Alex's Column 25 September 2025
- NAFA
- Sep 26
- 3 min read
And along came the Build-up!
Darwin weather burst into the Build-up season last Sunday when blanket grey-cloud cover and heavy rain dominated the landscape.
It almost had a Wet season feel to it, so heavy was the rain.
I arrived home at Howard Springs mid-afternoon to find the road in front of my block flooded, with storm water gushing down the verges.
It certainly augurs well for Million Dollar Fish Season 11 which starts next Wednesday 1 October.
I’ll bet there’ll be hundreds – if not thousands – of anglers plying both the freshwater and the salt in the quest for a Sportsbet-tagged barra worth $1 million.
If they’ve all survived, there will be 11 of them out there – including the Season 11 $1 million barra – as well as another 100 red-tagged barra which were released for Season 11.
Don’t next Thursday’s NT News Million Dollar Fish lift-out magazine which has lots of useful information and some great images.
There’s nothing like a spike of hot Build-up weather to get the barra on the chew.
That certainly happened last week at a couple of Top End destinations.
In Kakadu, billabongs like Four Mile Hole, Alligator and Red Lily fished well, both during the day and at night.
On the Mary River system, Corroboree Billabong continued to improve, including with catches of barra in the 70s.
Shady Camp Fresh did its usual thing with little barra – that freshwater section above Shady Camp barrage has been chockers with rats all year.
In the salt water, Darwin Harbour continued to produce barra of all sizes for those who understand the fine print of fishing this close major waterway.
The harbour has been firing for weeks now, with reports of good fishing in all the arms.
On the other side of Darwin, the neapish tides must have been ideal for Shoal Bay, judging by the reports I received of great fishing.
Roger Sinclair and Peter Thiel checked out Bynoe Harbour in advance of Darwin Fly-rodders Saltwater Fly Fishing Tournament which will be held on similar tides starting tomorrow week.
Roger said it was a pleasant day and water temperatures were slightly up, and that seemed to get all sorts of fish to bite.
The fly comp has an interesting scoring format: there are seven eligible species and points are awarded for each one, with bonus points if you catch the lot.
Additional points are earnt for other species, but only based on length and not nearly as much as for the seven nominated species: barra, salmon, snappers, trevally, queenfish, tarpon and mackerel.
The boys caught four of those species – barra, snapper, queenfish and trevally – fishing exceptionally with their own home-tied flies.
With their research completed, they switched to baitcasters to try to nail a few “dinner” barra under the mangrove trees on the incoming tide.
It was a good move, yielding half a dozen up to 70cm, mainly on prawn imitations.
We’re coming off spring tides this weekend, but they’re still pretty good for both Darwin Harbour and Bynoe Harbour.
One thing for sure is that there’ll be some Sportsbet-tagged barra swimming around in both those pristine estuaries.
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The new Classic Lures Indigenous Range caught my eye at the recent Australian Fishing Trade Association Show on the Gold Coast.
Designed by legendary indigenous barra guide, Lance Butler, the artwork depicts aspects of his "Bandin", "Saltwater Man" culture, including how certain wildlife relates to barramundi fishing.
For example, the design of No 1 "Birds Of Prey" represents "HUNTING FROM ABOVE".
Lance designed the Jabiru as a peaceful hunter, spearing its prey with its beak, while the Egret, "The Barra Bird", tells him where the barramundi are.
There are six lures in the range.
Being Classics, with great colours, they're sure to catch fish.
Produced by JM Gillies, they should be available in tackle stores later this year.
