I have just returned from a cracking weeks fishing the Ningaloo Reef in my 3.8m tinny with my dad. In recent years i have become mad keen on my topwater fishing and was keen to get stuck into some good GTs. I went up with no expectations but hope that with low swell and wind i would have a chance to fish the back of the reef and find some GTs.
The swell was pumping the first couple of days, so that was spent catching spanglies inside the reef. The swell dropped away on the 3rd day and after fishing inside and waiting for the offshore to drop a bit we headed out back. We moved down the reef looking for bait but not having done it before, i was not really sure what i was looking for. It was not long before i found a strip of reef that appealed to me, the deeper water met the back of the reef and there was plenty of bait about. It didnt take long before i had my first hookup, what i thought was alot of drag turned out out to be nowhere near enough and despite severe palming of the spool i was busted up very quickly. I fished the area for a short time more with only a goldspot trevally boated before the onshore wind forced us home.
Tommorrow could not come quick enough and after waiting for the offshore to drop a bit we were back at the same area of reef by late morning. First cast my stickbait was taken by what turned out to be a bigeye trev. Back in again and i was on straight away to what i knew immediately was a GT, after motoring it off the reef and a short fight, the first GT of the trip was landed (15-20kg range). Another slightly larger GT was landed shortly after, the fish then went shy and the onshore wind once again forced us to call it a day. The following day followed the same trend as the previous, with one nice GT landed before they shutdown.
The next day blew 25 knots from the north all day and left us grounded, despite this i was pretty satisfied with landing 3 nice fish to this point. The wind forecasts had been consistently wrong for the trip, so i didn't know what the next day would bring. I woke to a glassy ocean and arrived at the same strip of reef earlier than i had any other day. It did not take long to get stuck in and in 2 hours i had put 6 GTs on the boat, the majority being around the 20kg mark with one better one closer to 30. The northerly had picked up again and was going to make for a rough ride home, so we decided to settle on one last fish and head back. It was not long before i hooked up to what i immediately knew was a significantly larger fish than i had dealt with, after some serious work motoring it off the reef and 6 Gs down i was spent before i had it. After sucking in a few deep ones i got some energy back and after a fight time that wont set any records, i had a very solid GT boatside. I had brought every fish in the boat myself up to this point but this fish required my Dad to get the net over its head while i had the tail, i called it for around 40kg but really have no experience with fish this big.
The last day turned up little wind but an increase in swell, we headed back to the the same strip of reef early and caution had to be issued as the swell was pretty borderline. We waited between sets to get in for a cast and straight away i landed a nice GT, the next run resulted in me getting busted up by a solid fish. The big swell was starting to take the enjoyment out of the experience, so we made the decision for one last run in, which resulted in a solid GT nudging the 30 kg mark. With this we headed back in completely satisfied with the experience.
All up i landed 12 Gts for the trip with plenty of spanglies to fill in the time. Fishing from the small tinny i was never able to get a session on the back of the reef any longer than 3 hours, as you are restricted so much by conditions. I think i would have spent maybe 12 hours combined fishing for GTs for the trip. Fishing seemed more productive on a rising tide than a falling one. Used the FG knot - leader- crane via uni knot- split ring setup and had no failures which was positive, used mainly shogun 7/0 trebles and bent alot but they all held.
Alot of thanks has to go to my Dad for dragging all the fish off the reef and having absolutly no desire to catch a GT, thanks also to Brandon and Jay who have given me plenty of good advice over the last year.
Gear used: Stella 10000FA (20000 spool)
Stella 10000sw w/ no limits 16000 spool
Carpenter Monster Hunter 80H
Ripple Fisher Ultimo 82MH
Jerry Brown 100lb solid
Varivas SMP Pe 8
Varivas Shock Leader 170 and 200lb
Home made stick baits
