Blue skates spotted at North Pier

Virginia had plenty of anglers spinning this past week. However, the action seems to have died off and apart from the odd garfish, wave garrick and smaller kingfish, not many fish were caught. The water was extremely clean and with the amount of baitfish around, the gamefish seem to have moved into slightly deeper water.

Backline from Durban up to Ballito has been jam packed with pockets of baitfish and action among them. In these conditions it is important to make an attempt to get into an area which allows you to cast directly into deeper water. A deep water point or a channel alongside a sand bank will be ideal. Use different depths throughout your session to find out where the fish are feeding and to target different species too.

Blue Lagoon had very little action throughout the week, leaving most anglers fishless. On a few of the mornings there were small shad caught on bait, a handful of wave garrick and a stonebream or two. Again, the water is extremely clean in this area, so anglers using smaller, well-presented baits are catching the majority of the fish.

Durban Beachfront has begun to produce a few blue skates here and there, particularly after two days or more of the northeast winds. Anglers on boats in the basin at Vetch's Pier have spotted these blue skates swimming around in slightly deeper water close to North Pier. This is a good sign and can mean that we will be in for a great season of blue skate action in the basin this year. Shad have been coming out in fairly decent numbers off the piers. However, many of these have been undersized and effectively released. Smaller stumpies and pompano are still in our Durban waters and have made up the bulk of the catches from this area.

We also know of at least seven nice grunter caught in Durban harbour last (Wednesday) night.

The garrick below was caught by Mark de la Hey of Freespool on the KZN north coast recently. The photo is courtesy of Rapala South Africa.

(Main Photo: Gallo Images)

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