Summertime beach fishing options

By Robert Thornton

Summertime offers a world-class platter of beach fishing options, regardless of which corner of our continent you find yourself on. Though the species and techniques to catch them vary from region to region, summer beach fishing always brings friends and family together during the festive season.

On top of being accessible, beaches provide a range of exciting prospects for novices and veterans alike, lending themselves to anglers of all ages and skill levels. Finally, there’s more than just the fishing to enjoy, with bait collecting, beachcombing, swimming and relaxing often part of a beach holiday fishing adventure!

 Given how vast and diverse our beaches are, this blog will outline a few of the most effective techniques and tackle that will work on most beaches around Australia. We’ll also provide little tips and tricks to make your beach fishing holiday more enjoyable and hassle-free.

A beach is a beach!

Australia’s beaches differ a lot in appearance, accessibility and ecology. The beaches in Western Australia’s remote Kimberly region and the swell-battered coastline in southern NSW, for example, might seem like chalk and cheese! Scratch beneath the surface though, and you’ll find that these beaches all have a few things in common.

Firstly, they tend to be made up of fine sand or some type of granular sediment, which is merely fragments of dead coral, rocks and bone broken up over millennia by constant wave action.

Speaking of waves, they too are a common feature of beaches, varying in size, strength and intensity depending on the location. Breaking waves create ridges and undulations in the sediment close to shore, which in turn provides habitat and hunting grounds for all sorts of marine life.

Through this lens, it’s easy to see why – to an angler at least – a beach is a beach! Whether you’re in the Northern Territory or South Australia, things like deeper water close to shore or waves breaking over a ‘back bank’ always warrant closer inspection. Beaches everywhere are relatively barren for the most part, so any gutter or hole carved out by the swell is going to attract life.

For more general beach fishing tips, you can read my beach fishing basics blog here.

Summer beach bait fishing

Most anglers will tend to use bait when starting out, and this is no different on the beach. Beach holidays are all about relaxation, and there’s nothing much more relaxing than soaking a bait as frothy seawater swirls around at your feet!

With that said, there’s a few boxes to tick if you want to give yourself the best chance of success.

Starting with tackle, the first ingredient is a long, soft (preferably fibre-glass or composite) rod, which should be paired with a spin or side-cast style reel. Long rods allow you to hold your line above any breaking waves at the shoreline, plus they give you the ability to cast out further if needed. A soft-actioned rod is helpful when bait fishing for species like whiting, dart, salmon and bream, as they allow fish to mouth and pick at the bait without feeling any resistance. These are all transmitted as ‘bites’, visible through the rod’s sensitive tip and felt in the angler’s hands! A Beefstick 802MS is a solid all-round beach rod for the job, with its fibre-glass tip, 8ft length and 2-piece configuration making it perfect for a family beach holiday.

Any 3000-5000 size spin reel spooled with 6-10lb monofilament linewill perform well on this rod, with the natural stretch and shock-absorbance of the mono complementing the slow taper of the rod.

The best baits depend on where you are, however squid pieces, yabbies, worms (beach, blood or other aquatic worms), pipis, cockles and other locally available forage will work on most Aussie beaches. Collecting your own bait is an option, and bait collection is part of the adventure for some! If this isn’t your thing, however, most tackle stores sell frozen bait tailored to the species available in the area, so don’t worry if you don’t know which bait to use. Just call in to a local tackle store and ask them what’s been working!

Whichever bait you choose, the key is to keep it small and to cast it into the deepest and calmest water you can find near the shore, even if it’s only 50cm deep. A light running sinker rig with a small hook between no. 4-8 is a very generic but effective rig for light surf fishing, and one that won’t tangle as often as other rigs; perfect for kids and beginners!

Once the bait is deployed, beach fishing can be as hands-on or off as you wish to make it. Sticking the rod in a sand spike (often just a simple piece of PVC tube) while you wait for a bite is one approach. This approach has its merits, especially when soaking bigger baits on heavier tackle out beyond the breakers, where wait times between bites are longer and the chances of the bait moving out of the strike zone are less.

For bread-and-butter fishing in shallow gutters close to shore though, it’s always better to hold the rod. Holding the rod allows the angler to stay in touch with their rig as it wafts and sways around in the gutter (which is what you want) and is an excellent way to teach youngsters and beginners how to feel for bites. Additionally, having it in your hand means you can quickly and easily re-position your bait when it drifts out of the strike zone.

Most shallow surf gutters hold plenty of life, so a well-presented bait is likely to grab the attention of any foragers pretty quickly. The bottom line is, unless your chasing big jew, greenback tailor or other big predators from the beach, it’s unwise to ‘set and forget’, and much better to stand there with the rod in your hand.

Summer beach lure fishing

Lures generally don’t get as much fanfare on the beach, especially on summer beach fishing trips the family, but this doesn’t mean family-friendly luring options don’t exist – far from it, in fact! Tossing lures off the sand is a great way for kids and novices to grasp lure fishing basics, and with the right approach lures can be just as effective as bait. Another bonus of lures is they allow you to cover lots of ground, which means an angler can potentially come into contact with several species or more. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves though – you’ll need to kit yourself out properly to get started!

Lure fishing in the surf can take a few forms, and in this blog we’re going to focus on two main techniques: lightweight luring in the gutters and distance casting for pelagics.

For light work in the gutters, a simple estuary luring set-up is perfect. Any 1-3 or 2-4kg spin rod between 7-8’ is fine for chasing whiting, bream, flathead, salmon, tailor, small queenfish and trevally in close. A 1000-2500 size spin reel with 6-10lb braided mainline is a good match for the rod, with this system allowing maximum feeling through to the anglers hands and effortless casting with tiny lures. Fluorocarbon leaders should also be kept super light (6-10lb), as this helps present small lures as naturally as possible.

Speaking of lures, small soft plastics, hardbodies, blades, jigs and other metal lures can be very productive in the surf. Soft plastics are without doubt the best all-round presentation in the gutters, with the Bait Junkie 2.35” Prawn, 2.95” Flickand Risky Critter all highly effective on whiting, bream and flathead, as well as small tailor, salmon, queenfish and trevally. Light jigheads give the plastics plenty of ‘hang time’, with anything heavier than 1/8oz overkill and likely to make the plastics present unnaturally.

Casting for pelagics is a little different. When chasing ocean speedsters from the sand, casting distance is a priority. Transient species like tailor, Australian salmon, queenfish, mackerel, trevally, bonito and others will enter surf gutters, but spend most of their time beyond the breakers moving between areas.

For this reason, a long graphite rod with a decent casting weight is the weapon of choice. Anglers chasing pelagics from the beach cast lures ranging from 10-100g, so it’s important to match your rod, reel and line to the size of the presentations you’re looking to throw. The Seabass range of shore casting rods are an excellent budget-friendly but very competent tool for this job, with models ranging from 3-6kg to 10-20kg! Given the punishment this style of fishing can put your gear through, metal-bodied reels are a logical pairing, with the BG, BG MQ and Saltist MQspin reel series popular with surf and rock anglers.

The trick to this technique is to make lots of casts out past the breakers, bringing your lure back relatively quickly, and covering lots of water in the process. By covering water, you’ll be able to find areas where fish are holding.

Lures like the OT Jig, Sawarash and Saltiga Over There 80S are designed for pelagics, and are great choices for prospecting the surf anywhere in the country.

Handy accessories

Keeping it simple goes a long way at the beach, especially if you’re teaching the basics to newbies. You don’t want to be digging through mountains of tackle when re-rigging, nor do you want to be weighed down while fishing on your feet! This is why most beach fishers have a small wearable bag for spare rigs, bait, tools and other basic necessities. The Solus Hip Bag and Guide Waist Bagare perfect for keeping a few basics on you, plus you can even keep your phone handy and dry with the Guide Phone Pouch, which can be attached to the Guide Waist Bag.

Up the beach and away from the splash zone, it’s always nice to have a few cold drinks and food at the ready. Daiwa’s Insulated Tote Bag is ideal for family beach trips, as it will keep everything dry and insulated, plus the simple tote bag design means it’s easy to pick up and carry to your next spot!

Summer holiday fun

Beach fishing really is a universal part of summer holidays in Australia, and a great way to introduce friends and family to the sport we love. Beach fishing can be as simple or technical as you want to make it and is therefore the perfect activity to add to the beach holiday itinerary. Whether you’re a seasoned pro or a hopeful novice, the surf can provide hours of entertainment, as is easily one of the best ways to relax while fishing.

Happy holidays and tight lines!