A FISHO LEGEND RETURNS
Along with other pioneering luminaries such as Vic McCristal and Ron Calcutt, TED CLAYTON ranks high as one of Australia’s finest ever fishing writers. This entertaining, perceptive and deeply informative article, Ted’s first in more than 20 years, shows what we’ve all been missing out on over the past couple of decades.
IT’S about 20 years since I submitted anything to a magazine and I am now 81 years old. A while back I had an eight-month waltz with the “Spanish Dancer” – one that I appear to have won. But it took its toll. You could say that I am no longer “robust”. I think that’s a nice turn of phrase. Somewhere along the track vertigo and diabetes also crept into the act.
Readers with long memories may be disappointed. I no longer march around with 20kg mulloway draped over my shoulder. My horizons have shrunk a little. These days I’m more than happy with a bag limit of snub nose gar or a good javelin taken on light gear.
After I’d been out of hospital for a while I managed to walk the length of our driveway. Believe it or not, at the time that was a milestone. I say that for the benefit of those with similar problems. You need to be a bit bloody-minded. An extra 100m a week and I’m now back into fishing.
Twinkle toes I am not. Bog my feet in mud in 40cm of water and the result can be quite exciting.
I now throw eight-gram lures but I still get a bit wistful when I visualise a deep gutter on a nice southeast night with a squall beating on the raincoat. I can feel the heavy gear loading up and the weight of a good mulloway coming on. If I miss anything it is that direct contact with the night and the elements – there was something deeply satisfying about it.
Some months back I was fishing with my son-in-law Paul when I hooked a good flathead. It fought around behind me and I pivoted with it. I ended up crawling around on my hands and knees in 60cm of water. Paul came to help. “Find the rod! Find the rod!” I yelled. He did – then the creature got a bite on his own gear and left me to it. I stood the rod upright on the bottom and climbed it. Bless my faithful Alvey reel, the mud simply lubricated it and we had flathead for dinner. There’s still a lot of fun and excitement out there.
All of the fishing that I do these days involves wading. As problems arise I invent something. One of my most useful tools is a light length of aluminium tubing. It has a spike epoxied into the business end. That’s essential on slippery rock. When travelling it sees me over logs. When I take up a fishing stance I stick it into the bottom and hook the top end into my navel. That turns me into a tripod – very stable. All I have to do is remember to turn around!
On dry land I function quite well. Long walks are not a problem. I get up amongst the mangroves on the big tides (wet through to the armpits!) and I reach the flathead hotspots on the low tides. It’s enough and I get a slice of the solitude that seems to be a part of my nature.
I realised after the hospital that I was basically limited to 5km of shoreline. I’d known it on a superficial level for most of my life but I decided that I would get to know it intimately. I would make a study of it. The breeding spots – the tracks that bream and whiting use on the making tide – where they drop back to on the bottom of the ebb. Where the big five to the kilo snub nose gar hang out when they feel romantic.
In a very satisfying turn of events the javelin (grunter bream) have staged a comeback. They were scarce even when I was a boy but I now know of one breeding spot. They are collector’s items and if one legal fish turns up among the bream and whiting it makes the day. The best I’ve taken recently weighed 2.2kg. No doubt I could increase the catch but one rod, one bait and a lot of patience equals one dinner.
I hope you don’t think that I’m going to spill the goods on them? I’ve worked too hard to do that. I will tell you this much: what they really like are prawns but yabbies will do the job. They put in an appearance after Christmas. Another case of a breeding season coinciding with a food supply. The freshwater run-off of the wet season flushes out the prawns.
A word to the unwary: javelin have what I believe are called pharyngial teeth. They are a set of ridged grinding plates in roughly the same place as the “onion” in a mullet. Gilling one carelessly will get you a nicely lacerated finger.
I call this detailed study of my shoreline the “Exploration of Inner Space”. It came about by necessity but after eight years of study it still maintains its interest. I can recommend it to anyone, fit or frail.
A good place to start is with a wander across the flats at low tide. Spying out where and when the mud crabs are actively digging out their tunnels. Watching the chestnut teal ducks earning a living. Seeing the mangrove seeds take root and then following their fortunes – good or bad. On a more mundane level you get the latest movements of your next dinner. The flathead marks, where the bream and whiting are feeding.
The mass of small pits dug into the tidal zone all tell a story. The average pit dug by a bream or whiting is about 10cm across with the sand piled evenly around the perimeter. Small rays dig a similar pit but there is always a channel where the sand was pumped out. There are a set of pits that turn up at times that have me intrigued. About three or four centimetres across and as numerous as thrown confetti. They usually appear overnight and often around Christmas when the new crop of yabbies (about 10/15mm) appear. My guess is that they are snub nose gar.
If the signs are good for bream, whiting or flathead then there is every chance that they will be back again on the next tide. Not a certainty but a good bet.
At low tide on the flats the places that you should fish the rising tide are also obvious irrespective of any marks. A casual glance draws the comment “Yair, that’s a flat beach” but it is not! Apart from the natural slant that becomes apparent as the tide rises you will see small pools of water lying about. Perhaps they support a little weed bed. Not much of a feature to us but those slightly deeper spots provide an extra 30cm of protection to the fish cruising the front edge of a rising tide. Remember that the first fish in is the best fed.
There are huge flats that are genuinely featureless but if you study them there is always a drainage channel that leads to deep water. The fish use those channels to move in. If you are really lucky the point where the channel intersects the weed bed will be a shallow scoured out hole that everything will use as a jumping off point. They also get a lot of food by digging in the soft bottom. Stand back and land your baits in the hole.
Weed beds persist in generally the same area but they do break up at times. The result is a range of small islands with a covering of sea grass. It may be different elsewhere but in my country (SE Queensland) these islands have a small area scoured out on their northern side. If you take a look at low tide you will see the pools of water. Getting towards half tide, stand well back and plonk your bait over the bed and a metre or two past the lip. Any fish working the flat will arrive there eventually.
If I am fishing a decent spring tide in that kind of country I try to arrive about three hours before it’s full. That way I can intercept the fish before they have a chance to spread out. By the time high tide has arrived many of them will be with you among the mangroves spikes. That calls for floats and some mucking around. I go home. If you’re keen the fish will go out the same way that they came in but they will be spooky and travelling.
If you have visions of putting a glut on the fish market then forget about it. That won’t happen around here. A couple of good bream and a few honest whiting perhaps. Interesting fishing. I call that time well spent. Any species taken in roe points to the peak of their season. Remember that for next year.
In general I fish the breeding seasons. It adds variety to life but periodically I will break away and target something. Then of course there are always targets of opportunity. I always carry a couple of flathead lures and a few No.10 hooks for gar (I’m a born optimist in that I even carry a bit of string for tying up the odd mud crab that I spy. Those are active times for Ted in the mud!)
My seasons are : Jan/March – bream/whiting/javelin. April – whatever moves. May/July – bream. August/Oct – flathead/whiting. Nov/Jan – snub nose gar/
whiting /bream.
There are overlaps depending on the season. We have learned to exploit the breeding seasons but keep in mind that fish have evolved to do the same. See any density of bait – gar, hardiheads, even mullet – and there will be predators nearby.
The breeding season for flathead and summer whiting coincide. Whiting are a food source for flathead. Sea pike roe up and peak in mid winter and under the Bribie Bridge and tailor, mulloway and cod will feast on them. The mulloway and cod also target the sea mullet in that season.
On the subject of bait. Never buy imported raw prawns, they carry disease. They might even be illegal by now. I use big eating prawns. People suck their breath in at that but if you do your sums it is the way to go. When the big locally caught raw prawns drop from $28 to $14 a kilo at the supermarket (and they do!) I buy a full five kilo carton of them frozen and keep it in the freezer. Endless stir-fries, satays and curried prawns at about $3.50 a person. For bait I peel them, lay them flat and fillet them lengthwise. They cut six baits. Three prawns usually gets me through a fishing session. On impulse I recently bought a pack of good looking bait prawns. A calculation based on weight put them over $30 a kilo.
The bulk of my fishing is done with an 8’6” (2.6m) Shimano Baitrunner Light with Steve Starling’s name on it. My reel is (what else?) an Alvey Luderick Special 475B (12cm drum). It is a very simple side cast that runs on ball bearings. In the mad rush to use light “egg beaters”, this is a reel that is sadly overlooked. The combination is light and well balanced. I’m not about to enter any casting competitions but I reckon that I get much more distance throwing my 8 gram Rapala LC8s than your average egg beater exponent. I fought a big golden trevally for two hours on the clock with this gear. I had him beaten but a load up of floating weed close in to the shore broke the line (good luck to him). The same set of gear will also catch gar.
The top choices of shallow running lure for my type of fishing come and go. It is very frustrating. Most lures will catch fish but many of them tangle on a long cast or don’t cast well at all. In 10 years I have seen three lures that did what I wanted. The last to appear (and the best) is the Rapala LC8 (Long cast 8gm). Apart from their shallow running depth they cast like a brick and never tangle.
If I’m facing over two metres of water I dip the rod tip in about 60cm – that, of course, lowers the tow point and running depth. In a metre I lift the tip in the air. At dusk when the fish are in 30cm, the little floating shallow running Rapala Fat Rap is my choice. Sometimes in that depth of water the flathead come out of the water like a trout.
The rod, the reel, the lures, a good quality six-pound line – that’s the basics – that’s what catches the fish. A shoulder bag, a small container with a range of hooks (including some No.10s for the gar) and a few swivels, six sinkers and a knife of some sort. Sharp hooks are essential. A belt and bait bucket. Hang a landing net off the shoulder bag. You are ready. Creature comforts like clothes are optional.
When I forget to eat and start to do stupid things like fumbling knots or kicking rocks I get out my can of Red Bull and a Milo bar. That’s the time to stand back, I’m dangerous!
Editor’s note: The Bribie Library is planning a retrospective on Ted’s fishing writing including displays of his work plus a DVD. Check fishingworld.com.au for details.
