For weeks the Gold Coast has dished up dirty water, stubborn swell and frustrated anglers. Now a strong westerly is on its way, and the crew behind Dougie Burt's Fishing Channel reckon it is the turning point the region has been crying out for.
In the channel's 28 May tackle-shop report, Dougie was blunt about a strange season. "This year's been very, very unseasonal," he said, describing a parade of subtropical lows and a swell that simply would not lie down. The good news is that the swell is finally tipped to fade toward a metre by Sunday and roughly 0.6m a week later.
Before it settles, a brisk northwesterly near 25 knots was set to swing west and hang around for up to eight days. Offshore it will be sloppy, but Dougie has seen the upside before. "I don't know what it is about westerly, but I've seen it happen in front of my eyes," he said. "It more or less filters the water so it's really clear."
That clean water is the trigger. The report expects mackerel close to shore, with anglers urged to troll divers around the inside bait reefs, run their lures north-south to soften the side-on breeze, and chase working bird schools holding spotted, school and longtail. Casting metals on light spin gear was tipped for surface fish once the swell drops away.
Snapper were high on the list, taken on ball jigs, slow-pitch jigs and 40-80 gram soft plastics inside 50 metres. Cobia and longtail tuna were the live-bait picks around the deeper reefs, and with the first whales due through any day, the report noted cobia often travel with them. Spanner crabs were flagged as a flat-water option, the pots fishing far better without swell.
The estuaries are still producing despite the run-off. Jewfish have been about in the Seaway and Jumping Pin bar, flathead were expected in the saltier mid-reaches, and tailor, whiting and a strong run of mud crabs all rated a mention. Big mangrove jacks were on live bait off the north wall, and the report reminded everyone that May is the best month to tempt a snapper inside the Seaway on light, fresh baits. An unusually good year for calamari and arrow squid, plus surface-active bass in a spilling Nerang dam, rounded out the rundown.
The message for the week ahead is simple: the westerly looks ugly on paper, but anglers who time their windows and let the water clear could strike the coast at its best in months.