Summer and winter combo catches in the offing

THE surf fishing has been in a mixed period of the year in terms of catches. The summer fish are still coming out but the winter fish are starting to take over.

The north has seen plenty of bigger edibles coming out for the guys scratching in the rockier areas. The use of circle hooks in these rocky areas helps reduce your chances of getting stuck. Use softer bait like fleshy fish baits or chokka. These areas can produce a multitude of reef fish, so go prepared as you don’t know what is going to bite your bait next. The inedibles are still around up north, so if you want a drag-testing sandy or honeycomb, aim for the upper North Coast where the water is still holding some warmth.

Use as fresh bait as possible and make it nice and juicy. The trace for these fish is the standard thick nylon with a 120lb steel bite trace attached to a circle hook.

This trace can be used for most inedible fish on the KwaZulu-Natal coast – the only thing to change will be the size of the circle hook. You would, for example, use a 6/0 for brown skates, an 8/0 for grey sharks, a 9/0 for sandies and a 10/0 for diamonds as a rough guide.

The edibles in the Durban area have been on the quieter side but some big stumpies and pompano have made it onto social media recently.

Octopus legs, chokka, crabs and prawns have been the most used baits for edibles this past week.

The Blue Lagoon area has been the most productive, according to reports.

Other than the stumpies and shoal pompano, some decent kob were caught on chokka baits.

Some blackfins were hooked recently. These speedsters enjoy jumping into the air and generally win the fight. Other than the blackfins, some bigger flatfish were hooked. The two main species have been the thorntails and diamond rays.

The South Coast saw some garrick action on live shad. The shad have been a bit picky on most mornings but a drifted sardine has made quick work of getting your limit. The trick is to get through the smaller shad to get ones that make the legal size limit of over 30cm.

The South Coast is still producing good numbers of bronze bream.

The rocky ledges and gullies have seen many species landed but the stone bream and bronze bream have made up the bulk of the catches. Pink prawn and cracker are the two must-have baits for these species. Light tackle will get you more bites and see you have a lot more fun. Tight lines and screaming reels.

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Send info about fishing or fish caught in your area to: mike.pereira@kingfisher.co.za