Author: barra

Team Berkley break through for a win at the Pflueger Mondy Trophy

Tournament stalwart, Trevor Burgess teamed up with Mondy specialist and tournament rookie Brian Rake as Team Berkley for this event, the two made a formidable duo landing their full limit of three fish in the first session and holding on for the win.

The pair pre-fished for several days prior to the comp, and had identified several areas holding fish. They had pulled several fish each day, but left them biting at each spot so they would still be there for the comp.
In the first session they started in first position and headed straight to their best spot. Second cast Brian gets belted on a Richos Extractor and stitched up in the timber by a metre plus fish.

They went in to try and get it off, but eventually had to bust the lure off. They moved to an adjacent bank and Brian soon hooks up and lands a small barra on a Richo’s Extractor.

They worked their way around the bay and Brian hooks up to another good fish that spits the lure on the jump, another small barra jumped out in the commotion and Brian fired another cast into the spot and hooks up immediately on 61cm fish on the Extractor again.

Trevor dropped one barra before landing a 58cm to fill their limit for the session.  Somewhere in the mayhem Brian lost another good fish. This was all in the first two hours of the competition, before a strong South Westerly front tore through the lake and shut the barra down. The pair were unable to add to their tally for the rest of the competition, and managed to grimly hang onto their lead through to the end of the competition, despite having gearbox problems in the last session, which put them out of action.

 The pair used Richo Extractors in Gold/White and Green/White, twitching them down before a 5-6 second pause, then continuing this retrieve back to the boat. All hits came on the pause. Outfit used were ABU Revo and Daiwa Zillion baitcast reels on Loomis and Pflueger rods. Lines were 30lb Bionic and 30lb Berkley Whiplash braid, both used 50lb Schneider leader.

Second placed Pro Team, by a narrow 15cm went to the Gin Gin Hotel Team, father and son duo, Rob and Tommy Woods.

They fished bays within D area to find their fish. Once again the bites came early on Saturday morning. Tommy caught the first barra or the tournament just 15minutes after the start of the event. Both Rob and Tommy had three or four bites early in the session, Rob was unable to stick his , but Tommy went on to catch three barra, including a 61cm fish that gave him the Big Barra Junior Trophy.

The second and third sessions yielded little action, although Rob had a chance on a midsized fish late in the last session, only to have it jump off.

Rob commented that Tommy was on a winning streak, after picking up a swag of prizes at the Rocky Barra Bounty. He certainly cleaned up at Mondy, with big barra Junior, first barra of the comp, and leading the team to second placed Pro Team. Not a bad effort for a twelve year old! The effective lures were a Rapala XR10 retrofitted with Gamakatsu singles, and a Damiki Tremor in Sexy Shad colour. They both used 30lb Suffix braid and downsized to 30lb Suffix leader, with so many smaller fish around.

It was clear the difference was finding fish prior to the comp, getting to them first, and making the most of the early bite before the change came through and shut down the fishing.

Both leading teams spoke of the importance of their Humminbird 1197 Side Imaging sounders that were paramount in them finding barra in prefish, and the comp.

With only two teams catching barra, the remaining places were awarded on their catfish captures.

Champion Catfish Team and Third Pro Team were Reidy’s Lures/Lowrance of Peter Price and Jason Crofts. The team made the long haul south from the Mackay area to check out Mondy for the upcoming ABT Tour. They managed to find five Catties, taken on Transams and Slick rigs.

Fourth Pro Team went to I’m on Lures, another Mackay team, of Simon and Cameron Black. They caught three catties over the tournament on Gulp 5” jerkshads to take away $250. The father and son team were happy with their weekend as they also scored well in the lucky draws with a Pflueger reel each.

Fifth Pro Team – Control Freak Rods of Aaron Mogg and Gene Pyrce were unlucky to jump off two barra early in the first session, but still took home a lure pack for their three catfish that came on Squidqies rigged weedless.

Kayak Trophy In the first ever Barra Kayak Tournament, eleven teams turned up to try their luck on Monduran, and unfortunately the Barra Gods did not smile on them. No barra were landed, and the South Westerly blow that came through on Saturday morning turned the tranquil Mond pond into a dangerous inland sea, without notice. Several kayaks took on water, as waves swamped their craft, making it difficult to make headway.

To their credit, most teams backed up for the second session, where they had to battle directly in the wind at the start. Sunday’s session wasn’t quite as bad, but strong gust still made life difficult, and dropping water temps shut down the barra.

In the trying conditions the Hobie Fishing Team of Stewart Dunn and Carl Gallagher triumphed as Champion Kayak Team with four catfish, totalling 148cm. Stewart travelled all the way from Sutherland, south of Sydney for the event, which is a massive effort! He teamed up with Brisbane based teammate Carl for the event. In the prefish, they found an area holding bait, in bird bay in the prefish, so made the long trip to their spot each session.

Their tactics was for Carl to fish the deepwater using Transams, and Sebile Lures on an EGrell S10/Diawa Certate 3500 combo, while Stewart targeted the weed edges with a Damiki Armour Shad in Skin Blue, rigged weedless on a Gamakasu Work hook. His outfit was a Lox 4-7kg rod, and Shimano Stradic 3000 spooled with Sunline 15lb PE and 14lb leader. All their bites came on the Armour Shad, three in the first session and their fourth fish in the final session. In the trying conditions Stewart and Carl were happy with their result, and donated half of their prizemoney back to MASA for stocking.

Second Kayak team went to the Hobie Pro Angler team of Kerrin and Cy Taylor. Barra Tournament specialists, the brothers went into the event yet to catch a barra from their Hobie Pro Angler Yaks, and I think they came away with new found respect for Yakkers. They commented how difficult it was to prefish, as there was so much distance to cover even before they started fishing. It also limited their fishing locations considerably. The Taylor brothers managed three catfish for the comp totalling 129cm to take out second place.

In third place with the biggest catty of the tournament was Team Pontoon 21 of Denis Metzdorf and Tom Lazlo, Denis caught the 52cm fork lenth catty on a Slick Rig which gave him a Lure Prize pack for biggest catty and $200 cash

The fourth placed Kayak team went to Native Watercraft, consisting of Lawrence Pearce and Douglass Carroll, Lawrence picked up a 40cm Catty on a Soft Vibe lure.

Despite the Barra-less competition and trying conditions, the Yakkers were positive about the event, and are looking forward to the next opportunity. A big contingent from the KFDU forum made the trip together and had a great weekend socialising around camp in between sessions. 

With so few barra caught, many trophies went unclaimed, but there were plenty of prizes handed out in lucky Draws including some great reels from the Pflueger stable;  The Patriach XT http://www.purefishing.com.au/reels/pflueger/spin/patriarch-xt-spin/ The Arbour SW http://www.purefishing.com.au/reels/pflueger/spin/arbor-sw/ And the New Salts http://www.purefishing.com.au/reels/pflueger/spin/salt/  as well as Berkley Tackle Bags, and Lure Prize packs containing; Shimano Stiffy Lures, Berkley Hollowbellys and Mullets, Cultiva Lures, Strike Pro Lures, Jackall Lures, Rapala Lures, Nitro Jigheads, Suffix Line and Leader, Squidgy Lures and Berkley Mullets The MASA crew held BBQs to feed the hords, and over the weekend $1000 dollars was raised for MASA’s sponsor a barra program which equates to 2000 Barra. Several teams donated some of their prize money to MASA. Thank you to all who competed in the Pflueger Barra Trophy events in 2011.

2012 – We look forward to bringing you four exciting Trophy Events in 2012, Faust, Teemburra, Awoonga and Monduran. For the Yakkers, we are looking at running three events at Kinchant, Awoonga (from Boynedale Bush Camp) and Monduran. Keep an eye on australianbarra.com.au or check out our community on facebook – barra trophy series

Thank you, from Matt Fraser and Ian Baker      

Category	Team/Angler/s	Result	Prize
Champion Pro Team	Team Berkley – Trevor Burgess & Brian Rake	3 Barra – 175cm	$800 & Berkley Tackle Bags
2nd Pro Team	Team Gin Gin Hotel – Rob & Tommy Woods	3 Barra – 160cm	$450
3rd Pro Team	Reidy’s Lures/Lowrance – Peter Price & Jason Crofts	5 Catfish – 169cm	$250
4th Pro Team	I’m on Lures – Simon and Cameron Black	3 Catfish – 131cm	$150
5th Pro Team	Control Freak Rods – Aaron Mogg & Gene Prynce	3 Cafish – 127cm	Lure Prize pack
Champion Yak Team	Hobie Fishing Team – Stewart Dunn & Carl Gallagher	4 Catfish – 148cm	$400 & Berkley Tackle Bags
2nd Yak Team	Hobie Pro Angler – Cy & Kerrin Taylor	3 Catfish – 129cm	$300
3rd Yak Team	Team Pontoon 21 – Denis Metzdorf & Tom Lazlo	1 Catfish – 52cm	$200
4th Yak Team	Native Watercraft – Lawrence Pearce & Douglas Carroll	1 Catfish – 40cm	$100
Big Barra Senior	Brian Rake	61cm	Pflueger Patriach 9540
Big Barra Junior	Tommy Woods	61cm	$200 Foxies Voucher/Barra Maddness
Longest Catfish	Denis Metzdorf	52cm	Lure Prize Pack
Champion Catfish Team	Reidy’s Lures/Lowrance – Peter Price & Jason Crofts	5 Catfish – 169cm	Lure Prize Pack
First Barra Caught – Boaters	Tommy Woods	41cm	Lure Prize Pack
First Fish Caught – Yakkers	Stewart Dunn	49cm	Lure Prize Pack
Hard Luck Story	Matt Garner		Lure Prize Pack
Ladies Lucky Draw	Toni Potter		Pflueger Arbor 040
Lucky Draw	Cy Taylor		Lure Prize Pack
Lucky Draw	Peter Sippel		Lure Prize Pack
Lucky Draw	Mark Lockwood		Lure Prize Pack
Lucky Draw	Cameron Black		Pflueger Salt 40
Lucky Draw	Trevor Cassidy		Pflueger Arbor 040
Lucky Draw	Simon Black		Pflueger Patriach 9540
MASA Donations & Funds Raised		$800/1600 Barra

Taylors Triumph at the Pflueger Peter Faust Barra Trophy

The irrepressible ABT and AFC Barra Champs were always going to be hard to beat on their home dam, although they trailed after session one, their consistency shone through and gave them the win. In their own words, here is how they did it;
Saturday – We started out by fishing a couple of deep & shallow locations for no fish. We moved to another area, a weedy tree-lined edge in a large bay full of drowned creek beds. 

After fishing for just 15 minutes, we caught our bag limit. An 80cm size class fish was first caught then several minutes later another around 80cm and a fish just over a metre long were captured in two casts. After that we decided to stop fishing our main areas for the rest of that session as we thought we had a substantial bag limit and wanted to leave the fish for the final session on Sunday.

Sunday – We started fishing and it took about 20 minutes for the first fish to connect which looked about 85cm. However, right at the net the fish escaped. 10 minutes later, another fish was hooked. This one was well over a metre long and ejected the X-Rap during a 2m high leap out of the water. The next hour involved hooking up two more fish and landing one, which was just under a metre in length. The action started to slow down significantly so we moved to another location on the lake, some drowned shrubs in 3.5m of water with mats of lilly pads surrounding them. 

The Lowrance HDS Structure Scan displayed mid-sized barramundi in the general area. We fished in tight to the lilly pads and in the next 30 minutes we caught 2 small fish about 60cm long and lost another 2 about the same size on Squidgy Slick Rigs. These two completed the bag limit of three fish. We used 110mm in the Slick Rigs mainly in Slimey colour and used the Rapala XRap XR10 in the Purple Albino colour. Any colours seemed to work though.

The outfits used were a Shimano Calcutta 100B with a Millerods Salty Barra rod and Shimano Chronarch 100D5 paired to a Shimano T-Curve Barra HVY T-Series rod. These were spooled with 20lb FINS PRT braid connected to 80lb Black Magic leader.    

Second place Pro team went to B&K, the newly engaged couple of Brook Ebzery and Katie Sanderson. They had a great session on Saturday that saw them catch and loose fish in all sorts of ways. Katie caught the first barra by throwing out a Transam, then sitting down with the rod in her lap, to do something else, she noticed a tug on her rod, and thought it was Brook messing with her, but all of a sudden the line took off, and she was connected to a barra, they managed to land the 92cm fish, which gave Katie the prize for first barra of the tournament.

Katie managed another good fish on a Mullet, during the fight the line got wrapped around the tiller arm and lanyard, but they somehow managed to get it off and land the 96cm barra, which eventually won her the “Big Barra – Ladies” Trophy’. Brook also had a debacle while fighting a fish, he got his hat cord wrapped up in his reel, so he ended up with the reel jammed against his chin, they managed to untangle it and still land the fish……it was all happening!

Leading after the first session, they didn’t quite get the bites to match Team Evinrude/Mako in session two, but Brook did manage to land the Biggest Barra of the tournament with a 106cm fish winning him the custom made ACM Big Barra Rod. Katie’s speech at the presentation was very entertaining, as it was a comedy of errors, but they must have been doing something right as they took home the 2nd place cash, and the Big Barra Senior and Ladies Trophies and Prizes.

Relegated to third Pro Team by their daughter and Son-in-law- to- be, was Elaine and Shane Sanderson of Team Big Fin. Shane got a good metre plus fish on a gold Blade on Saturday, and then Elaine bought home the bacon on Sunday with two good fish taken on a Squidgy and XRap . Elaine was heard to mumble something about teaching the kids too well, after being pipped for second team and the ‘Big Barra – Ladies” Trophy, by her daughter. Holding down forth place was Team Rapala, the formidable pairing of Jon Millard and last year’s invitational winner Trent Power. Jon was the one to land all the fish this time though, with one coming on a Berkley Hollowbelly and the other on Leads Shad.

Jarrod Dalton and Brad Purdy of Team Hornet, got themselves on the scoreboard with a 67cm taken by Jarrod on a Richo’s Extractor. Their weekend was extra challenging with an electric motor steering fault, but they battled on with it steering by hand, and managed to get a barra.

Amateur Teams It was great to see seven new teams line up in the amateur category to experience ABT style tournament barra fishing.  The Team of David & Goliath – Vinnie Verfeld and Karim de Ridder made the trip from Townsville to have a go. Karim reigned surpreme catching a 101 in session one, and a 103cm in session two, to put their team in first place within the category. The succesfull lures were Squidgies and Hollowbellys. The guys enjoyed the weekend, and I dare say we will see them back for the ABT Barra Pro events in November.

Second place in the Amateur category went to John Trigg and Paul Stevenson of JT Reel Repairs. These guys are sooty nuts and targeted sooties all weekend on Rapala Fat raps and poppers. John said he was disappointed not to have scored any on Saturday, but they came home strong in the Sunday session with three fish for a total length of 130cm.

Third team was X Country, the Father and Son team of Jeff and Zac Attwood.

In the smallest boat in the field, the lightweight Xcountry 4.2m, powered by a 15 horse Yamaha, Zac managed to catch a solid 49cm Sooty late in the first session on a Rattling spot.

The ten year old was stoked with that fish, as it helped him to a swag of prizes, third in the Amateur teams, as well as the biggest fish for a junior and the longest sooty for the tournament. All three juniors in the event took home a lure prize pack for coming and having a go.

A big thank you to Local Sponsors, Lindsay Dobe from Barramundi Fishing Charters, Aaron from ACM Custom Rods, and John Trigg from JT Reel Repairs. Also thanks to local organisers Daniel Grech and Belinda Winton, who made this event happen. I must also mention Freddy Grech and Trevor Cassidy who also helped out in running the event.

Naming sponsors of the event Pflueger donated several Salt and Arbor reels. Other sponsors included Berkley, Squidgy, Cultiva, Nitro Jigheads, Strike Pro, Jackal, Rapala and Sufix. A great weekend was had by all. It’s great to see Peter Faust Dam in such good shape with plenty of fish biting so early in the season, it looks like it could be one of the most productive barra dams on the tour this year.

The Mondy Barra Trophy is coming up on the 1st and 2nd October, this event has Pro, Amateur and Kayak Divisions to cater for all types of barra anglers. Mondy is starting to fire as well, with lots of good reports of 40 – 70cm barra being caught with the odd metery also being encountered. Matt Fraser    

Overall Results
Total Barra Caught	18 Barra – 9 per Session – 1651cm total length – 91.7 average size
Total Sooty’s Caught	5 Sooty’s – 226cm total length – 45.2cm average size
Pro Team Results:
Champion Pro Team	Evinrude/Mako Eyewear- Kerrin & Cy Taylor – 6 Barra for 481cm
2nd Pro Team	B & K – Brook Ebzery & Katie Sanderson – 4 Barra for 402cm
3rd Pro Team	Big Fin – Shane & Elaine Sanderson – 3 Barra for 292cm
4th Pro Team	Rapala – Jon Millard & Trent Power – 2 Barra for 203cm
5th Pro Team	Team Hornet – Jarrod Dalton & Brad Purdy – 1 Barra for 67cm
Amateur Team Results:
Champion Amateur Team	David and Goliath – Karim De Riddler & Vinner Versfeld – 2 Barra for 203cm
2nd Amateur Team	JT Reel Repairs – John Trigg & Paul Stevenson – 3 Sooty’s for 130cm
3rd Amateur Team	X Country – Jeff & Zac Attwood – 1 Sooty for 49cm
Longest Sooty	Zac Attwood – 49cm
Champion Sooty Team	JT Reel Repairs – John Trigg & Paul Stevension – 3 Sooty’s for 130cm
Biggest Barra Senior	Brook Ebzery 108cm & 106cm Barra
Biggest Barra Junior/Sooty	Zac Attwood with a 49cm Sooty
Biggest Barra Ladies	Katie Sanderson – 96cm Barra
First Barra Caught	Katie Sanderson (17/09/11 1:15pm)