Big pompano at Virginia

Kosi Bay has been fishing a bit slow for this time of year, with anglers speaking about a sand bank along the front of the bay, which has limited two things. Firstly it has limited anglers fishing with outfits that have a limited cast, as well as limiting the ability to land a decent fish. Anglers have spent hours attempting to pull larger fish over the bank and have ended the fight with a leader that has parted from coming in contact with the bank for extended periods of time. Grinder outfits spooled with a decent quality 50lb braid such as Gatorbraid 8x, with either a tapered leader or a braided leader of 150lbs have done a lot better in these conditions. 

Cape Vidal has seen excellent numbers of edibles on small baits. Vidal has again been productive in the early morning sessions with shad being caught on spoon. Drop-shot fun for the early risers using McCarthy 4 and 5" jerk minnows. There are still a few decent sandies coming out, however the numbers have dropped.

Richards Bay has seen lots of milkies around to keep anglers busy, but will become a pest to most anglers after a while. These milkies take almost any bait thrown, no matter the size. When conditions were right, there were a few browns and honeycombs as well, which have fallen victim to red-eye baits and a large mackeral bait.

North of Salt Rock the water has been full of sand and there has also been alot of smaller fish in the area to contend with. There are still a couple of nice fish being landed on a well presented bay squid or red-eye bait.

La Mercy mouth area has seen a few big sharks being caught using bait boats and taking out bigger baits. Both blackfin and Zambezi sharks taking these bigger baits. It is nice to see a large Zambezi shark landed on the grinder outfit. There are still many smaller fish being landed on small chokka baits and also sea lice in the Umhlanga area. The bulk of these fish being made up of bigger blacktail and wave garrick. Not too many inedible species have been landed over the last week but with the forecasts being strong northeast winds this should change.

Virginia has been quite productive with a very nice trough being present which has produced many edible species such as pompano and grunter. During the week some excellent pompano were landed.

Durban piers have been less productive than the previous weeks with less fish being landed, but with some nice grunter being taken between the smaller fish. These fish have been landed late in the evenings along with a few grey sharks. Durban beachfront, mainly near Addington, has kept anglers busy with some pompano, stumpnose and grunter all on smaller chokka baits and red-eye.

On the Bluff some nice blacktip kingfish have been landed on live baits, mainly karanteen or smaller blacktail. This style of fishing requires extra heavy tackle and an incredibly good sense of balance to keep upright when being pulled flat by one of these powerful fish. Most of these anglers are being cut off on the rocks due to their tackle being too light. Small shad and grunter for the edible anglers and countless milkies are being landed by the anglers fishing for bigger inedibles.

Umkomaas has seen plenty of fish. Scottburgh has also produced some fish and a few grey sharks, if the fish can locate the bait before the weed engulfs the line. The river has been chocolate brown and a lot of debris has made its way down.

Margate has been offering a few better sized shad, fish-tailed barbel and some nice bronze bream.

Transkei has seen no sign of the sardines yet, but hopefully some cooler water will get them moving up the coast. Most points are still producing grey sharks and hammerhead sharks. Most estuaries have seen some very nice kob coming out, as well as a few garrick.

Reminder - Imperial Nissan Zululand Couta Classic at Mtunzini on 25 and 26 April 2015.

For more details on this KZN north coast deep sea fishing competition you can contact Hylton on 078 854 9358 or Rod on 083 587 3990.

May will see Pumula on the KZN south coast hosting the annual Quattro King of the Sea fishing contest.

The 2015 Inanda Bass Classic will be held at Inanda Dam over the first long weekend in May 2015.

Friday 1 May 2015 will be the show day where our sponsors will display and sell some of their goodies.

Registration will take place from 13h00 on 1 May 2015 and the briefing will be at 18h00.

The competition will be on 2 and 3 May 2015.

There is a guaranteed first prize of R60 000 for the biggest bass caught.

There will also be prizes for the runners-up in all the divisions with lots of lucky draws and booby prizes too.

The total value of the prizes excluding the cash prize is currently estimated to be in the region of R60 000 – R70 000.

Food and drinks will be available for purchase from the caterers on site.

Entry forms are available at www.inandabassclassic.co.za or from Ken Ainslie who can be contacted on 031 205 3777

(File Photo: Gallo Images)

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