Tackle Tactics » Tips-Techniques » Saltwater-Estuary » New Kayak, New Adventures

New Kayak, New Adventures

By Sean Bekkers

Over the past few years, I have been fishing more and more from a kayak. The simplicity of accessing the water virtually anywhere, rather than the battling the chaos of the boat ramp, is an aspect that I really enjoy. The cruisy starts more often than not set me up for a super relaxed and stress-free fishing session. As you can imagine, the more that you do something, the more elements you try and improve along the way. For me as my confidence in kayak fishing has increased, so has the scope of fishing and adventures that I want to do.

All this has translated into a want to upgrade and even upgrade the kayak to a newer and more capable model. I’ve spent hours researching on the internet, marketplace, kayak forums and most importantly, talking to people about their kayak and what they love about them and what they would change. Fast forward to this past weekend and I was lucky enough to get a run in the new style Hobie Outback from Sunstate Watersports. Bearing in mind all the points above, it was safe to say that I was like a kid at Christmas wanting to get this beast on the water.

After spending the afternoon before setting up a rod holder, esky and all the other bits and pieces that I could possibly need out there, it was time to figure out exactly what area I was going to fish and more importantly, what presentation I would throw. As we had the neap tide scenario, I decided to throw the new ZMan 4” Hercules in the deep water and along the edges. As the drains would still be holding water, instead draining completely, I decided to throw in some ZMan Slim SwimZ and ZMan 2.75” TRD BugZ for targeting these areas. The target species was flathead and fingers crossed I would find a few for the table along the way. As I haven’t yet fitted a sounder, I was really going to focus on finding areas that are likely to hold bait, including areas like deeper edges, weed banks and spots that the current was pushing into or over.

The night before I hardly had a wink of sleep and I saw myself at the water’s edge before sunrise. As I said earlier, this was my first crack in the new kayak and as keen as I was to fish, I also wanted to take my time and tweak things to suit me along the way. Sunrise finally came and gave me just enough light to hit the water. The area that I wanted to fish saw me heading into the draining tide, which was not a bad test for the legs straight off the bat. I just want to say that the pedal drive on these kayaks is pretty amazing and to be honest pedalling into the current wasn’t even a challenge. Following a couple of random stops along the way, that produced a small flathead, I was at my fishing spot in no time.

The first spot that I wanted to fish was a rock and weed edge the dropped straight into a few metres of water. I position myself about a cast length from the bank and decided to cast the ZMan HerculeZ swimbait up into the current. Once it reached the bottom I simply slow rolled and hopped it back to the yak. From here I just kept repeating this retrieve as I drifted with the current. It didn’t take long before the rod loaded up with what I thought was a reasonable flathead. Following a good tussle, I was met with a cool black spot cod. It’s worth mentioning that I was running a stinger hook on the bottom on the HerculeZ, just to give me another chance of a hook up and on this occasion the stinger worked a treat. A few quick pics later and it went back to get a little bigger.

As I continued to drift down the bank, I noticed a lot of bait holding hard up on the edges, sitting in the drains and small sandy pockets. With this there was an occasional bow wave moving through the bait and smashing it up. Without hesitation I threw a ZMan Slim SwimZ into the mix and after a few casts I was struggling to get a look in. Seeing so much bait and not getting a hit was killing me on the inside.

Looking back at the pockets inside the kayak for a presentation change, I noticed a pre-rigged ZMan 2.75” TRD BugZ, tied it on and smeared on a little bit of Saltwater Yabby / Nipper Pro-Cure Super Gel Scent to complete the presentation. I then sent it straight back into the bait, right on the edge of the weed and sand. A few hops and shakes later and I was locked onto a very respectable mid 50’s dusky flathead that had inhaled the 2.75” TRD BugZ. Following a good fight, this one made its way into the icebox for dinner. As you can imagine the weed beds are home to heaps of small crustaceans, like crabs and prawns, which the TRD BugZ represents well. Thinking back, with so many baitfish being on the edges and in the drains, throwing a slightly different presentation may have been the point of difference that I needed to spark the interest of the flathead.

Continuing down the bank, I cycled between the 4” HerculeZ and 2.75” TRD BugZ, with the HerculeZ Swimbait getting the attention along the deeper edges and the 2.75” TRD BugZ getting nailed in the shallower water around the weed edges. This strategy of cycling different presentations between the shallow and deep water meant that I covered the entire water column effectively. For the four hours that I was on the water, I end up with about six flathead and the one cod, which I was really happy with considering I didn’t have a sounder.

As I explained earlier on, this trip was all about trying out the new kayak and settling into how it performs, while tweaking any little things that I couldn’t account for before the trip. My first impression of the new Hobie Outback is that it is a super stable and capable fishing platform, the seating position is excellent (the highest position I’ve kayaked in) making for easy casting and comfortable pedalling. Most impressive though and what I believe to be a game changer for my fishing is the 180 drive system, being able to pedal in reverse and hold myself off the bank meant that I could place my casts perfectly at the bank, even when the tide and wind wanted to push me in. Next up is time to fit a sounder.

I hope you’ve been finding a few fish when the weather is good.
Screaming DragZ, Sean.

Sean’s Tacklebox:

Rods: Okuma Cerros Spinning Rods 7’ 1-3kg & 2-4kg / TT Rods Black Mamba Spin 7’ 4-8kg

Reels: Okuma Epixior XT 30 w/ Platypus 8lb P8 & Bionic X9 Braid / Epixor XT 40 w/ Platypus 10lb Pulse X4 Braid

Leader: Platypus Hard Armour 10lb & 12lb

Plastics: ZMan 4” HerculeZ (Sexy Mullet) / ZMan TRD 2.75” BugZ (Hot snake and Watermelon Red)

Jigheads: TT NedlockZ EWG 1/10oz & 1/5oz (Green Pumpkin & Chartreuse)

Scent: Saltwater Yabby Nipper Pro-Cure Super Gel Scent