Spending my life fishing in areas that are often pristine, remote, wild and untouched, it never ceases to amaze me where so-called river monsters turn up. You could be in the middle of the Pacific casting lures around un-touched bombies with 50-kilogram Giant Trevally swallowing your foot long popper to deep dropping a 3-kilogram piece of lead with flashing disco lights and 200-kilogram leader with a bunch of hooks on it to crazy depths in excess of 1000 metres of water for a gargantuan of the deep yet close to home virtually in your back yard crazy catches of monstrous fish turn up.
The Gold Coast has more than 500 kilometres of canal systems, channels winding upstream along old riverbeds eventually ending up either at a weir where the fresh meets the salt or into man-made lakes that not only house deep holes to well over 25 meters but also, extra large fish. And it’s not just the Gold Coast that holds this ecosystem but also many other tributaries that has some sort of tidal influence. To name a few species, Qld Groper weighing more than 150 kilograms, 50-kilogram estuary cod, 30-kilogram Giant Trevally, metre long Barramundi and sharks longer than your average dinghy.
Jaye Newton with a Mermaid Waters barramundi Landing a bull shark
from the canal
Throughout the day these fish move silently and mostly go undetected however under the cover of darkness shapes and the backs of fish breaks the still waters as they come to the surface to feed on smaller prey schooling around bridge lights or taking shelter around jetties or other semi submerged structure.
In some cases, right in the middle of a metropolitan city, mullet the size of your arm spray out of the water as what looks like a car being driven in behind them smashes through the water with a mouth gaping wide open hoping for a catch. This is the Giant Trevally strike and a once this is visualised in front of your eyes it sends an instant shot of natural adrenalin into your body as you cast a foot long popper or stick bait out into the whitewash. Most of the time using a live bait will undoubtedly hook you something but seeing a bow wave behind your lure as you retrieve it back is second to none.
Other ooglies that inhabit the waterways that often take you by surprise, is the Queensland Groper, a monstrous fish that can grow as big as a small car and has a mouth bigger than a standard washing machine. These fish often rub themselves along rock walls or even along a cement retaining wall throughout a canal system. You might be thinking ‘why?” Well, I can’t answer that for you but one thing is certain, if there’s a deep hole in the main river or around a canal entrance it would be a fair bet to say that a Queensland Groper may call it his home. Old areas such as Tumbulgum in the Tweed and even the deep hole adjacent TSS in the Nerang River is a well known spot where giant gropers frequent but don’t go thinking you’ll catch one as they are a protected species and even hooking one will land you into some pretty hot water with the law, but seeing them in the wild is history right there in front of you as a 2 metre fish that weighs around 100 kilograms or more is most likely more than 100 years old.
The estuary cod is a similar fish found in similar areas, they don’t grow as big, but they do have similar features. If you do hook onto an estuary cod, have a look down his throat as you’ll often find a whole crab sitting there just behind its gills, another fact that I can’t explain but I’ve caught many all around the tropical parts of Australia and throughout the pacific isles and yep most have a crab in their throat.
The Barramundi is a tropical sportfish made famous for its aerial displays, muscle fighting drag pulling runs and of course top eating at the end of the day. These fish inhabit the northern tropical waters of Australia but now we are finding more and more right here in Southeast Queensland. The quite simple explanation for this is that Barramundi fingerlings can be bought at most aquarium shops and people who do buy them take them home and raise them in a fish tank environment for a couple of years. In that time, they receive loads of food and love and of course, they grow and they can grow pretty quick.
Eventually ‘Barry” the barramundi will outgrow the fishtank and often the owner will let it go into the rivers or canals or creeks. Times this by a hundred or so a year and eventually you have a population of metre plus barramundi schooling throughout the local waterways. New technology with electronics such as Live View from Garmin allows anglers to find and pinpoint exactly where the fish are, often around bridge pylons, rock bars and structures. Most caught are released by the sportfishing angler and targeted during the warmer months of the year.
Sharks have been an issue for a long time and will continue to be the taxman at the end of the day or should I say at the end of your catch. Bull sharks, or river whalers, are a species that has poor eyesight and relies on the receptors around their nose to home in onto their prey. A tough fighting trevally during the warmer months of the year thrashing about the surface will often attract the attention of a nearby bully and within a minute or two you either retrieve half a fish, no fish or the whole thing. Sharks are fun to catch, they add the element of danger due to their razor-sharp teeth, their blistering runs and the sheer size of them as fish to a metre are the norm. A wire trace is a necessity when targeting them and surprisingly the best bait to use if you can’t catch a trevally for some reason is a piece of dead freshwater eel. Deep holes, main channel with some current and pretty much anywhere where there’s action from the food chain starting with small river prawn being chased by trevally and of course this brings in the sharks. Same with whiting brings in the sharks or fishing a deep hole in a quiet stretch of the tidal lakes. But be aware you are messing with danger for if you are in the wrong spot at the wrong time when the fish thrashes, it could end pretty badly.
All of our creeks, rivers, tidal lakes and canals house a variety of fish, some bigger than others and sometimes what lies down below the surface is more than meets the eye.
Monster Gold Coast barramundi caught by Warrick Johnston
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Published in print August-December 2024
