Ever try to battle a feisty 13-pound barramundi while a 2,000-pound crocodile watches you from 10-feet away? There are not many places in the world where you can do that.
I was in the Northern Territory of Australia's Outback when I was confronted by the paradox. Let the fish swim away or try to land it before the croc exploded on it just a few feet from
our boat? I chose the latter.
A fat barramundi thrashing at the surface just off the gunwale is an attraction that the giant toothy critters that control the Mary River waterway
can't resist. The 16-foot long black saltwater croc glided up to our boat as I let the fish swim away. After 10
minutes, the reptile moved away and I was able to quickly land the fish. My guide, Paul Massey, quickly started the outboard and we moved away from the imminent danger.
That monstrous croc, almost 3-foot wide across its back, was only one of about 15 that stalked us while we fished the muddy tidal river which borders the Kakadu National Park at the Top End of the island continent.
Each time we hooked a fish and got it near the boat, we would look up to see approaching crocodiles. We were fishing one of the prime spots on the Mary, the Narrows section, which is located some 3 miles
downstream from the Shady Camp boat ramp and weir and about 20 miles above the Chambers Bay.
The Shady Camp park and launch ramps are part of the Mary River system which includes both freshwater
and saltwater areas. A weir or "barrage" is set across the river to prevent saltwater from moving further upstream on an incoming tide, but there is a boat ramp on each side of the barrage. Shady Camp is
surrounded by floodplains, and barramundi breed on the floodplains in freshwater.
Timing The Trip and The Bite
During the prime months of March, April and May, the river falls and gets cooler. The water temperature will start off in the 80s and drop into the upper 60's by mid-May. When the water is
dropping, the fish are shallower. Then when the water is rising, the barra are found in the deeper spots. Also, when the water is warmer, the experts use smaller lures than they do when waters
cool. Warm waters mean active fish that will feed often. Cooler waters cause the barra to feed less, but on bigger baits that allows them to conserve energy.
In March, Paul often runs by boat early in the day, two and
one-half hours downstream from the Shady Camp ramp to the prime fishing waters along the coast (and those away from an armada of "runoff" fishermen). Later on waters get rougher
downstream, but waters near the ramp can be crowded with boats. There are 100 boats at the boat ramp most days in March.
Too, the further away he travels, the more fish he and his clients catch usually. Exactly where he goes depends on the rainfall that each watershed receives in the wet season. Some rivers get more rain. For
example, the nearby Wildman River drainage gets less rain than does the Mary River, so the fishing it the former will be better earlier in the season.
From mid-May through July (their winter), most of the better fishing is in the billabongs. After that, the "build
up" (to the wet season) occurs when things in the tidal rivers get active again. The waters are warming up in their springtime (October) and the bigger fish are starting to move back up the rivers then. From
December though February (Australia's summer), the fishing slows due to the high water.
Giant Barras To Dream About
"The biggest barra and the best numbers are often taken in the three months following the wet season when the runoff has peaked," says Paul. "Between March 1st and the second week in May, my anglers
have caught 38 barramundi over one meter (39.37 inches). The largest was almost 50 inches. A 44 inch long fish might mean a fish of 30 pounds one day or one of 40 pounds on another depending on where the
fish had been for the previous 3 months and what it had been feeding on."
"The fattest ones have been up in the freshwater feeding in floodplain," he explained. "The lighter fish are
usually those just moving up from the saltwater and have been confronted by constant tidal currents. They're lean, mean, fighting machines basically!"
Paul's largest barra was a 65-pounder caught near the mouth of the Mary River in March of 2001. The guide actually saw the fish in just
3-feet of water with its back above the surface and cast to it.
Giant fish sometime congregate nearby on the mangrove flats around the mouths of the tiny bay rivers from 10 to 30 feet wide right at the
end of the wet season. His client's top day for numbers was when 3 anglers caught 197 barra below a broken mud weir. That outstanding day also was very early in the season near the mouth of the Mary River.
Where To Look & What To Throw
Paul likes to throw diving minnowbaits and surface lures in tannin-stained water that sport natural, subdued colors, such as gray,
brown, white, green, and black. In muddy waters, he opts for lures that have internal rattles and those that vibrate greatly as they roll through the water, in order to appeal to the barra's sense of hearing.
"The fish are often on or near the bottom but will move up depending on bait and tidal movements," says the guide. "As a result we have to put lures out at the various depths
until we find out where the fish are holding relative to the normal dropoff along the river's channel."
At the junction of the river and a tributary with a large floodplain above it, there is often an eddy formed
when the tide is coming in and the water is still moving out of the floodplain. Paul will be anchored in such areas because the bait should be congregated there making for a barramundi "feeding station," as the
guide calls them. If a mud bar with a dropoff exists, then casts should be to it.
"Barra will sit at the edge of the bar and then move up on it to feed on the baitfish that are being pushed up
on the shallow bar," says Paul. "Then, they will drop back down into the deeper water. The barra will be concentrated at these spots and others where the baitfish are sucked out into eddies near the main
channel, but when the water gets too low, the fish will head downstream."
Guide Experience
Fishing in the tidal creeks and the freshwater billabongs above dams or saltwater intrusion weirs, called
barrages, is often excellent in the NT, but you need a top guide, like Paul. A guide on the river for 10 years, he knows the water. With some 180 days each year guiding over 400 barramundi fishermen, Paul's
knowledge is without peer.
The former commercial fisherman from Queensland caught his first barramundi some 11 years ago in the
Darwin area and decided to stay and open his own sportfishing guide business. Paul's daily guide service rate is $275 Australian per person (2 minimum) or $550 per person, which includes accommodations and
all meals. Paul picked us up at our Darwin hotel, the MGM Grand, and we motored some two hours in his 4-wheel drive to the Point Stuart Wilderness Lodge where we dropped off our bags and headed for the
nearby ramp to launch his 16.5-foot boat.
Paul's main fishing "tool" as he calls it is a 2001 model Quintex boat
that is a fairly typical rig for those fishing such waters in the Top End of Australia. The aluminum, modified-V hull with deep draft and plenty of room between the gunwales has a 90-hp Honda four-stroke
outboard strapped to the stern. There are several built-in underfloor storage boxes and three comfortable seats for anglers wanting to sit in the stable craft while fishing the barra.
"As a tool, maintenance is vital in maintaining its function, so I spend a lot of time taking care of it," explains Paul.
The wilds of the NT are ever-present. Snakes including the
aggressive taipan, birdlife, such as jabaru, ibis, eagles, egrets, brolga (a bird that is the NT symbol and makes the same sound as a didgeridoo – the aboriginal instrument) and wild buffalo are often
seen. A dingo (wild dog), and wallabies (or small kangaroos) are also present. My target was the barramundi, and fortunately, it is abundant in the Northern Territory. In fact, there is no better barra fishing than
that found on Australia's top End!
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