Well it must be said my predictions of a fish filled weekend for the ski boat competitions was horribly wrong!
Both Durban and Hibberdene competitions had lean pickings with very few couta being caught.
Apparently the shad have come on in full force, not big shad but shad none the less!
The biggest fish other then a couta was a yellowfin tuna of 19.1kgs caught by Gary Ryan!

Angling
Well it must be said my predictions of a fish filled weekend for the ski boat competitions was horribly wrong!

Both Durban and Hibberdene competitions had lean pickings with very few couta being caught.

In fact the hole long weekend was dead, I paddled 28 kilometre’s on my 495 Evo on Monday and managed to only hook one angry jumping blackfin…emotionally testing to come in with an empty hatch after that many kilometres and six hours sitting on my butt!

Aliwol Shoal had a very quiet weekend as well, both Durban and the mid to upper south coast lacked current which is what game fish favour.
Alex and Juan from The Kingfisher fished up at Mapelane over the long weekend on the ski boat and also said it was quiet, they did see somebody get a raggie out from the shore though.

Funny enough there were fish everywhere on Tuesday…typical! From snoek off blue lagoon, to couta around the bluff, couta off umdloti, plenty couta off Yellow Tail in Tinley and tuna off the wrecks! Its amazing how it can all turn around in one night, the pre frontal conditions generally turn fish onto the bite!

Port Edward seems to be fishing very well.

Apparently the shad have come on in full force, not big shad but shad none the less! Along with shad obviously come the predators, Dean Pretorious was telling me the hammers, hounds and nice size grey sharks were abundant over the long weekend which is great news!

Dean and his brother were doing a bit of research for the up coming Port Edward couta classic this weekend, they managed to boat a lovely twenty two kilo couta. The Port Edward comp has had two phenomenal events in a row with some magnificent trophy fish being caught; let’s hope this weekend is nothing less!

Some results from the Durban Ski boat just came in; Troy Corven landed the winning fish of 21.2kg’s on the boat Footprints, Nigel Gregson got second place with a 19kg fish on Dilly Gaff and then Mike Philip came third with a couta of 18.8kgs on his new boat Kingfisher!

The biggest fish other then a couta was a yellowfin tuna of 19.1kgs caught by Gary Ryan!

Well done guys, slim pickings in numbers but still lovely fish!

As far as things to come… well we can expect the smaller garrick to start filtering through from the south coast as they migrate up as far north as Cape Vidal. Prime season for them is June till the return garrick start to migrate south again as late as November!

The sardines shouldn’t be too far off; we should start hearing of pilot shoals off the Transkei in a couple weeks time. The daga and geelbek generally really come on the bite once the sardines have past but the geelbek are already abundant on the deeper wrecks!

Petri de Wet’s "Hier Gaan Ons Alweer" is starting to air on Monday evenings on Kyknet, channel 111 at 17.30. There will be six rebroadcast as follows: Tues 14:00, Wed 8.30 & 2.30. Thurs 16:30, Fri 11.30 & 1.30. This series will run for three months. "Stywe Lyne” is doing a series of articles on this fishing series. Petri and his team fish all over Southern Africa, fishing in salt and fresh water and will be fishing with The Kingfisher products, reels, rods, lines lures etc.