Fly fishing Central Queensland

The trail guide describes country that runs from the Central Highlands out to the southern Great Barrier Reef, and calls the region the self-proclaimed barra capital, a title it admits North Queensland and the Wide Bay-Burnett both dispute. All but one of the waters are storages. The exception is the Dawson River, which carries about six weirs along its length and is one of the rivers anglers name when they talk about saratoga.

Altitude sets one of them apart. Lake Eungella, on the Broken River about 145 km west of Mackay, sits at about 560 metres, which gives it a cooler climate than most of the north. Pack a jumper for the mornings.

The saratoga waters. Lake Callide, behind Callide Dam about 10 km north-east of Biloela, is stocked with barramundi, golden perch and saratoga, and saratoga are recorded there too. The trail guide says it is reached by sealed road and has cabins and van sites, and rates it for barramundi over a metre for ten months of the year. Lake Theresa, behind Theresa Creek Dam south-west of Clermont, takes the same three fish; the trail guide says you can fish it from the shore or a boat, and to take your own drinking water. Mount Morgan No 7 Dam, about 40 km south of Rockhampton, is stocked with golden perch, sleepy cod and southern saratoga, and the scheme’s current list adds eel-tailed catfish. On the Dawson, saratoga can still be fished in quite turbid water, because they patrol high and watch the surface. Golden perch, silver perch, barramundi and sooty grunter are recorded in the river as well.

Lake Maraboon. Lake Maraboon is the water behind Fairbairn Dam on the Nogoa River, about 16 km south-west of Emerald, and the trail guide calls it the second biggest dam in Queensland. It is stocked with barramundi and golden perch. Small natives such as Agassiz’s glassfish, flathead gudgeon and flyspecked hardyhead are recorded in the lake, which tells you what size of baitfish fly to tie on. Many visitors come for the redclaw crayfish, which are not native to the dam.

Gladstone. Awoonga Reservoir is run by the Gladstone Area Water Board, not Sunwater, and gives the public two places to start, the Lake Awoonga Recreational Area and the Boynedale Bush Camp, each with a boat ramp. Blue catfish are the recorded fish worth a fly, and the lake carries small rainbowfish, hardyheads and glassfish for forage. Barramundi are said to be there year-round, but they are not on the recorded species list, so treat that as an unconfirmed report. Its level has moved a long way since the wall was raised in 2003, so check it before you go.

Behind Mackay. Eungella, Lake Kinchant and Teemburra Creek Dam are all stocked with barramundi and sooty grunter. Eungella is the sooty grunter water, and the trail guide notes it for big ones; its barramundi are reportedly rarely seen. Kinchant, on Sandy Creek about 30 km south-west of Mackay, can look like a man-made billabong with shallow water-lily margins, and very large barramundi are reported from it, with catfish and spangled perch alongside. Teemburra, on Teemburra Creek at Pinnacle about 54 km west of Mackay, is also said to hold very large barramundi.

Saratoga are surface feeders. The trail guide’s advice is to go early, to a quieter part of the water, and to look deeper under overhanging trees once the day heats up. They have a bony, toothy mouth and are hard to hook, so expect to miss some.

At Eungella, the usual fly outfit for sooty grunter is a six to eight weight, casting weighted baitfish or large nymph patterns tight to the drowned timber, with a popper or frog pattern left to sit along the lily edges on calm warm evenings. Timber that close behind you calls for roll casts and a moment spent planning each back-cast, and one sharp strip frees a fly from lily stems better than a steady pull. The barramundi there are said to leave the lily bays to feed on edges that have warmed and coloured in the wind, so wait for that.

Golden perch, the trail guide says, are best in spring and in the evening.

If you want saratoga, start at Callide. It is stocked with them, saratoga are recorded there, and the sealed road and cabins make it the easiest base inland. If the Dawson is on your way, give it a day. If you are coming from the coast, go to Eungella for the sooty grunter and walk the cleared shoreline near the main camping area, more than a kilometre of it with room to cast. Treat any barramundi there as a bonus. Kinchant is the Mackay dam for a very big barramundi, and the trail guide says fish-attracting structures have been put in to lift catch rates.

The trail guide puts the best saratoga fishing from August to October and the best golden perch fishing in spring. At Eungella the warm months suit both fish, roughly October to April for sooty grunter and November to March for barramundi, though that is a general read rather than a record. Anglers report winter sight fishing in the weedy bays at Awoonga.

Check Queensland’s current freshwater rules, and whether the dam is in the stocked impoundment permit scheme, before you fish.

Sunwater owns five of these dams and posts current facilities and alerts for them; on Awoonga, start from the two public areas the water board provides. A line on the map is not access permission anywhere here: use formed public access, and obey gates and signs.

South of here the trail becomes the Wide Bay and Burnett and north it becomes North Queensland.