corroborree

Inland barra have been taking lures in Coroborree and Hardies with the odd 80cm fish being landed. Now the weather is warming its going to happen! There are still fish to be caught in these two billabongs. Just try different things.  One crew said the sounder was showing fish,  but they had a hard time getting them to strike a lure. They changed lures till they found what worked, with the end result of some very nice barra. Sometimes you have to have to annoyed them with ”are we there yet”  approach, like the kids in the car ” Are we there yet, are we there yet, are we there yet! Eventually something will happen and you should come home with some nice fish. Every couple of trolls try a different colour,  and so on. Sometimes fishing is hard work but the end result good.

There have been a few barra caught down the Daly River,  mainly on the live bait with cherabim being the number one bait, but word is they have been hard to get this year. We hope the amount of traps down there during tourist season have caused too much long term damage, because they are an essential part of the food chain. Still catching the odd barra on lures,  green and the bleeding mullet colour in most makes have been doing alright. I heard of a nice barra caught of the crossing at night under a bright moon, but keep a good eye out for the  red eye snapping handbags. Make sure you know where they are and not near you. l Mate mitch and I have been doing a bit of land based fishing at night for barra on the upper reaches of the Adelaide River,  with barra up to 70cm. The water is very cold but they are nice clean fish as there is a lot more sandy bottom,  plenty of rocks and hardly any mud in that part of the river,  and very nice on the chew to boot, two mile and four mile have been still producing barra on most types and colours of lure no real stand out ..

  With bigger tides this weekend with the full moon on Thursday the Harbour might a the go try to catch a barra or blue salmon that are floating about at the moment and crabs on the bigger tidal movement might be also worth a crack  live bait like mullet or sardines might get some interest even dropping some lives around the rock bars might give some nice results ,the Narrow on the Adelaide and the mouth of leaders creek might be good on the change of tide but you will have a small window there but you will be out of the wind if it blows up, full moon might be worth a night fish in the billabongs trolling weed beds or casting poppers and fizzers around thngs are always different fishing for barra at night remember to pack the bushman and make sure lights are working on the boat so if others are out there they will see you and travel at a slower speed just to make sure and be safe ,so from the team from Happy Mick’s be sun smart and be safe on the water..