The word on everyone’s lips at the moment is ‘sardines’, with those netted at Winkelspruit on Monday and Tuesday last week going on the market at R1 500 per basket.

Come Wednesday, sardines were reportedly heading north but they were all out in the deeper waters and out of reach for most netters.

One net was dropped around a shoal of fish at Blue Lagoon at Durban but disappointment struck when the net was pulled ashore and all that was caught were maasbanker.

While an excellent bait fish, the catch included no ‘silver gold’.

Thursday dawned with beautiful weather and sea conditions and good results for sardine netters loomed.

In fact, it was the best week yet with several big shoals of sardines appearing at Uvongo.

A number of nets were dropped and some big hauls were recorded. One net contained 500 baskets of sardines and immediately, the price per basket dropped to R300.

It was clear that if netting continued the market would be spoiled. One person had even advertised fresh sardines at a price of R1 each!

Netters were back in action at first light on Friday, and while several boats launched through the surf at Uvongo, shoals of sardines were located but all heading northward and out into deeper waters.

One net was later dropped at Addington Beach, Durban, where a fair haul of sardines beached.

Friday morning also saw Margate anglers fishing in the vicinity of the pier enjoying some excellent fishing – a number of shad and garrick were caught, with the shad being quite sizeable and comparable to those generally caught during November.

Reports later in the morning were of some excellent fishing at several South Coast spots.

As expected, netters hit the beach on Saturday morning before first light and a big crowd had formed at Winkelspruit and Uvongo in anticipation of more fresh sardines.

Unfortunately, ocean water temperatures had risen to around 23 degrees Celsius, which was too warm for these cold water fish.

Surf angling was again excellent down south where shad are now plentiful but, unfortunately some anglers are not adhering to catch limits.

Garrick are now becoming more plentiful as well, with some nice kob also having been caught in the dark. It seems as if the South Coast is the place to be at the moment.

Anglers fishing in the vicinity of where sardines were netted recorded tremendous battles with big sharks feeding on sardines.

A large crowd is fishing the Blue Lagoon at present, with catches having also improved.

A lot of shad have been caught but again, some anglers ignore catch limits and are keeping undersized fish – while still taking more than the bag limit of 4.

Some of the shad are really small and a friend of mine was throwing spoon when he hooked and landed a shad, not much bigger than his spoon.

Anglers fishing for garrick at Umgeni Mouth have done well with most of the garrick being caught on live bait.

The pier at Virginia had produced a few fish at times, as well as at Umhlanga.

No doubt sardines have brought the fish with them, and all the local angling spots should show improved catches from now onwards.

Anglers fishing the rocky outcrops should start catching a variety of edible species, and already there have been a couple of really nice rockcod caught, but they would not reveal where they had fished. I do however believe it was around La Mercy.

At the weekend, members of the public were disappointed that they could not acquire their stock of fresh sardines, but I believe that the main shoals have still to arrive along the South Coast.

It is hoped that water temperatures will drop again, but who knows. The fish could appear somewhere along the backline at one of the local beaches.

Social media has been really active concerning sardines, and advice is to keep looking and keep your ears open for any news.

Sealice