KZN FISHING REPORT - 15 December 2007
Shad and Kingfish - South Coast
With the shad season now open and the holiday season upon us, most well known venues will have maximum angling impact on them. The weather also seems to have eased up and angling will almost certainly start returning to normal. Small shad are feeding at most spots but it’s the Umkomaas stretch that now attracts these small shad. The river mouth itself seems to be the place to fish for these fish.

ROCK & SURF - South Coast
Flatfish in the form of sand sharks and brown skates can be caught off most banks and the chances of hooking a big honeycombe ray are also good. Edibles here include small kob, grunter, pompano and the odd stumpie. Although the annual kob or daga season should now theoretically be over there have been reports of numerous big kob being landed. A few specimens in the 20 kg range have recently been landed in the Winkle area and Dave White managed to land a good specimen of 30 kg during the past week-end. Another very unseasonal catch was also made last week-end when Niel Morton landed an outsize Shad of 5, 5 kg in the Toti area whilst fishing for grey sharks. Mark Mellon caught a stumpie of 6.1kg’s on Saturday using a grey shark trace (7/0 hook with 90lb carbon coated wire) and a mackerel fillet.
Grey sharks have now started biting well in the Scottburgh area and some fish up to 20 kg have been accounted for in and around this area. Those anglers targeting big sharks have had some mixed fortunes lately as numerous zambezi sharks have already been hooked and lost in the Green Point area.
Terry Nel from Port Edward reports that in very difficult conditions, fish are still being caught and fishermen are being treated to some of the largest shad seen there for quite a while. Some of these fish have been tipping the scale at around 3kg's. Garrick are also being caught and are more spread out one being landed on spoon at Lucky Dip also in Port Edward. Bronze bream are also eating and although some are small and undersize, a number are being caught.

ROCK & SURF - North Coast & Durban Area
Much the same can be said for the North Coast where angling has picked up nicely, particularly the Tinley area where there are reports of some big sand sharks and some nice size grey sharks. Simon Peacock hooked five monsters and had hooks straightened and pulled.
The Mapelane are has produced some good fish, Raymond de Bruyn from ESA had some great fishing on Tuesday. Ray landed four fish, three big sandies, one of 40kg’s, 69kg’s and 86kg’s as well as a black fin shark, Ray must have slept very well that night.
In the Durban North area, especially Umhlanga, fishing has improved tremendously. Local lady angler Dawn Noah caught a kob of 91cm and a shad of 2.5kg’s, according to Dawn lots of other species are coming out, blue skates, grunter, big shad and a few long tail brown skates. Great to see this area working again.

ESA KID'S TOURNAMENTS - This Weekend

ESA Kids Tournament South Coast of Kwa-Zulu Natal: Warner Beach.
Date: 15 December 2007.
Contact Linda from High Tide Fishing Tackle 083 601 3411 or 031-9166617.
Venue: Warner Beach; Life Saving Club, Warner Beach
Tournament starts: 07:00
Prize Giving: 12:30 at Warner Beach Life Saving Club.

ESA Kids Tournament North Coast of Kwa-Zulu Natal: Balito.
Date: 16 December 2007.
Contact Ian or Rogan from Hook Line and Sinker on 032-946 2303
Registration: 06:30 at Hook Line and Sinker, Balito.
Tournament Starts: 07:30
Prize Giving: 12:00. At last car park Salmon Bay, Balito.

SKI BOATS
Ski Boat fishing has also stepped up a notch and a lot of Ski Boaters focus has now changed to game fish as dorado, couta and a variety of other game fish have already been accounted for. The main area at the moment is obviously the “deep reefs” off Durban where there is a lot of dorado and the odd sailfish have been landed. The Aliwal Shoal has over the past few weeks produced some quality fish. Big wahoo and kingfish are now regularly being caught and spear fishermen report sightings of big shoals of couta. Further down the coast the Protea reef has also yielded some quality fish. Big tunny and the odd couta are now being caught in this area.
Results of the Highway Club Deep Sea Fishing competition held on the 02-12-07. Unfortunately bad seas put a damper on the competition so most boats were back by 9:00am. In all they had 53 entrants with a total of 24 fish being weighted in, the biggest a sail fish of 39.5kg caught by a Munro. 2nd was a dagga of 18.5kg caught by B. Smith and 3rd was a dorado of 9.5kg caught by M. Irwin. Fun was had by all and they look forward to seeing more entrants in their competition on the 22nd of March.

FISHING SKIS
Fishing Ski anglers can now expect some good angling as the dirty inshore water caused by recent rains has started clearing up. Scottburgh has over the past two weeks really lived up to it’s reputation and ski anglers venturing a little further out than usual are getting some nice couta. The North Coast has also produced some of the first couta of the season. Places like Umdloti and Westbrook can be a sure bet when the clean water moves in. On Wednesday Gavin landed four nice size snoek before work from his paddle ski.

The UHTFC Report
The UHTFC report by Bill Simson is although they have had many storms this week, the rivers have only been discoloured for short spells. The fish are active in dams and in the rivers, but the anglers are the inactive ones. In the dams 9 rods caught 11 trout and in the Umzimkulu 8 rods caught 8 trout in the last week. The weather has been very changeable, very hot one day and cold enough for winter the next. They are hoping for more fishermen after 16 December.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For the latest KZN fishing news, tune into East Coast Radio at 5.40am Monday - Friday.