#FishEagle: Night fishing rewarded with grunter

Wednesday last week was the only day the north-easterly wind really pushed through, and although there was some wind during the rest of the week, it was mainly ideal for angling.

The sea water temperature remains just over 26 degrees every day.

For much of the week the swell hovered at one metre, but then spiked to three metres on Friday and the rest of the weekend.

Local anglers who persevered in the surf and the rocky outcrops managed to land a few fish, although most catches were of the non-edible variety.

Various ray species were recorded, including honeycomb, diamonds, some brown skates and a couple of big sandies.

Not many anglers target these summer flatfish but this year there has been an increase in guys fishing for the inedibles.

The high water temperatures could see these excellent sporting fish remain in local waters for some time along with the grey sharks that have been on the bite.

As usual at this time of the year, some anglers concentrate on fishing the rocky outcrops mainly for the small fish that frequent these areas.

Surprisingly a couple of copper bream were caught at Sheffield Beach but the anglers had to work for their catches. Guys fishing at Tinley Manor managed a couple of nice stumpies plus one or two kingfish.

Further south at Umdloti a few small salmon and the odd shad were caught. A couple of anglers have been working the Tongaat area for pompano but have not had much luck.

Friends of mine have been fishing at night for grunter in the vicinity of the hypermarket and have done pretty well for themselves.

They have been using a variety of bait, including sea lice, prawn and shell bait used in mixed grill with the prawns.

One night last week they landed four grunter with one weighing in at six kilos.

On another night they said that peckers were raiding their baits at first, then disappeared and all was quiet. One of the anglers using sea lice bait suddenly hooked a grunter of seven kilos.

One good sized stumpie was caught as well and then all went quiet again for about half an hour. Then the guys fishing with prawn began to catch decent sized snapper salmon. Apparently the snappers were pulling for around an hour and the anglers ended up with a decent haul for the night.

Offshore anglers continue to target game fish and some nice couta have been caught along with some snoek in selected areas. Dorado continue to linger in local waters.

Tuna seem to be more prevalent out deeper among the shoals of bonito and also where the water temperature is a bit cooler.

Along with the game fish a few sailies were landed and released where possible but sharks continue to be a real nuisance.

I believe the inshore water is too warm at present resulting in the fish not feeding properly at times, and some anglers have resorted to fishing a bit deeper where they find cooler waters.

The bottom anglers have found that fishing on the inshore reefs could be unproductive and on travelling deeper have found fish feeding a bit more.

There are some big rock cod out deep and the odd yellowtail and geelbek are being boated.

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