REGULAR FEATURES Grass sweetlip reef catches

QUEENSLAND John Loeskow

When people talk about reef fishing in Central and Southern Queensland, the focus usually turns to the glamour species. Red emperor, coral trout and nannygai are highly sought after by all anglers fishing the coral reefs from the Capricorn Coast down into Sunshine Coast waters. And rightly so – they look great, fight hard and are sensational on the plate. But there are a few other species that are available to fishos from Rizza with a cracking sweetlip caught while targeting coral trout.

The standard fish community that shows up on the underwater footage. Strangely sweetlip are rarely seen on the camera.

the shallow reefs to the deeper offshore areas that are worthy targets.

Redthroat sweetlip are highly prized for their firm white fillets, and yellow sweetlip (or spangled emperor) take a variety of lures and pull like freight include a number of small to medium sized emperors and seabreams. Along with red throat, long-nosed and yellow sweetlip, grassies are among the larger and more often targeted representatives from this group of fish. Their brown haven’t seen an undersize grassy in the areas we commonly fish, and the average size is usually between 35 and 45cm in length. Any fish over 50cm is a nice capture, and we have caught a handful of fish over 60cm. They have been reported to 70cm and over 5.5kg.

The bigger fish offer great sport, with a fight not unlike a similar sized red emperor with lots of head shakes and hard lunging runs. They are a great eating fish, whether cooked whole or filleted, with white flesh that is suitable for a wide range of cooking styles. However, these fish tend to bruise easily so make sure they are handled carefully and placed into a slurry of iced seawater when possible.

WHERE THEY LIVE

Grass sweetlip are found the entire length of the northern half of the Australian coastline, from Moreton Bay near the QLD/ NSW border to Exmouth in Western Australia. Generally speaking, the waters off Southern and Central Queensland seem to produce larger specimens than northern areas.

For more consistent structure, like a wreck or reef edge, the outer fringes will hold the better-quality fish. However, we’re not usually looking for distinct drop-offs, ledges and hard reef when chasing sweetlip. Broken ground made up of scattered coral, rubble and shell grit provides an ideal habitat for the fish and crustaceans that make up reason why slowly drifting on the tide changes can produce productive fishing when things get a bit quiet. Covering a bit more ground is a great way to make sure you are presenting your bait or lure to actively feeding fish.

One bonus about fishing for grass sweetlip is that they are a year-round

A battered and bruised fish that was at the end of its days.

trains when hooked close to structure. However, in this article we’ll take a look at the humble grass sweetlip and the techniques that will bring more fish to the boat. THE TARGET SPECIES Grass sweetlip (Lethrinus laticaudis) are a member of the Lethrinidae family that colouration is a little drab in comparison to other reef fish, but they do feature a group of brilliant blue lines surrounding the eye.

While juvenile fish often inhabit coastal estuaries and inshore eel grass beds, the adult fish are more common in deeper water between 16-40m. We results, you will need to focus your efforts on the middle grounds between the shallow reefs and the deeper offshore areas. In the region we fish off Bundaberg the preferred depth is in the 25-35m range with some form of bottom structure. If you are fishing prominent the bulk of the sweetlip’s diet. In these areas sweetlip will operate as grazers, moving over fairly wide territories as they hunt for food. You can normally see this happening on the fishfinder as individual and small schools of fish move in and out of the transducer beam. This is probably the target. Looking at our trip data over the last few years, we’ve caught good numbers every month of the year. In saying that, we usually get better numbers of big fish in late autumn and late spring. They are willing to bite outside the peak times of dawn and dusk and seem more keyed in to tide changes and solunar bite times. Interestingly, during the bigger tides that occur around the new and full moon, the tide changes are far more important triggers for fish activity than moon above/below bite times. During the slacker neap tides with very little current, the minor and major times can be the only period that fish are willing to feed readily. WHAT’S

ON THE MENU?

Grass sweetlip have a pretty varied diet making them a candidate for a wide range of bait and lure fishing techniques. As far as bait fishing goes, we always make sure we have a range of different baits to suit the mood of the fish on any particular day. Providing the bait is fresh and presented effectively, it will get the attention of the fish. Squid and cuttlefish heads, whole small squid and small cuttlefish are good baits.

The only downside of these is their strong appeal to pests like triggerfish and remoras, which often devour your offering before

Isaac with a double header that took up a nice spot in the esky.

Lorne with a proper sweetie that thought a live scad was too good to resist.

it reaches the bottom. Flesh baits cut from whiptails, baldy bream, school mackerel and mac tuna are excellent, withstanding the attack from smaller pickers before a bigger fish can get a shot at the bait. We always try and catch at least one legal schoolie to use as bait throughout the day. Scad fillets and skeletons are also very appealing to the bigger models. When the pickers aren’t too bad, large prawns are a great choice if the bite is a bit slow. If you are particularly targeting the bigger models, live baits are a preferred method. Pending availability mackerel scad are the first choice, but other small live baits will work quite well at times. It’s surprising how often a 40cm fish will scoff down even a big live scad.

We’ve done a bit of lure fishing for grassies over the years and at times it can produce some exceptional fish. The neap tides and tide changes are definitely the best times to chase sweetlip on lures. I’ve had limited success with micro jigs but they can work reasonably well. Soft vibes and soft plastics are ideal A nice sweetlip caught on a Nomad Vertrex soft vibe. The iridescent stripes around the eye are quite unique.

This is pretty typical of the bottom structure fished for sweetlip. Broken fern, wire and soft corals with plenty of sand and rubble mixed in. choices for anglers chasing these fish on artificials.

In the shallower water where triggerfish aren’t as prevalent, soft plastics really shine. Using 4-5” jerk shads rigged on an appropriate jighead will get hit pretty hard on the drop, with most fish hooked in the bottom third of the water column. Prawn and squid imitations also work well. Soft vibes in the 80-100mm range are perfect for prospecting over likely areas. Nomad Vertrex and Samaki Vibelicious vibes have a great action on the drop and take minimal rod work to get them vibrating. Small subtle lifts close to the bottom produce the best results. TOOLS OF THE TRADE

No specialised gear required here! Light to medium threadline outfits are suitable for bait fishing, provided that have a nice, smooth drag. Lighter line in the 10-15kg class will stop most sweetlip, but the presence of other species, like coral trout and red soft tip rod can help convert bites into hook-ups.

I fish a Daiwa Saltiga LD 20H overhead reel on a Saltist Hyper Jig PE 4 rod and this rig has stopped some pretty impressive fish. During winter I sometimes swap to a Shimano Talica 8 on a Grappler Type J B 604, which is also ideal. These rods feel very light

Blue Maori cod aren’t a common capture but Bruiser wasn’t complaining about catching this fella.

emperor, make this choice far too sporting. We fish 20-25kg braid mainline with 2-3m of 30kg mono or fluorocarbon leader. At times the bite of a big sweetlip can be deceptively gentle, and this is where a when you pick them up but their pulling power is unbelievable. When fishing live baits, heavier gear can be used as the bigger fish will hit the bait with gusto. In winter the fish

will sometimes play with the bait before inhaling it so wait until the rod really starts to load up before striking. For lure fishing a medium threadline outfit is a good compromise that can fish lighter soft plastics while maintaining enough power to pull fish away from the bottom.

For both live and dead baits we use the modified paternoster or Smithy rig. This setup looks a bit back to front but on the broken ground that we fish it is highly effective. The rig is made up of a short, twisted dropper loop around 30cm long with a 60-100cm leader running to the hook. Sinker size can be changed easily as the current changes and the bait is presented just off the bottom. Bait size will dictate the hook setup that is used.

Smaller baits are fished on a single hook and for this a 4/0 or 5/0 Mustad Big Gun is pretty hard to beat.

Larger cut baits, whole squid and skeletons work best with two snelled 5/0 hooks or a swivel ganged three hook rig. For live baits we use a snelled rig with an 8/0 Octopus hook on the front and a 6/0 Mustad Big Gun as the rear hook. Additionally, when the current is minimal a simple running ball sinker rig can be deadly for hooking fish that are just mouthing the bait before committing. Use just enough lead to hold the bottom and keep feeding your bait back as it starts to lift up too far. We have even caught big sweetlip on unweighted baits fished out the back of the boat for mackerel, so it goes to show how much of the water column they are exploring to find food. WELCOME BY-CATCH

When chasing sweetlip you can expect a wide variety of by-catch, and almost all of them are very worthwhile targets in their own right.

Smaller baits will see a number of species including pink hussar, tuskfish and Moses perch coming to the boat. Larger

cut baits and live baits open up the spectrum to include the bigger demersal fish we all love to catch. Red emperor and coral trout are very partial to the same live baits that sweetlip like to hunt, and I haven’t seen anyone complain about catching one of these.

Other species that show up from time to time are Māori cod, blue Māori, nannygai, gold spot estuary cod and cobia. When the postcard fish are conspicuous by their absence, we’ve come to rely on catching a feed of grassies to ensure a nice feed of fish making it to the esky to provide some firstclass fillets for the table. Hopefully some of the information in this article can help you do the same. For more information check out some of the action on the Whiplash Fishing YouTube channel.

A big late afternoon sweetlip that beat the sharks back to the boat.

Late spring and summer coincide with the storm season. Make sure you keep an eye on the weather.

Now that’s some by-catch! Azza with a massive red emperor that ate a strip of mackerel flesh intended for smaller demersal species. It’s better to be lucky than good!

Bigger sweetlip will happily take live and dead baits if presented suitably.

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