2023 DFR Territory Fly Fishing Open - Team Dragg'n Flies results and tactics

So, two pre-fish outings told us – the fish are smarter than us!     Doh!

We found fish where we didn’t expect but not large numbers, we didn’t find fish where we expected at all. Too much dirty water in some places. Too many grass mats on most edges. Not many lily pads about.

But we had two things in our favour to turn around our capture rates during the 2023 DFR FW Open  competition – the first was the wind was forecast to be under 6knots for the one and half days of the competition unlike the wind gales about 15knots plus during the pre-fish outings. The second, other anglers pre-fishing one day prior to the competition, found more receptive fish to take their offerings. At least it was something.

Friday nights briefing was sussing out the top teams and how they were going. We did not hear any whispers about schools of small barra – which we couldn’t find at all during our pre-fish outings! Though we did hook a couple during our pre-fish outings – definitely not enough to cement our expectations of a place in the top few 2023 teams, if schools of barra were found by others we would be totally out of the placings - unless we had stonker days on Saratoga and big Tarpon.

After the obligatory rule reminders, safety first etc - we got given our competitor bags of sponsor goodies, our lovely newly designed competition fishing shirts (though a bit pink – it was a nice shirt!) – and the all important scorecards – hoping we need those!

Half the anglers hung around sharing stories, flies etc – while me and as ugly as I am – I needed my beauty sleep. Also, for me on competition days usually finds me up quite early, checking leaders, flies boxes etc - for the 20^th time or so it seems.

Next thing its 5:20am and a knock on teammates door gets us going shortly thereafter. We launch at the ramp just as the glow of pre-dawn is seem to the east.

We head to the ‘rock hole’ region in hope of some barra there or nearby in spots we have got them previously – but nothing first half hour, then one tarpon, then nothing for an hour!

Bugger – Plan A, sucks big time! Plan B maybe?????

We persevere fishing a few bank edges where we have got some nice Saratoga during previous outings but very poor results for team – worse still nothing for me and now it is 9:30am – so much for coming in the top half of the team listings!

We head to the opposite end of billabong to try out something new, because Plan A and B are not working!

And luckily we hit a hot patch. Then another, then another – I start rapidly landing Saratoga one after another with a few tarpon inbetween. The sartoga seemed to have flicked a switch and took our flies with free abandon

Given the poor catch rates of the first couple of hours - amazingly, by 3pm I have 20 saratoga and a full line of tarpon - sadly still no barra.

While Peter catches up to my total, I catch two more Saratoga for upgrades, and also upgrade my tarpon line 10 or so times.

With just enough time to get back to the ramp to hand in our scoresheets - Peter eventually has 17 Saratoga and a good full line of tarpon. That’s one less Saratoga than he caught last year.

I also have 7 catfish on my scoresheet – a clear indicator of my Saratoga tactics of dropping fly off edge of weeds and letting it fully sink to bottom of water column before beginning final retrieve. A lot of my biggest Saratoga were also caught way down and just as I lifted fly off the bottom. I even got a sleepy cod or two.

It ended up a great day for me – given the mid-morning timeframe of my first fish to the net!   

Key lesson learnt during Day1, was that when we found a few areas with 5-7 lily pads every 20-30meters apart, it was what really made the day for us with quite a few multiple double hook ups along a particular 3km long or so stretch of weed bank. Once with several other teams nearby, we caught 7 toga between us in less than 20 minutes while the other teams got one or two from what we saw. 

We noticed that the Saratoga seemed to be quickly re-orientating to the lily pads after many weeks of only long grass based weed beds to hide under – so we frothed the water with our flies - 2 meters to the side before the lily pads, then the pads themselves, and then for 2 meters past the patch of lily pads as we slowly travelling with the electric along the edge of the weed beds.  once we pulled three good sized toga from the one small patch of lilies.

This learnt lesson formulated into our PlanA for Day2, this involved us targeting several  locations at bottom of billabong we had used over the last couple of Opens, first up. Then hit this weed bank patch hard again in Sunday’s last session.

From a competitive fly fishing tactic perspective - we focus our fishing efforts specifically on the Saratoga as a priority – the Tarpon are purely by-catch. To help accomplish this, we use slightly larger hooks to avoid the effort of getting a 15cm tarpon to net, measured and only to have to upgrade it later. Time that is better spent targeting the Saratoga – as more points, bigger fish. Also we avoid to a degree, wear and tear on the leader that you get from catching Tarpon. 

Yes, the tap, tap of the tiny Tarpon picking at the fly and not hooking up can be disconcerting and distracting but the thought of another Saratoga with its strong deep body based flexing tail sweeps on the end of a taunt fly line makes it the target of choice. Its is easier to finish off a line of tarpon with a small nymph pattern in last hour of the day, if desperate enough and needed. (both days we never needed to specifically target tarpon).

We get back to ramp just before 5pm, feeling a lot better than I did at 9:30am when no fish measurements on my scorecard, that’s for sure!

Most, but not all, competitors are tight-lipped about their captures but we do hear of a few good 65cm plus toga being caught, so Peter’s biggest Saratoga of the day of 58cm was not going to cut it for that prize.

We get the boat loaded back onto the trailer and head back for a shower and rest before the gala dinner the saturday night of the Open has become. While not formal dress, the meal is gala quality. What a three course meal it was! Awesome presentation and flavours! Not your usual ‘pub’ food that’s for sure.

The day’s results are then shown. One team had found some barra schooled up and caught a line each of the iconic fish. We had 39 Saratoga for the day. So, we ended up in the top few teams and individuals. In the details, I was in third by quite a few fish from second, Peter was in sixth. While as a team we were in third. The two teams in front of us were previous winners of the open and very, very good NT fly fishers.

Not knowing where the schooling barra were, might be the deciding factor for us advancing any further than third placed team. But we were keen for the next session of the Open. Day1 was 10 hours long, Sunday would be only 6 hours. What kept us still hopeful was catching the majority of our fish in 6 hours on Day1, after 2.5 hours of almost no fish– so could we do it in just the 6 hours of last day of Open. We thought we could.

With numbers of those in front and numbers behind, both individually and as a team, were not the deciding factor that we could control, rather we controlled only what we could catch in those six hours in the last session was – this had to be our focus. Only then could we measure our captures against the very good anglers ahead and behind us. So too, whether they again found barra first up – then also catch the other species needed after that.

So, with imagined captures of gigantic fish in the morning, we get to bed to be up early the next day.

Morning of Day2, we launch at a similar time, heading down the billabong instead of up it like on Day1. We head to our favourite “toga alley” to begin our last session. Our goals for the last fishing session were at the minimum: 12-15 Saratoga each and full lines of good sized Tarpon.

But we didn’t set the world on fire in the first hour.  Eventually though we manage a few Saratoga and tarpon. with sun quickly moving across the sky, we need to maximise capture possibilities. We get up on the plane and move to the long length of weed bank that we fished three years ago – in the middle on the south side of it, is a GPS mark we call ‘50-60’ because of the size fish we caught there once. Not many lily pads but enough. Surprising us both as in just a short space of time we get multiple hook ups, many fish surging our capture counts.

We focus, like yesterday afternoon, on only the lily pads, zooming along with electric on high speed between patches of lilies. We get almost half a line each of Saratoga before the lily pads fad out to only grass reed beds. So, we motor back up the billabong to the location we caught multiple fish the day before.

At this new location back towards the boat ramp, Peter hits a hot patch in the next few hours and finishes off his line of 20 Saratoga, for his second last fish we had a double hook up, I netted Peter's Saratoga first, hanging mine out the back while I did so, and then just as I went to net mine it popped off. Bugger - needed that one!

I was at that time 5 short of full line of Saratoga and am still constantly dropping Saratoga, when we finally stopped casting, I was also one short of a line of tarpon. But I was done physically and could not find the energy, even mentally, to cast another time

I could have fished half an hour more and we would have still made it back to ramp in time to hand in out scoresheets, but we had exceeded our goals for the day and felt safe to maintain our spots individually and as a team. Peter was totally pumped in gaining his first full line of Saratoga since we started fishing together, this should see him moving up the ladder board from sixth for sure.

The ramp was packed on our return. The few non fly fishing boats must have wondered what was going on with 15 fly fishing team boats trying to get out of the water at the same time.

Next was a clean shower, put on the competition shirt for the obligatory all teams photo and also get stuck in to the finger food provided. 

We did hear a whisper that the two teams in front of us had average days – so maybe we were in with a chance.

The best of species – Barra, Saratoga, Tarpon, Most Meritorious, and the Catfish crown - were all awarded, then the individual scores and standings were called out and prizes awarded. When we got down to the final three competitors, it included Peter and I – so Peter had moved from sixth at end of Day1 to at least the top three on Day2. Turned out Peter with his great day on Saratoga, had secured first place (second year in a row. Go Peter!), and as a team we were also first place, again for second year in a row. While I maintained my third place from Day1 but on Day1 I was several hundred behind the guy in second and now at end of Day2 was only 37 points behind him. I needed that one more fish it seems!! Sooooo close!

Interestingly, it was only 76 points between first and third – basically one Saratoga! Bugger, maybe next year for me to be Champion angler. But for us it is all about the team results - yes we do like our individual placings, but team first always. We fished well this 2023 Open, accumulating our biggest amount of points so far........., 

But know we can fish better and we will almost certainly work out the barra as a more regular capture. And from now on, I will always fish right to the end of allowed time - that’s for sure!! One fish! aarrrgghhh!!

Still overall, we were totally stoked to say the least, with so many great fly fishers competing with us over the one and half days - we felt quite blessed and lucky to get a repeat of 2022 as the winning team, and for Peter as Champion Angler in 2022 and 2023. Thanks to the many fly fishers through the years where we have benefitted from their advice and suggestions.

We are already planning and keen for next year! 

Actually, I am ordering up some of just the right materials for our regular flies already, even have a few more flies I am thinking of tying up and testing in 2024's pre-fish outings. How about this mudeye pattern (photo from other tiers on FB) shown here but weed guarded and on a 1/0 B10s

So another good comp results for our team, and individually

What’s next – time to chase some longtail tuna over next few months, maybe tease up some sails and marlin wide off Dundee. Then we need to start prepping and regaining knowledge of Bynoe Harbour for the 2023 Salt Competition happening before the start of the wet season. Not forgetting the ‘Strong Foam Arm Crab’ (photo from other tiers on FB) I have recently been tying to tempt ‘Blue Bastards’ with – need to make the time to chase those too!

Keep those lines tight swoffers!!!! Especially in the waters of the NT!!!! yeeehaaaah!