PIET Bodenstein, skipper of his boat, Bliksem once again proved his title, ‘couta king‘ by winning the Quattro Go Fish King of the Sea competition with a magnificent couta of 31kg.
With over 150 entries made up of ski-boat, paddle ski and jet ski anglers some good-sized couta and tuna were brought to the scales. The Pumula Hotel once again provided an excellent venue and the competition was enjoyed by all.
The divisional winners were Richard Longford on a kayak with a 22kg couta, Tom Smith (jet ski) and Greg Defilippi (ski-boat).
Offshore angling is still producing some good catches of tuna and with current slight reverse, some good bottom fish have been accounted for.
On Monday, Darren Poole, fishing on his father’s boat Dumizulu had two nice sized cracker and Tackle Box 1 had a cracker of around 20kg and another of around 16kg on Tuesday. Mike Schneider of Must Byt Charters, one of the few anglers who really tackles marlin along the coast, was rewarded with a black marlin on Sunday weighing in at 146kg, a good-size fish for this time of the year.
Whales of the season were spotted during the week and a lot of spinner sharks are around. These sharks normally arrive just prior to the sardines, so hopefully this is a good sign.
A welcome return to Protea and all along the coast are large shoals of bonita and frigates which always attract some form of gamefish activity.
Shad have started to make an appearance and while still on the smaller side at least anglers can now get up early and start targeting these fish. Most popular spots along the coast have been producing shad, so hopefully the bronze bream can have a break and recover from the pounding they have been taking over the past couple of months.
The Sandspit at Port Shepstone has started to throw a couple of kob and grunter, with the kob being caught mostly on the paddle tails. Big Tree at Soutbroom has also been producing some good sized kob in the evening, with these fish being mostly taken on red eye sardines.
This weekend sees the next round of the NCAU champions league being fished on the North Coast around the Tugela area, so good luck to all those taking part.
(Mark Bennett, Tackle Box)
Port Edward
Great news came in this week of sardines being sighted just south of Port St Johns with reports of large shoals about a kilometre out to sea.
Everyone, not just the South Coast fishing fraternity will be hoping for favourable ocean currents and temperatures over the next couple of weeks so that we can look forward to welcoming a really spectacular sardine run this year.
Two garrick were caught during the week and although still on the small side, shad have been on the bite. A hammerhead shark was also landed here over the weekend so the chances are good as we approach the fishing season.
(Terry Nel, Tackle Net)
