Fish Eagle / Angling Report

Surf angling conditions were not all that great at the beginning of last week and it was only towards the weekend that the surf moderated. There was a real mixture of the weather conditions with winds blowing from the north and south, rain during the week, plus a big storm on Saturday evening. There was also a near perfect day on Friday with excellent sea and surf conditions and I saw the gamefish anglers out at sea for most of the day.
I was talking to some offshore anglers during the week and they were saying that there is still plenty of live bait around – small shad, mackeral, mossies and even small sea pike can currently be found just off the backline well within reach of surf ski anglers. A friend from Durban said they have also been catching red eye sardines at times and he now has a ready stock of fresh bait in his freezer. Luckily I now know where to look for fresh bait for the shad when they arrive.
I did not see anyone at sea for the first half of last week because of the bumpy sea conditions, but towards the end of the week there were plenty of craft in the Umdloti and Sea Belle areas. These anglers were catching a few snoek on the backline and apparently some couta off the Umdloti mouth. Unfortunately not many of these fish were boated due to high shark activity. The dorado seem to have thinned out a bit, but there are still plenty of big tunny around.
I was at the beach early on Saturday morning to watch the launch for the competition held by the Westbrook ski boat club. Unfortunately I could not spend a lot of time at the beach when the boats were beaching, but apparently there were a couple of good fish caught and some lost to sharks. One angler that tried fishing on the bottom said that there was a strong reverse current running which made fishing almost impossible.
I believe that anglers fishing on the bottom when conditions allow are still catching some decent fish on the reefs. One skipper told me that he had been fishing out deep between Umdloti and Westbrook and caught some half kob, weighing between six to nine kilos, plus a few decent soldiers and a small cracker.
When I had a look at the rough surf on Monday morning the water looked ideal for stumpies. Sure enough, I received reports during the week of stumpies in the region of three to four kilos that had been caught – mostly on sardine baits. The stumpies love the rough water as there are plenty of places to hide. I think that a few more stumpies could be caught this week during the high tide periods. The summer flatfish and grey sharks are still around if anglers are looking for some sport with these hard fighting fish.
It is a real pity that some of the popular angling beaches are badly sanded up and anglers might have to travel around a bit to find decent fishing water.
Sealice

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