Nowra, New South Wales

The Crookhaven River entrance. Picture: John Lugg, NSW Government.
The Crookhaven River entrance. Picture: John Lugg, NSW Government.
Nowra boating map
Part of a Nowra boating map by the NSW Government. Click here to download the full PDF.

Nowra has great fishing on the Shoalhaven River.

The river has 50km of tidal water, much of it shallow.

Nowra township is 18km upstream from the entrance.

The river has two sea entrances, one permanently open to the south at Crookhaven Heads, a joint mouth of the Crookhaven and Shoalhaven Rivers, and the other intermittently open 5km to the north at Shoalhaven Heads.

The Shoalhaven River has most typical NSW estuary species, with bream, flathead and whiting the main catch, but also with luderick, mulloway, estuary perch and bass.

The river is shallow and usually clear and for this reason can be a challenging fishing location.

Winter sees a good run of luderick, with big flathead in summer.

Perch are often found near the deeper rock walls.

The Crookhaven mouth’s north shore bordering Comerong Island has good flats and weedbeds, with a rock wall that has landbased fishing, accessible via a ferry.

The inner wall has mainly luderick, while the outer wall has tailor, bream, flathead and mulloway.

The lower Crookhaven has dense mangrove areas bordering extensive flats which fish well for whiting, bream and flathead.

‘The Canal’ runs between Comerong Island and the southern mainland and is lined with rock walls.

The walls on the south bank have bream and luderick.

Local oyster racks produce good fish.

The rock walls at Greenwell Point, the wharves at Orient Point and the breakwall on Comerong Island are all good places for large bream, flathead and winter luderick.

At Nowra, the flats at the end of Pig Island have flathead, whiting and bream.

There is rocky reef between the island and the bridge, and navigating the north shore requires care, but the deep water next to it holds bream, luderick and mulloway.

The bridge pylons hold fish. Upstream of the bridge are rock walls with bream, flathead, whiting, mulloway and estuary perch.

The NSW Government installed an artificial reef 4.3km north-east of the Shoalhaven River entrance in 33m of water in January 2015, at 34 50.955S 150 47.731E (WGS84 datum).

There are 20 concrete modules in five clusters, five modules per cluster.

Kingfish, trevally, snapper, morwong, tailor, salmon and mulloway are the main catch, as well as baitfish.

To the north of Nowra the Gerringong area has good inshore boat fishing, with Werri Drift a proven flathead ground along Werri Beach, about 750m offshore.

Gravel Patch is 2.5km off the northern point of Werri Beach and has morwong and flathead.

The Crack in the Wall is almost 2km directly off Walkers Beach, with morwong and flathead.

There is broken reef between Black Head and Werri Point. The regions bass dams are Tallowa, Danjera and Flat Rock.

Stocked waters near Nowra include Danjera Dam, Flat Rock Dam and Tallowa Dam.

Great fishing can be had south of Nowra at the outstanding fishing location of Jervis Bay.

Book your fishing stay early at Booking.com


fish finder book

Nowra tides
Nowra region coastline
Shoalhaven artificial reef
NSW Govt Nowra fishing guide PDF
NSW Govt boating map PDF
Shoalhaven surf report with cam
NSW fishing regulations
NSW marine parks

Email corrections, additions, pictures or video here.

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