I was fishing in the creek that flows about 50m behind my house. Over the past 20 or so years I think I’ve cast a lure to every little nook and cranny this magical little waterway holds.
On this day it was rainy, windy and cold, but the opportunity for a few easy hours on the water was inviting.
I motored up to a spot where a flat drains and fills into a deeper channel. The small snake drain that falls off the flat often holds fish. I had five rods rigged and was fishing alone.
I dropped the electric, hit the anchor button on the iPilot and started casting.
The first rod was rigged with a three-inch Z-Man paddle tail on a small football head jig about 8 grams in weight. Shad tails need to be lifted and dropped so they are visible to the fish.
I cast ahead, behind and out to the deeper water, five casts in all. No bites. Rod two was rigged with a 1/8 ounce gold TT blade. Second cast produced a wriggler about 35cm long, which was released, then a small bream on the next cast.
Blades are a slow retrieve, a steady sink and draw with a soft rod so the small hooks don’t pull free. They send a lot of vibration out and at times get bites when other lures miss out.
Rod three was next, and had a small Zerek Prawn rigged on a jig head on two-pound braid. I’ve caught a lot of fish on the Zerek in recent times; it has become a bit of a favourite.
Five casts produced another rat around 40cm, then an even smaller one. Small flatties love this lure, so I kept casting it for a bit. I pinned a nicer fish around 45cm shortly afterwards.
I changed rods to the Red Eye Shad, a lipless rattler vibe style lure that needs to really be ripped off the bottom fast, then dropped back, then ripped again.
As it was cold and the fish didn’t seem too active I didn’t think this would be the type of retrieve that would suit the conditions, but on the fifth cast, well out into the deeper water, the lure was belted by a heavy hit and I had a nice 63cm fish for release.
Ten minutes later I pinned a 55cm fish, which I kept. It had a big gut and curiosity got the better of me so I cleaned it and found a whiting about 20cm long in its gut cavity as well as a silver biddy.
Quite clearly the fish were actively chasing and feeding. If they have relatively large bait in their bellies, the fish will chase relatively big lures. Fast rips and vigorous jigging often get the bites.
As the tide rose over the flat the bite shut down and I picked up the fifth rod with a pink and silver Micro Mullet and trolled for a bit.
This method is a “finding” tactic, and the aim is to troll until you find the next group of feeding flathead. On this day that took about half an hour.
On a corner further up the creek I pinned a small fish, then a second. There was also a pelican working the shallows so I dropped the electric and began casting again.
Using the lessons learned from the first spot a ripping retrieve with the Red Eye Shad pulled a nice 53cm fish and my dinner was sorted.
I headed home with nine flathead to 63cm caught in about 90 minutes, which would be considered a bit above a “par” performance in this particular creek in the winter months.
Flexible
What I’ve learnt over many years of chasing flathead is that their moods change according to bait and conditions, and you have to be flexible in your techniques to crack the pattern on a given day.
Some days you catch a lot of small fish and the bigger ones are absent, other days the average size is much bigger.
This probably reflects the fact that different size ranges of fish come on the chew at different times, and that smaller fish generally feed more actively and for longer than the adult fish.
A recent trip was a good illustration of this. Three of us worked a well-known series of lagoons and sand bars near Jumpinpin for around 30 fish but the biggest was only around 55cm.
We just couldn’t crack a decent one despite trying multiple spots with multiple lure types.
My son, in contrast, went for a fish up the creek behind the house for a couple of hours with his mate and girlfriend, and while at first the bite was slow, just on sunset he pulled an 89cm, a 79cm, three in the 60s and a 58cm fish on trolled lures on one bank of the creek.
Bite windows for the big fish are often short, and working out when that bite will occur is quite tricky.
The hardest time to reliably catch flathead in my local area is the first two hours of the run out tide. Sometimes you can work this period hard without a single bite.
In Queensland the best flathead fishing is in spring (ie, about now as you read this) coinciding with the spawning run of these fish.
A lot of flathead head towards the estuary entrances and the large females move onto the spawning beds in deep water accompanied by huge numbers of smaller males.
At this time deep water jigging with large soft plastics, vibes and blades can be very effective.
I much prefer to fish the shallow water flats with light line and smaller lures as the fish fight a lot better and we usually catch bigger numbers, while still getting good quality.
Fish light
When working the shallows it pays to keep casts long, line light and use just enough leader to stop a bite off.
There isn’t a flathead swimming that can’t be landed on four pound quality braid such as FireLine.
As far as leader goes, you need enough to get the bites and enough to stop getting chafed through by the abrasive teeth of the fish.
Fluorocarbon has less visibility to the fish but there is a lot of debate as to whether it is actually less abrasion resistant than nylon.
With small lures such as blades and prawns style soft plastics I like to run an eight pound leader with about 15cm of 16 pound fluorocarbon as a bite tippet when big fish are about.
If there are a lot of 80cm plus crocodiles around I’ll go to 20-pound fluorocarbon such as FC Rock.
I’ve been chewed through by a few monsters on 12 pound over the years so I get a bit nervous when the last six inches might get frayed. When the fishing is slow and tough or the water is crystal clear I go down in leader size and take the risk.
You first have to get the bite.
Rods
Rod action is important. For hard jigged medium three or four inch plastics on ¼ to ½ ounce jig heads with 3/0 to 5/0 hooks you need a stiff tipped rod.
This allows you to impart better jigging action and the stiff tip gives you much better hook impact on the strike.
With a vertical upward jig style a lot of flathead are pinned in the roof of the mouth and this tough bony plate requires a stiff rod to belt the hook home. I have a Loomis NRX 803 that is perfect for this application.
For blades, shallow trolling, small Zerek Prawns and 1/8 ounce 2/0 jig heads you can use a softer blank with a bit more forgiveness in the tip.
Lures
There are always new lures to try, and every week the next flathead lure of the century arrives in the tackle shops.
Like many things it is how you use the tool (and all lures are tools) rather than what the tool is that counts.
The Zerek Prawn in the smallest size is my latest new toy, and I’ve caught plenty of nice fish up to 65cm on this great little lure.The medium size is also good when rigged on a jig head.
However, the essential six lures in my box are Gulps (three and four inch Swimming Mullet, the four inch Minnow in chartreuse and white, and the three and four inch Shrimp), the TT Blades (range of colours, size up to ¼ ounce), Red Eyed Shads, Lively Lures Micro Mullets (pink and silver, pink and purple, pink silver and yellow), small Squidgy Fish and Shads and the old Mann’s 5 plus.
Add a few Zerek Prawns and you’ve got all the flathead weaponry you need to unlock most bites.
As a final tip, catching flathead requires a bit of stealth. Don’t race up to a spot at full noise and expect to get bites. Stay quiet, minimise noise and use your anchor when the bites are slow as even the noise from the electric can scare them.
The humble flattie is a great fish – as I’ve written many times before, you never stop learning about them.
This story was first published in the Fishing World October 2013 issue.
