AWESOME DAY -BYNOE HARBOUR,NT - GO THE FLY!

FROM 'THE STIG'

Finally got on the water this last weekend, after 7 weeks of on-off money permitting work on boat and other regular life ‘poop’ getting in the way

Was advised by the ‘gun’ fly anglers here in Darwin, that Bynoe harbour 1.5hours SW of Darwin was the go on father’s day weekend as the tides had little movement and the water clarity was through the roof awesome clear – perfect for sight casting to fish. The only potential compounding (i.e. negative) factor was the wind – but online forecast reports showed little wind early gradually building to 15knots by 4pm.The next decision was whether to head off Saturday night and stay at the great little country pub near the boat ramp or leave really, really early and drive out in morning to be on water half hour before sunrise to then motor out to starting location I wanted to be at when the sun came into view.

The wives of my fishing buddy and myself chose the latter for us (as if we ever had the choice once that gold ring was on our finger!!). Still a full Father’s day on the water casting flies to sighted fish- who could ask for more.

Morning started with the water almost as smooth as glass. However by time we got to an outer reef at the front of Bynoe Harbour, the water had become chopped up by a constant wind, especially at this exposed reef. I suggested we head to the windward side of an island a kilometre away when we got a few flashes chasing our flies. We soon were in to some active and aggressive small queenies. Here is one of Peter's queenies.

They kept us entertained for an hour or so. Queenies for the most are so eager to take the fly, so vibrant in their shaking, jumping and slogging runs. There was also the odd plate sized GT to be caught, that you knew instantly what it was by the different fight down deep, thumping, and circling.There were random bait balls getting hammered by fish and birds but always more than two cast lengths away. We chased and then they appeared where we used to be ---- so we chased and chased some more to no avail. So we went back to the queenies again - in the shallows around the submerged rock structures near the corner of the exposed reef.

The wind was increasing and waves were getting rougher, so much so that in my low profile Stessl 4.75 protracker it was getting quite interesting rocking about. Again the thought came to move but my fishing companion has more patience than I, given his Canadian steelhead background of catching sometimes only one fish over the course of day in snow covered country and loving it!

Peter instead suggested we move to a bit of a current line not far away where the randomness of slashing fish was a little more constant. At this location, we found that the bottom dropped off from two or three meters deep 50m away from the reef to 20m deep and it seems the predators were pushing the baitfish up against this drop off and then slashing into them. At other times they regularly cruised this dropoff making them easy targets for our flies. We get to this area just as a lull in the wind occurred. It glassed off around us for three hundred meters in all directions for the next few hours. Perfect!

We also enjoy an awesome sight of seven medium sized manta rays cruising slowly through in front of us 6 or so metres down. A majestic sight – till one swam through Peter’s line and foul hooked – Peter fought it for a while and I think we could have readily brought it to hand for a few photos but we eventually broke it off to chase more suitable targets slashing around us.

There were up to four other boats in the spot at various times when we were near the reef but none were catching fish. Some were bait danglers, others jigging – but no fish were netted by these boats. As for us it seemed every second cast saw a 40-60cm mackerel, or the occasional queenie and trevally attacking the fly. The non-fly fishing in the boats would leave abruptly with much roaring of their engines when we kept catching fish and they remained fishless, over the next few hours other boats arrived and ended up leaving in the same way - in disgust and empty eskies – Go the Fly!!!

With the window of glassy conditions you could see a few baitfish start to pop across the surface as they were being forced up by the predators and we could get there with the electric motor before the big fish arrived in force.
Peter was using a bushy profile clouser using kinky fibre, about 10cm long with a little flash, while I was using smaller tighter profile clousers, quite short in length.

Peter out fished me on the mackerel - netting three if not more for each one I caught – so for the day the profile and length of the fly was important. Interestingly, the baitfish were much shorter than Peter’s fly, instead being more my length of fly of 5-6cm. I can only assume the larger fly caught the predators attention more amongst the multitudes of bait than ‘matching the hatch’ that I was trying to do.

Bites offs were few so wire never became a major need., which was not usually the case with narrow barred mackerel and mono leaders, most took the fly while we were using only a stop start single hand strip of 20-50cms on full sinking lines.

There was not a lot surface slashing by fish, and the birds had gone -- so it was just the little boils of only a few baitfish in patches about 4m across to indicate where to cast. Even when the baitfish were not boiling casting from shallows over the edge of or along the drop off, usually resulted in a fish or at least a follow. If the water had not glassed off – you would not have known the baitfish and the predators under them were even there and our day would have been very different.

One particular bait boil I cast to, I let the fly sink more than usually and first strip came up tight to a good fish. It took off line strongly, the fish tracked us all over the patch of water we were fishing so much so I had to use electric to chase it. Finally, I saw its profile down deep in the very clear water, a trevally of some sort, and larger than what we had been catching. 

As I never handle a draw out battle with a bigger fish well – I really horsed it (lose now or later, or maybe not - the poor reasoning), I was turning it over regularly to disorientate it, putting a lot of pressure on the fish and my eight weight rod – much to the astonishment of Peter. I really put the hurts on it and had it to the boat quickly to discover it was a Golden trevally. At which point I was ever so slightly more careful – as I love catching Goldens far more than GTs, what an awesome fish!

Finally, after one anxiety producing missed net shot, the still fairly green fish was in the boat. Hand slaps all round and a few whoops and hollahs and yeeehhhaaahhhss!!!!! Was I stoked! Many pictures followed.


Our fishing had been a bit ‘hit and miss’ the last few outings, so getting into heaps of fish and a few good ones really made us feel on top of the world. But catching fish only on fly when no one else was – well that’s ---- well, priceless.

Add to that watching the fish take the fly in awesomely clear water – all on flies we tied the weekend before in anticipation of this trip – even better still.

One down side of trip was when we got back to ramp and I was backing the boat trailer towards the ramp to load the boat for the trip home – I notice the unusual wobble on the left hand wheel and found the bearing had collapsed. It was a 10km/h slow ride back to the local pub a few kilometres from ramp to strip the wheel down and take parts home to reinstall bearings and take back the next day. But given the awesome day we had – I wasn’t even stressed about the consequence of my poor trailer maintenance.


Now what day can I get back there soon???????? What are the tides?? What will the wind be doing?
And what flies will I need to tie to be ready for it?