The Entrance: massive 1m-long flathead caught in the channel
Despite its siltation issues, The Entrance Channel continues to punch well above its weight with one lucky angler hauling in the largest flathead in living memory.
Despite its siltation issues, The Entrance Channel continues to punch well above its weight with one lucky angler hauling in the largest flathead in living memory.
Corey Dobson was up early on Sunday morning casting live poddy mullet from 4am on the northern side of the channel, east of The Entrance Bridge, when his reel exploded in his hand about 7.30am.
“As soon as I hooked him up the reel started screaming,” he said.
“I knew it was a good sized fish. I was playing with the tensioner.”
With the fish running Mr Dobson said he had to run up and back along the shore trying to stop the giant lizard from snapping his 12kg line.
“The tide was between the run in and the run out,” he said.
“And then he’s gone for another run about 500m, I had to run all the way back to the sand (bar) but the water helped me there.”
After 25-30 minutes of frantic fighting the keen fisherman was able to bring the enormous dusky flathead to shore but nothing was going to prepare him for the shock he got when he pulled out his tape measure.
Mr Dobson said the brute just tipped the tape at 103cm and weighed a colossal 10.8kg — one of, if not the biggest ever flathead landed in NSW in the modern era.
The Australian National Sportsfishing Association record for a dusky flathead is held by Brendan McMahon who landed a 6.03kg whopper from the Macleay River on May 7, 2000.
There was no indication of its length but it would have been well shy of the mythical one metre mark.
In 2015 Chris Hollins was fishing from his kayak in a river near Mollymook on the NSW South Coast when he hooked up a 97.5cm flattie weighing an estimated 7.5kg.
In 2016 avid fisho Paul Lennon caught his “Holy Grail” when he landed a 101cm flathead from waters near Karuah at the head of Port Stephens.
Mr Dobson said he was going to invite his friends and family around for a “big fish dinner”.
The incredible catch comes after semi-retired plumber Steve Kollaras hauled in a 46cm bream from The Entrance last month.
Last year Mr Kollaras also caught an impressive 82cm flathead from the same location, proving The Entrance channel is still attracting monsters of the deep.
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