Flathead are definitely one of the easier species of estuary fish to catch on fly. They will respond to a wide range of traditional and specialist flies and you will catch them as a by catch when your fishing small flies (from a flathead’s perspective) to species such as bream and whiting and relatively big flies (from a flathead’s perspective) even when fishing for barra.
This is the third in my series of scrounger flies and like the scrounger baitfish and the scrounger jelly prawn it’s tied on a worm hook which in soft plastic parlance is also referred to as a weedless hook and more often than not this fly can be retrieved not only through weed but also over or around most structure such as detritus matter, drowned timber, rocks etc, in rivers and lakes, without being snagged up.
Weight can be added to a fly in many different ways and they effect how the fly sinks and swims also in many different ways. This is how I add weight to weedless / worm hook when I am going to use the fly to make a fly similar to my Scrounger fly.
This fly can be cast onto a muddy bank, right into mangroves and onto rock bars and then can be retrieved over and through all manner of structure with an extremely low incidence of getting snagged up.
in the process of Tiewell being sold and reinvented the large rubber tails for #2/0 versions of my estuary fly never came back on the market. What I have come up with as an alternative is using the rear half of the 2.5? Z Man Grub Z. That has created an even better fly.
My clousers have progressively mutated to being tied out of synthetic Flash Blend. This is my best mutation to date and as well as being very durable it is slightly translucent and moves well in the water making the representation of a bait fish better than the original. It also sheds water well on the pick up and back cast making it easy to cast.
I tie these downsized version of my original articulated slow roller fly in sizes #1 and 1/0 sizes and fish them on my #8 weight fly rods with 20lb Maxima Ultra Green leaders. They are an absolute treat for native bass and all sorts of estuary and coastal species including bream, flathead, and mangrove jack and smaller pelagics including trevally and queenfish.
This is the biggest version of my Mud Prawn Fly and the one that I use when chasing barramundi in relatively clear salt water around structure such as drowned timber. It’s a very durable fly that swims hook point up so that it’s fairly snag resistant. It is designed not only to provide a representation of a prawn that is readily taken by barra of all sizes but it can be crept slowly over logs and other structure giving the maximum time for fish to respond, can be fished like a soft plastic or can be fished as a faster moving fleeing prawn.
My first fish on fly fell to the magic of a Woolly Bugger and many have gone the same way since then. Tied predominately as a prospecting fly for barra in Awoonga this fly also gets a swim in estuary and coastal waters when I am looking for grunter and fingermark.
An ideal fly for targeting bottom feeders such as bream, flathead, flounder, whiting, bonefish or tropical trigger fish. Because of the lead shot it sinks quickly, swims hook point up, resisting snagging up on detritus matter or bottom structure such as shells or small stones, and as it is retrieved, has the added benefit on soft bottoms of kicking up a little sand or mud in much the same way as the natural.
