Reel it in flathead and bream Australia wide fishing competition

Hello everyone it’s now Monday morning.
I’m on my way back home It’s been a really eventful fishing weekend away with Greg competing in the Reel it in Australia wide flathead and brim fishing competition.

Greg and I decided to head up to Fish in the lake entrance area and try our luck fishing up there.
We’ve booked a cabin at the Metung caravan park at Metung which is the most beautiful quaint little village going I reckon.
We went up to the area a day early before the competition on Friday to have a look around and see if we can find where the Fish were because we have not finished the area for a year and we had no local knowledge of what the fishing is like,
or what areas to

fish in .

I have to admit that my last fishing trip on
Tiger Ben was pretty ordinary as I just had one of those days that I spent tying knots and untangling lines all day .
So I was looking forward to a better time this trip .

On Friday morning it was pretty hard going as there wasn’t any fish hiding in the spots that we tried. Greg then snagged a big flattie so we knew some were in that area ,
we shifted spots and in no time Greg landed two trophy bream with both well over 45cm ,
and I actually scored for the day what they call a Donuts ,
its when you put your finger and thumb together and it makes a doughnut which is a zero and means absolutely nothing.

But I had a really challenging day because I’m not used to casting such light lines and small lures and plastics .
We were casting lures instead of plastics most of the time this trip and lures have the hooks attached on them swinging free and lose with three hooks on each cluster and they are called trebles ,
and there’s two sets of trebles on the plastic hard bodied lures that we were casting .

These hooks are all barbed and needle point sharp so they go in anything soft easily ,
So now I am like a human pin cushion with those hooks striking me in the hands hands constantly and one also went in my pants and into absolutely everything else ,
and I also spent the first day trying not to tangle up as every time I did something my braid just knotted and tangled at every chance that it had right in front of my eyes.

Greg landed an awesome flattie and i was at the time trying to untangle myself and not fishing.
I would say for the first Day that i spent half not even fishing.

It got a bit cloudy and overcast and Greg said where is your coat Curly and I said it must be still in the car so lucky Greg a good spare jacket on board he lent me and what do you think happened ?
pretty much half an hour later i got a lure caught in the jacket and the hooks went in deep in the sleeve of the jacket because it was loose and me too clumsy and in the end we had to cut them out with braid scissors and continue fishing,

my frustration was starting to build because the constant braid tangles and reties and the fine hooks in my hands just kept happening.

The side pocket next to me was full of cut out braid tangles in multiple colours as it didn’t matter what rod that i used and leaders it looked like a coloured bird’s nest beside me .
Greg didn’t say anything .

So the clouds lifted.
I took Greg‘s jacket off and what do you think?
Same thing lure in my new hoody ,
it went right through to my T-shirt and now they both have a hole in them the size of a ten cent piece , so that was a bummer and I had a hell of a day.

Caravan park ,
Walk to the pub for tea and get ready for the morning,
Back at the room
Greg tied on the new leaders we needed and we hit the sack till daybreak.
We launched in the Nicholson River and fished out towards Painsville by
The first ten minutes I knew that my patience would be tested again today as the tangles started straight away and hooks were sticking in me everywhere .

Greg landed a couple of huge flatties and I managed to catch a tailor We ran a duel set of Rooworx Elite shallow water anchors on the back of boat for further field testing .

They worked a treat the whole time but one got snagged on something in the down position so I actually had to strip off down to my jocks and get out of the boat into the what i thought was freezing water and lift this spike up and clear the snag and mud and get back in the boat and it wasn’t actually that cold which was pretty good and we had s towel handy and then we fished on, and on the on the next cast
Greg caught a big flattie and for the rest of the day it was donuts,

We changed lures and this time I cast into a mooring bay and caught a rope with the lure ,
Greg drove us over to the rope on the front electric motor ,
It was too far gone so we decided to a bust off was in order,
Greg later told me how much the lure that I lost had cost and I just remembered that I owe him some money or a beer when i see him next .

So by that night Greg was over tying both his and my leader knots all the time and he did his and went to bed pretty early and i had to have a go at tying the
Slim Beauty and the FG knot for the first time ever on the dimly lit dining table
After quite a few hours of attempted knot tying trying these two ,
i gave up on them and looked on the nett for an alternative joining knot and i found the Albright knot ,

It looked really quite easy but with these big fingers and in the dark it wasn’t either.
I looked at the time it was 1.30 am we were getting up at six so i decided to go to bed and try again in the morning,

You would not believe it first thing in the morning i sat back there and i tied the knot easily and perfectly ,
I got the braid scissors and cut the tag off as close as possible to avoid the knot from snagging on the rod runners when i cast.
Unbelievably i cut the main line instead of the tag ,
With no glasses on .
Hopefully Its not an Omen for today perhaps.

Round two
I managed to to tie on my leader,
Phew

So on Sunday we decided to go and fish at
Lake Tyres instead but when we arrived at the boat ramp there’s not much water actually left held in the lake when we looked there it’s down and about a metre and a half to its normal level,
so all of the regular fishing spots are not there anymore with them now they are all high and dry and green grassed with no water on them ,
so we didn’t even launch there and instead went back to the Nicholson river.

We spent the day while casting. laughing chatting and carrying on basically inventing things with new ideas we run by each other as Greg is a very intelligent man.
But ,

Don’t tell him I said that,
I really do enjoy our interesting conversations.

We solve some of the problems of the world but not my next problem.

It had started to drizzle,
so i put my coat on again and i was down the back of the boat and Greg up at the front , and i soon dreaded it when i retrieved my lure and it swung in the air straight back and into my hair .

Oops lol,

A hair fish

Theres me now for five minutes battling trying to extract this lure from my dreadlock without Greg knowing ,
Every time i moved the lure and got a hook out another two hooks went deep in .
In end I asked Greg for his help,
He tried but like me the barbs were holding fast.
I asked him if he were a good hairdresser?

I said maybe cut the hook and leave it in there but then he turned into a bit of a barber ,
snip and off it came .
It was about six inches long ,
Maybe its undersize.
We were laughing

about it for a while ,

Then the rain started and it belted down for a long time and i thought ,
oo oh as I could feel my chest now getting cold,

The jacket i had on wasn’t really waterproof at all and its still pissing down so i got saturated right through to my skin and to top it off i got another bad tangle and so i without thinking I sat on the seat to fix it ,
Big mistake
I felt an Instant wet ass.
Bugger.

So Greg was now up to chasing his next flattie and he was desperate to try and get his fifth fish for his bag.
I was wet through all afternoon and cold and actually barracking for him,
I didn’t want to catch a fish i wanted Greg to snare that last elusive fish .

This comp we could have continued to fish until midnight i believe but after thee days of constant casting the body fatigue sets in along with me being wet through i was actually over it nice and early in the day but I hung in there for Greg to have a chance at his fifth fish .

So I have to hand it to Greg to fish in a strange place with no updated local knowledge he managed five four monster flathead over the competition all between 70 and 80 cm long .
Awesome effort .

Curly one Tailor .
Lots of patience.

It was not to be in the end and not through a lack of trying,
so its time to pack up for the trip back to Melbourne
Tired and sore but smiling laughing and still friends.

Got to love fishing
Why not
Check out Rooworx shallow water anchors on facebook for yourselves .

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