Graham’s giant flathead in Arctic conditions

A tale of a giant flathead in Arctic Conditions
I fish with a group of mates who share the same passion for the sport.

Who else would you find to camp for days on a crocodile-infested river in the Northern Territory enduring heat, mosquitoes and monsoonal rain?  Or to bob around like a cork in the ocean for hours, green with sea sickness, hoping to catch a winter kingfish?  Sometimes we are rewarded for going the extra mile with superb fishing or perhaps an amazing encounter with a pod of dolphins or a whale. 

The alarm screamed, it was 4:30am and still dark outside on the south coast of NSW.  We struggled out of our sleeping bags and looked out the window - it was meant to be sunny, and we had planned to chase flathead at Wonboyn Lake on light spin gear. 

The conditions that greeted us however were freezing cold, and the wind was blowing rain sideways against the windows.  Our good friend Lee was asleep on the lounge room floor.  “Lee wake up, it’s time to go”.  Lee was exhausted from work and politely told us that it was too cold to catch predatory fish as we had planned.  Lee is a very articulate man.  He said all this in just two short words and went back to sleep. 

Dan and I looked at each other.  “What d’ya reckon?” I said skeptically.  My sleeping bag beckoned, even the house was cold.  “C’mon let’s go” Dan said, “we’re awake now and anyway, how bad can it be?”

We reached Wonboyn, pulled up in the car park and then, we just sat there.  The windows were being lashed with rain and neither of us wanted to open the door.  We looked at the clock.  It was 6am and it was still dark.  It wasn’t too late to turn around and go home.  “How bad can it be?” Dan repeated.  We laughed, grabbed our rods zipped up our rain jackets and began walking to the lake. We took up positions on the lake’s edge and made a few casts into the gloomy water.  We turned to see a mullet skipping nervously across the surface nearby.  Was it being chased?

We continued on our (not-so) merry way around the shoreline to where the weed started to thin out and there was more sandy patches to cast at. I was pretty sure this is where we had seen the nervous mullet earlier. I used a small 2.5” plastic trying to make it flick and dart between the clumps of weeds as best I could.  But my casts were only going a short distance in the wind and I wasn’t feeling particularly confident of catching a fish.  Actually I wasn’t feeling much of anything, especially not my fingers and toes.  Not to be disheartened I cast out again.

As the lure hit the water I felt a solid tug on the line as it sank towards the sandy bottom. Instinctively I leaned back on the rod to set the hook.  Whatever was on the end of my line was big, but it was almost motionless. It didn’t peel metres of line off the reel, but instead chose to swim up and down the bank, with me in hot pursuit.  After a couple of minutes, Dan and I caught our first look at it.  ‘It’s a crocodile!’ he yelled.   I was quiet.  I could feel the 6lb braided line being pulled through the weeds and the rasping of the fish’s teeth on the mono leader.  I was terrified that at any moment either the braid or leader might break.

The contest lasted a couple more minutes, although it felt like much longer.  The line held strong and soon, this amazing creature slid gracefully up onto the sand.  We both whooped and screamed into the wind like children at the back of a school bus.  The beast measured over 90cm long and 20cm across the shoulders.

This beautiful fish was far too big and too old for the table, so I was thrilled to see her swim off into the darkness.  We were both ecstatic and my heart was still beating through my chest.  Neither of us had seen a flathead this big before, let alone caught one.  We sat on the sand, in the wind and rain, and soaked it all up.

Graham Fifield