Sweet Water - Jungle Perch et al

FRIDAY, jUNE 22, 2012

Tully Junglies

I drove back from Cairns this arvo after a quick work trip and stopped by Tully for a quick fish. I ended up with about 10 JPs and 8 sootys for about 2 hrs fishing! All sootys fell to a little rapala as did about half the JPs, and the rest of the JPs fell to a little sammy stick bait. It was great watching the stick bait get smashed on the surface, and the other memorable hook up was the first fish, a solid JP close on 40cm. I hooked a little guy and then these two brute JPs raced out from cover and attacked the little guy which resulted in the 40cm model stealing the lure from the little guy! Awesome session.








tHURSDAY, aPRIL 26, 2012

Herbert Tributary Jungle Perch and Sooty Grunter

Nic and I hadn't chased these little sweet water sport fish for quite a while, so after a lazy start to ANZAC day we got active and made the trek to the Ingham area. Our target stream was running surprisingly hard but looked great. We were both armed with 6lb spin sticks with Daiwa Sol 2000 size reels and and assortment of hard body and soft plastic lures, including the Lake Police Jackall Mask Vib.


My first cast with a 2" Berkley T tail and 1/8oz jig head was smashed by a little sooty.


Nic soon followed with a number of sootys, but they were wising up quickly. I changed to a mask vib and again the first cast was hammered but this time by a healthy jungle perch.






We both tried a heap more casts and Nic jumped a small barra off but that was it for this spot so we moved on upstream.


Here we tried a mix of hard body and soft plastic lures and scored quite a few more sootys. These ranged in size from the micro model to Nic's PB wild sooty. A fish of about 35cm and a kilo in weight. A great capture in the tight country, fast water and with light gear.




FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 2008

Herbert Tributary Sooties

The Herbert River passes through Ingham in NQ and there are a myriad of tributaries in its fresh water reaches that are home to tough sooty grunter and timid jungle perch.

Stoned Sooties, Sunday 14/9/2008

Nic and I took some visiting Sydney friends to one of our favourite haunts this day in the hope we would all find a Sooty. We fished the pools and rapids not far from the road for one small sooty, then worked our way further upstream.


The fishing from the bank here was difficult to say the least, but amongst the first snags and overhanging trees, six fat sooties were seen holding, then the biggest jungle perch I have ever seen. This JP would have been close on 40cm, and looked to be a very solid
fish.



Nic was the first to score a sooty here. A little fella of around 15cm. I then tossed out a small squidgy fish in grass hopper colour on a 1/16oz jighead. Just as the lure was approaching the bank the squidgy was ambushed and a fat sooty headed straight for cover. I had no option but to lock up the drag. Luckily my 6lb leader and 6lb braid held and I soon had a great sooty on the bank.

Unfortunately we only had a couple of hours today as we had to have our friends back at the airport by 4pm. What made the fishing difficult here was the very steep bank and many overhanging trees. Next time we'll try and get a canoe
in as that would provide access to both sides of the river and many more snags and overhangs.