Beenligh Bowls Club. 11 Hanover St, Beenligh. Editor Trevor Saunders PO Box 5057, Eagleby 4207

Transcription

1 Next Meeting Tuesday 13 th November Next Meeting Beenligh Bowls Club 11 Hanover St, Beenligh Editor Trevor Saunders tgkmsaunders@gmail.com PO Box 5057, Eagleby 4207 With the bulk of the members away at Glen Lyon Dam, the November meeting will be put back until the 13 th. I ll have DVD on my trip to Cania dam in September and the club trip calendar for 2019 will have to be discussed. A basic schedule was put together at a committee meeting and one of the changes was moving some of the trips to midweek. The bulk of members are retired (our average age, 61.3 years) and as you know weekends on the water are becoming more crowded.. There will still be some weekend trips, so as not to disadvantage working members. A weeklong trip to Cania Dam was one suggestion possibly in late September, early October. All these and other trips up for discussion. (see Ross Williamson s wise words below) Upcoming Trips November 23 rd to 25th - Bass tagging, Albert River, Mark Ward s property, Kerry. Trip Captain Lloyd Willman December 1 st Christmas barbque, Brad Baldwin s residence. The club is providing the meat, salads etc. December 9 th Mangrove jack trip, Pimpama River, Trip Captain Jeff Maddalena Don t forget 2019 Tag a-toga at Borumba Dam

2 Presidents Ramble Welcome to my notes for the November newsletter and an update of my thoughts earlier this month. I intend to make this a fixture in the newsletter so everyone can get involved and know what is happening. Our Perth house settles on the 19th November so unfortunately, I will miss the November meeting. Membership - Please renew if you have not already. It is your club and your views on what we do is important. If you are considering not renewing then please by all means let us know why and what we can do to fix it. Committee Meeting - We trialled a new approach based on advice received that the guiding executive group should be 5-6 people so it is not unwieldy. We were able to get a fair amount done efficiently. We will continue with that approach but of course everyone is welcome if they want to contribute. I intend to hold them quarterly. Fishing Trips - At the meeting we sketched out the trips for next year. They mirror past approaches however we a planning three major week long trips for the second half of the year. They will be:- August September/October November Rainbow Beach Cania Dam Glenlyon Dam I had planned to revisit Lake Monduran in April however recent experience is that it is not fishing well as floodwaters have gone over the spillway taking many fish with them. I ll reassess early in the new year and perhaps that will also be a possibility. One of the major items we want the whole club to consider is midweek trips. Most of the membership is retired or may have access to RDO s. we had a serious discussion about many or most of the day trips being held midweek to avoid boat ramp congestion and jet skis and the like. Please make your views known, especially for the busy waterways. We need to decide if that becomes our exclusive choice or if we schedule both midweek and weekend for every trip or conduct a mixture based on how busy the waterway is perceived. If you cannot attend the rescheduled November meeting on the 13th please make you views know. I am happy with any of the three outcomes but perhaps the busy solution may suit best. We will discuss this and the pencilled in trip list at the November meeting. Fees - We held a discussion about reducing our significant bank balances. We discussed reducing the fees to the ANSA cost and will seek everyone s views on this. Past Members - My mistake but I believe our 25 th anniversary is 2020 and we will contact past members to come along for a dinner. Perhaps this will also be a time to encourage them to re-join. John Reid is doing a good job gathering names of past members as we work towards this..

3 Borumba Trip -I have nominated and will take my red boat. I don t think Ian will come up for the weekend so if anyone wants to come along as my moral support please let me know. We can have up to 3 people in the boat and in the team. Alternatively, if someone wants to take their boat with me as their moral support also discuss this we have to nominate early December. Xmas Party - That time of year is fast approaching. The club will provide meat and salad. It will be BYO drinks, both soft and alcohol and a plate of nibbles or desert to share. Please confirm to John your attendance and numbers. John Eldred will have lollies or similar for the young ones. Website - Thanks to Martin for his great work looking at our club website. John and I will be visiting Kingaroy to discuss their great facebook presence in late November. This may be the way we go. This is work in progress to make our presence better known and attract new members and engage better with you all. To misquote a great leader Let s make our club great again. Ross Williamson SBSFC Trip Report- Pimpama River 20 th Oct 2018 The preceding weekend to the club trip was one of the wettest weeks we d seen for 6 or more months, so it was always going to be interesting on how the river faired. I arrived at Diamond Head around 7am in ideal conditions and the tide already outgoing, and readied to launch with one boat launching and another queued to extract. So the Good and the Bad. Bad- The boat that launched forgot their bungs, clearly not 1 of the 3x P.O.B. thought to check. A Minor delay while I staged at the ramp. Good- The boat which extracted opened the prime parking spot at the top of the ramp. Happy days. It was surprising how clear the water was given the amount of rain leading up to the trip. I checked in with Martin and Lloyd, saw calls and I headed towards the mouth. Trevor had landed a couple of legal Duskies, Lloyd headed upstream. Chris Robson Lund was clearly in his element of extreme fishing, so much so that he didn t know if he was upstream, downstream or just exstream. There is a chartreuse clouser down in there So after a couple of hours fishing practise, we met at the Stockyards for a catch up, morning tea and a Fly Casting Clinic under the keen eye of one of the local fishermen, before again heading off the try and land a Flathead or two. A few fish were caught most on Fly and some lure casting. Near everyone got at least a fish. Conditions were really good early with a tricky little wind direction later in the morning.

4 The Crabs were very quiet considering a bit of a flush, Brad and his crew scored a couple of Sandies, only undersize Muddies otherwise. We had 8x boats of the water which made this the best attended trip of the year. We headed back to the ramp around midday after hitting a few more spots and pulling the pots. I think all the flathead caught were just over legal size and around the 42-43cm range. No monsters but we know where they live Thanks everyone for the interest and coming along. Kev Ford MIARA by Tom Walbank Late September we left on a road trip to Yeppoon. Our first stop was at Miara, where we stayed for 4 nights. Miara is situated at the mouth of the Kolan River about halfway between Bundaberg and As most of you know it is the same river that Monduran Lake is on. Miara is a locality name, there is no village or town, just a caravan park. If you need supplies or fuel you need to travel back to Yandaran about 9 km. If you need alcohol and have to go to the nearest hotel back to where you turn off the Bundaberg to 1770 road to Miara about 12 km. The park is right beside the river with its own sandy beach that stretches approx. 4 km to the river entrance. The park also has its own boat ramp. There is a public boat ramp 2 km back down the road. The park is popular with families and enjoys an 80% occupancy rate year-round and is particularly busy on weekends, so it pays to book ahead if you plan on a stay. The majority of people come here to crab as straight opposite to the park on the other side of the river there is a maze of mangrove lined channels. The few that were fishing were after Grunter and fewer still sport fishermen were there for Barra and Jacks. An angler from Bundy who comes here regularly said he barely goes home without scoring a Barra this trip was the exception. After setting up camp it was about 2pm when I launched the boat. As with any new locality I fish, I like to troll while looking for sandbanks, drop offs, deep holes, structure and the like locations I am likely to concentrate my efforts later on. With the wind blowing knots I headed for the protection of the creek across from the park. Just inside the creek there is a nice hole on the first bend then a shallow sand bank to the next hole on the opposite side. It was only 2 hours before low tide so I had to put the outboard in shallow water drive to cross the bank as my lure bounced up out of the deep water it was latched onto by a 38 cm Flathead, then 10 min later as the lure was coming off the same bank into the next hole, it was nailed by a 48 cm Flathead which made for a very tasty meal that night. The next bank was too shallow to cross so I dropped the electric and started casting as I made my way out of the creek which resulted in a 24 cm GT. By now the tide had started to come in, so I switched back to trolling and I explored a few kilometres up stream of the Kolan River before returning to camp. The following day I was keen to explore the creek further. This proved to be a good decision. During the last 2 hours of the run in and the first hour of the run out tide I trolled up 4 legal Flathead, the largest measuring 68 cm

5 and 4 Gold Spot Cod, the best being 40 cm. Al the fish were caught up on top of the sand banks between the deeper holes. Switching to casting at structure in deeper water proved unsuccessful as I made my way out of the system. For the remaining run out tide I trolled towards the mouth of the river. This proved to be a bad decision, as this was when a treble became imbedded in my index finger. I won t go into how it happened as Trevor described it pretty well in last month s bulletin. However, I will say that it shows how quickly things can go wrong and how awkward it is to scale and fillet 4 Flathead with a treble hook in your index finger, not to mention the pain. The third day with a band aid in place of the treble I wanted to explore Yandaran Creek which is supposed to hold Barra and Jacks. When I arrived at the mouth of the creek the tide was still making. My plan was to troll up the creek until the tide turned, then cast back out with the tide. My only success was a 45 cm GT. From here I travelled further upstream to the railway bridge where I found the deepest water so far 20 ft. Downstream from the bridge is a long hole containing plenty of snags, rock shelves and eddies to cast at. Another 2 hrs passed without a touch. By this time the wind was up, so I trolled back towards camp with my only success being trolling up a brand-new cast net. Next month Futter Creek and the Barra versus Kayak saga. Fly Fishing Again???? by Trevor Saunders Fly fishing is often a follow on from lure fishing, the next level you might say. Whether you reach it and continue is a different thing. Some do, often forgoing lure fishing as a result, fly purists they are called. In my experience, you either love it or put it behind you. I probably fall somewhere in between. My first thoughts about fly fishing came after being given a book, Trout Quest by David Scholes, now a collector s edition. My first practical experience was when I was doing National Service, posted to the School of Artillery at North Head in Sydney. Trout had been stocked in Manly Dam, and with time on my hands, I went and bought a 6 weight Daiwa rod, fly reel with a DT6F line. Didn t catch any trout, but taught myself to cast. Posted to Brisbane in 1971, I had to take it to the next level and catch a fish. It came by drifting a dry fly below the Luscombe Weir on the Albert River. Australian Freshwater Herring loved the Greenwell s Glory. I caught quite a few of these, on the endangered list apparently, but never any since. The next step, tying your own flies, a #12 hook, black wool and black duck feathers as wings morphed into a crude wet fly. Back to the weir, Herring loved it, even Mullet. The real surprise was just on dark, two Bass were the result. I think I m pretty unique, in the fact that the first Bass I ever caught were on a fly rod. Working in the tackle industry after being discharged, put fly fishing even more on my radar, with lure fishing even more so. Fly fishing for Trout on the New England, Bass in the upper Noosa (best was 60 in one weekend) and other species, Flathead, Trevally, Redfin, Yellowtail Kingfish and more. My greatest experience was fishing with my mate, the late Darryl Steel, one of Australia s SWF pioneers, for Yellowtail Kings, Longtail Tuna and Cobia. We donated 3 complete fly lines to Kings under the bay channel markers one trip. While the above might seem like old time ramblings, fly fishing has always been just a little bit in the background, compared to my normal fishing regimes. Now as you all know by now, my wife Glenys is a more than competent fisherperson. She hates me fly fishing in the boat, so that has all but negated fly fishing in her company which is most of our trips.

6 The recent trip to the Pimpama was probably my first serious opportunity for a long time. With the Stacer sitting on it s keel in the yard, while I removed some cancer from the trailer, it was the new Cross Country Ezi Topper for this trip. I was a bit reticent to tow it down the M1 on its collapsible trailer ( no springs) but it behaved perfectly (as long you kept to the 90kph recommended maximum). Lloyd and I launched together at the Pimpama barrage, a spot I hadn t been to for decades. Rubbish everywhere, and a dead wallaby floating next to the launch site made it less than salubrious. We headed down to the island opposite the stock yards, and with the tide still making worked flies over the flats. The water colour didn t really excite me, so I moved down to the mouth and cleaner water. I had caught Flathead here, in proximity to the seagrass weed beds in the past. An hour s fly casting, no result, and as the tide turned a just legal Flathead grabbed the Clouser. My go to line for dredging the bottom is an 8 weight WF floating line with a 3m Hi Density clear sinking tip section. This allows me to work the fly right along the bottom almost to the leader in the rod tip. I moved to the flats near the old oyster leases, Chris Robson Lund came down (or up) and fished soft plastics in the same area. A stream of expletives followed his dropping a nice fish beside the boat. A little while later he redeemed himself, landing a Flathead in the high 40 s. The minimum draught and silence of the Cross Country s foam sandwich glass hull came into it s own in the shallow water as a 50cm Flathead grabbed the Clouser. It had been years since the fly rod loaded under the weight of a good fish. It actually pulled a bit of line out. Martin was close by fishing the channel leading up to the oyster leases and Kevin in the distance upstream, fishing his way down. Get together time was 10am at the stockyards, so up we went to see who had turned up. As Kev said in his report, an excellent turn out. With the tide falling, Lloyd had headed back before he ran out of water. Forgoing the casting instruction session, I headed off as well, only putting myself up on one sandbank on the way. Up to the dead wallaby, complete with a group, fishing, drinking and dancing to rap music on the opposite bank. No wonder I don t like fishing weekends anymore Annual Membership Fees (Due by August Meeting every year) Normal Membership - $70, Family Membership - $90 Student over 16 - $20, Student under 16 (non family) $15, Junior $15 You can pay by cash at a meeting of by direct deposit into BSB Account

7 Any club member wishing to sell gear, please let me know so I can place it in the newsletter.