Bushman Mick's latest video is an object lesson in how Australian land-based fishing works at the back of nowhere — head torch in red, croc spotter in the pocket, lithium-powered torches on charge and an HCO popper queued up for the bottom of the tide. He spent a night and a morning on a flooded mangrove creek somewhere on the Queensland coast, fishing live bait under a four-metre saltwater crocodile he nicknamed Gary, and walked out the other end with a story about a barracuda that nearly took his line into the trees.
"These creeks are full of life. Barramundi, mangrove jack. But they're also croc country," he said in the opening of the video, uploaded on 17 May 2026. "Tonight, I'm heading deep into this flooded maze, chasing fish in the dark right as the tide starts pushing through. It's wet, it's eerie, and honestly, this place feels like something out of a movie."
He set up behind a fence on a bank that gave him a safe landing zone, ran two rods on heavy 0.8 mm leader and 5/0 octopus-style circle hooks, and pinned small live mullet on the bottom for the night session. The flow was savage. "Look at the power of the tide," he said as the creek emptied past him. "Landing a fish from here is going to be an absolute nightmare."
The lighting kit doubles as a survival kit. "When I'm fishing at night time, I like to have the lights off most of the time so I don't spook the fish. But when I do have my light on, I like to use my red light because not only does it not spook the fish as easily, but it keeps the bugs out of my face a bit more, and it also doesn't interrupt my night vision as much," he said. The white head torch only comes on for filming. The spotlight is kept charged for crocs.
He didn't have to wait long for company. "That right there, my friends, is the eye shine of a crocodile," Mick said, holding the spotlight steady on a single red dot across the creek. "Bigger crocs have bigger eyes. Bigger eyes are brighter and shinier. From my experience, that croc right there is at least four metres long. I've only been here half an hour. He's already come out to have a sus."
The morning rewrote the trip. With the tide draining out and small archer fish schooling in the shallows, he switched to a popper after watching mullet getting scattered by something quick. "There's a barra busting up right there. Right there is a barra," he said before reconsidering — the strike that came on the popper was straight, fast and toothy.
"That's a big barracuda," he yelled as the fish kited toward structure. "He's going to spool me. He's going to spool me. Oh my God, it's going into the mangroves."
The fight ended at the snags. "I'm on full lock on this drag. Full lock," Mick said, before the leader popped against the mangrove roots. He was philosophical about the loss. "That was the best fight that I've had in a very long time. We're talking that would have been like a 15, 20 kilo barracuda. Definitely barracuda. Really fast strike. Really fast run, like a sprinter."
The 0.8 mm leader, rated 55 lb but the diameter of an 80 lb line, was the casualty. "I've never been able to break that with a fish before. With a shark, yes, but not a fish. I've caught barras a metre with this. No problem," he said. He went home with one archer fish for dinner and a plan to return with a 100 lb leader and a bigger popper.
