Slow week as fish avoid avid anglers

WITH what seems to be the hot weather over with, we look back on what was a slower week for Natal fishing.

Up the North Coast rock and surf anglers have been burnt to a crisp trying to catch the bigger inedible fish that have been prowling the coast. Anglers putting in the time all along the Zululand area have been rewarded with good catches of honeycombs, diamond rays and sand sharks. These fish have all been caught on big chokka baits. Mackerel and red eye are seemingly hard to come by, but anglers that are using them are really reaping the rewards.

Grey shark activity has been quiet with only the odd fish coming out. These fish will be waiting for the dirty water, which will hopefully attract other nonedible fish to the Zululand shores.

Durban has been quiet with only a few grey sharks being landed.

A number of duckbill rays have been hooked and landed around the Virginia Beach area. These fish are an excellent tussle on medium tackle.

An excellent Zambezi shark of between 80-100kg was landed by angler Barry Watts, AKA Sinbad the Sailor, last week. This shark was caught off the beach on a throw bait of chokka. It is uncommon to find these fish taking throw baits as opposed to live baits, but Barry clearly enjoyed this unique catch.

Toti has been producing some nice flatfish around the Warner’s Tidal Pool. Anglers fishing pota squid seem to be coming right with the grey sharks, diamond and the brown rays, and there have been a few catches of honeycomb as well.

Scottsburgh seems to be producing some good grey sharks on shad cutlets. Local anglers have been catching plenty of undersize shad among the bigger fish. It is imperative that these fish go back to ensure a future for our fish and anglers.

Port Shepstone has only given us a few bronze bream and the odd hound shark in the deeper water around Shelly Beach and Splash Rock. Anglers fishing artificial and spoon don’t seem to be having the best time around that area and we hope that their luck changes soon.

Transkei has been very quiet with very little fish being caught from Port St Johns and further. Anglers reckon that the fishing should come right once the rain has stopped and the water cleans up.

There have been plenty of kingfish around all over the Durban harbour, taking all kinds of different lures. Paddle tails seem to be working well around the rocky area with some lucky anglers hooking into rock salmon. Anglers fishing off the boats around the banks seem to be hooking into lots of grunter around 2-3kg mark. These bigger grunter seem to have shied away from the conventional cracker bait and are now looking at squid baits.

There are a few perch hanging around the boats. These fish will take anything from a bread crust to sardine fillet. They give a brilliant fight although they are not a good eating fish.

There have been a few kingies around the Yacht Mall area with anglers using small 2gram lures to entice them closer to the rocks. To throw such a light lure, we recommend a 6 foot rod or shorter.

The Block has also been producing some good grunter in the much deeper channels with a few anglers hooking into fish that they cannot stop. Unfortunately anglers fishing from the Block do not have the luxury of following their fish when it takes off and they can’t stop it like the anglers on the boat do, and are often losing their fish.

Anglers fishing the South Pier are hooking up with some really beautiful kingfish. There have been one or two snoek around but not enough to start a snoek frenzy. Anglers seem to have progressed from looking for brown rays in the harbour to taking to task the bigger rock cod that hang around the walls and in caves around the harbour. Anglers are fishing slightly heavier with trolling rods and 6500 size reels, bait being used is usually a full pota squid or medium sized chokka, rigged on a Mustard Demon Circle 8/0 or 10/0.

Sodwana Bay has been producing some good fish over the past week, even with the temperatures pushing the high 30s. High winds have made for a big swell with lots of ski boaters turning away from launching. Anglers who have braved the weather have been rewarded with a few couta and dorado. There does seem to be a few tuna around, but they are being very temperamental with bait, eating mainly live maasbanker.

Cape Vidal has seen lots of dorado action with tuna being found in the deeper water. There are a few snoek hanging around closer to shore and these fish are hungry for the spoon. The smallest bullet like spoon in your tackle box will be the best suited for targeting these fussy eating fish, as they often do not respond to trolling lures and bait.

Zinkwazi has seen smaller pockets of snoek over the last week, but high temperatures have sent them into the deep. To those anglers complaining about these fish not being interested in trolling lures and only taking bait, remember when fishing for snoek to always make sure that the skirt in front of the bait is not able to shoot up the line if it gets taken. There is a very real possibility that another snoek will try and eat the skirt while its up your leader and this will result in a very unhappy angler having to tie a new leader and trace.

Tinley Manor is producing a few snoek, but is very quiet on the bait front as well as any sort of bigger game fish. There does seem to be a few smaller dorado around as well as a few loners.

Anglers fishing Westbrook are enjoying the few snoek, dorado and couta that seem to be hanging out in this area, although the struggle to find bait continues because of the water temperature being so hot. Mackerel and red eye don’t seem to want to jump on our live bait strings.