Gold Coast jewies

Had a fish off the Gold Coast on Thursday.

Launched at 5 am and had a fish for snapper for a couple of hours in close. It was blowing about 12 knots Westerly which made it uncomfortable wider. I had a look at one spot out on the 24s but there was nothing there so I came back in closer. No snapper so I then spent a couple of hours filling the tank with livies for this trip plus extras as dead baits for future trips. Got plenty of yakkas and a few slimies. Westerly was still blowing and had turned NW, so I went for a run up the beach of South Straddie looking for tailor but didn't see any schools. Westerly had picked up to around 15 knots WNW which wasn't promising but I knew a patch of reef not too far out where I have caught good fish before.

Got out there and there was one other boat down the Southern end of this reef. I did some drifts over the Northern end about 300 m away and then anchored up. Couple more boats turned up as the first one left. One drifted over the Southern part of the reef and the other fella decided he liked the spot I was anchored on and over the next 2-3 hours constantly ran right up beside me about 10 m away, outboard running the whole time, chatting to me like he was my best mate and drifted for about 100m before running back up straight back over his drift line! I stayed friendly, but there is not much point floatlining when that is happening and inside I was fuming that this bloke was so ignorant. Current was minimal and running to the West against the wind which also made things difficult and I had several trag jew steal my livies. Anyway, I saw the boat down South land a nice snapper and the fella next to me hooked and lost a good cobia. I had a couple of runs and missed fish due to hooks turning back into the livies or fish mouthing and not swallowing the baits. Frustrating stuff!

Finally about 3 pm, both of the other boats left. The wind dropped and swung to the North, the current picked up a bit to the South so the wind and current were in the same direction. I got a good burley trail going and worked the lines. One floatlining for snapper and a live bait down deep. I caught a small snapper about 50 cm on a cut bait which I released and the two jewies on the livies down deep. Started heading back about 5.30 pm and about halfway back the wind picked up again to 12-15 knots from the SW which made it slow and uncomfortable.

Talk about a small window - swell, wind, moon and tide - and getting the timing right!!

Great work Jeremy, they're some nice fish! 👍

I found them up there the other day too!

cheers

jim

Awesome stuff. We headed out Saturday night, lots of trag jew around.

What sort of depth did you get the jew? Am yet to get a out from the coast.

Around 50 m depth on a reef with good structure and holding good bait

Thanks Jeremy, looking at possible taking a day off on Friday and heading out to have another crack.