BLOG: Fishing the brown tide

BROWN seems to be the prominent colour at every piece of water I've fished in the past three weeks. As hard as it is to get excited about fishing saltwater that looks like a cappuccino, I've managed to catch some reasonable fish by getting my head around the fact that the scaly little buggers still have eat, no matter how crappy the water looks. In reality, fishing dirty water can actually have some positive effects on your success rates. Here are some things I've learnt fishing this winter's brown tides.

Reconnaissance

Scoping out the landscape at low tide in areas with tidal movement can make a huge difference to your day on the water. As the tide pushes in and the brown stuff covers the edge structure it becomes very hard to find good stuff to aim casts at. Being on the water at low tide allows you to check it all out and make a bit of game plan.

Lure Selection

I've been fishing a mixture of hard bodies, vibes and plastics and loud and smelly is the way to go when all is brown. Small bibbed minnows with loud rattles fished around the rocks and snags and small vibes and plastics in deeper areas have produced some nice bream and flathead for me in some very average looking water.

Casting

Fish really don't have the luxury of spotting lures from two metres away in the murk so accurate casts are truly the secret to success. Your lure needs to land within inches of the structure you are aiming at. Don't be afraid to let the lure scrape along or over timber and rocks, this noise is a dinner bell for anything holding close by and will result in the fish investigating the source.

Slow down

One of the biggest lessons I've learnt over the past few weeks is to slow down. I mean when you think you're taking too long to work an edge, slow down even more. Lots of casts, slow retrieves and even dead-sticking plastics and vibes can be the secret to getting bites. It's amazing how species such as bream will track a lure, then wait until it's sitting dead still on the bottom, then pick it up. Slowing down is easy to talk about but doing it on the water can be a challenge, especially if you're as hyperactive as me, but give it a go. It works.

Use brown to your advantage

In certain areas where fish are highly pressured, coloured water can give you a distinct advantage as you can get much closer to the fish without spooking them. A good flush of fresh will also push baitfish downstream much to the delight of anglers chasing species such as jews and flathead. So it's not all bad and can work in our favour. We just have to change the way we do things a little to get results.

Have you had success fishing after the recent rains, I'd love to hear about it?