Angling Report – 03 February 2017

A south westerly wind moved up the coast on Wednesday but for much of the week the winds were from the north east bringing hot and humid weather. The barometer was down on Saturday morning and the southerly winds were back for the weekend and began blowing before 7am on Saturday morning.
I visited some of the popular local surf angling spots durng the week only to find some of them deserted and others had just one or two anglers with lines in the water. This is a sure sign that the fishing is quiet. There are plenty of inedible fish around, few anglers are targeting these excellent angling fish. It can be very uncomfortable to be on the beach during the day when it is hot and humid and the north easterly is pumping, but the early mornings and late afternoon periods were the times that I expected to see anglers on the beaches but this was not so.
Two anglers that fish the Umdloti area on a regular basis told me that because of the schools of peckers that are stripping baits in the area, they have been using sealice baits and have had some results, especially early in the mornings in the dark. These anglers have caught several small stumpies recently that ranged from one to one and a half kilos in weight. They said they have had the success when the surf had been on the rough side and it is a well-known fact that these fish love the rough water. One morning during the week, a visitor to the coast landed a sandshark of 20kg after a struggle of half an hour and the fish was returned alive to the water.
My contacts told me that the fishing in the Umhlanga and Durban North areas has been quiet with just a few wave garrick and the odd mullet being caught. Peckers are still a big problem in these areas as well and anglers have reverted to baits such as sealice and catfish leg. Apparently a couple of nice rays have been landed during the late afternoon periods. Offshore anglers in the Durban North areas have found snoek feeding just off the backline but these fish have been elusive at times and an unsettled sea has not been in the favor of the anglers. When I looked at the sea during the week I could see that the water was nice and clean in some areas. In others the water was discolored plus there was a bit of a swell running for most of the week. The water was not all that clean off La Mercy, but off Umdloti looked quite good and it was here that a couple of sizeable couta of over 20kg were caught. The water off Selection in the Umdloti area looked best of all and I could see bonito or tuna working not too far offshore. Anglers travelling out deeper to cleaner water have found some big dorado and some nice fish were caught. One angler catching a nice bull dorado of 15kg on a live mossie. Another angler on the same ski boat had his live bait picked up by a big wahoo that screamed off taking a considerable amount of line but unfortunately the fish was lost when the trace parted.
I think if the winds would lie down a bit, the offshore angling will become more productive. In recent years, gamefish such as the barracouta which are most sought after, have tended to arrive later than they used to and it has been from March onwards that the shoal couta have arrived. Up until then it has been the larger lone couta that anglers have been catching.
There has been another increase in the price of fuel and this is the second in two months so many anglers will wait until they hear that the fish are really feeding before putting to sea. Outboard motors are thirsty machines and a day out fishing for garnefish can be really expensive. I was looking at the price of bait the other day and that has become expensive as well.
Sealice