This winter has certainly proved to be a difficult one in terms of fishing. We have had strange weather patterns, small fronts, warm northerly winds, pumping south easters, big seas full of current and a lack of the usual species such as belmam and bigger sized steenbras especially around the False Bay coast.
What is exciting is that in the last two weeks there has been a big increase in catches of kob, this was mostly due to there being a lot of colour and a strong easterly wind blowing. We hope this is the start to an epic kob season.
Anglers fishing at Macassar and Strand with chokka and especially sardine baits have been awarded with some beautiful size winter kob of up to 15 kg. Guys are mostly fishing with 4/0 to 6/0 hooks with some high density foam or the ever popular dingle dangle which is a really effective way of presenting your kob baits.
Anglers fishing with sardine and other fish baits have caught a few lovely size elf in the last few weeks. Definitely worth getting down to your local beach with a fresh box of sardines and targeting some winter elf.
Bigger seas have allowed the galjoen fisherman to get stuck into a few decent specimens. Areas like Macassar ledges have consistently produced galjoen throughout the season, mostly small fish between 30 cm and 35 cm, but the guys like Rean Rademeyer from Rademeyer fishing charters, who have put in the effort have been rewarded with some very good size galjoen throughout the winter.
The guys fishing the mountain and further up towards Hangklip and Betty’s Bay have also reported good catches of galjoen as well as decent hotnotsvis.
Hermanus has also produced a few bigger galjoen when conditions have been favourable.
Baits used are mostly white mussel, red bait, prawn and worms.
There have also been reports of good white steenbras being caught from Strandfontein up to Hermanus. The guys fishing False Bay have recently seen an increase in the numbers of steenbras, the only problem is most of these fish are under-sized, a worrying sign not to see any or very few mature or larger-size ones in False Bay.
The anglers fishing in Betty’s Bay have also experienced the same not only this season but in the last few years.
We must take a hard look at ourselves and start looking after our fish species; we must be more conservation-minded and practise more catch and release before we see a complete demise of especially our inshore species that we all love to target.
This has been an extremely poor year for belman especially in belman hot spots like the Strand and Macassar Beach.
It’s not easy fishing in the winter; ice cold mornings, rain and wind can really dampen ones spirit and keeps most anglers’ rods hanging on the rack in the garage. With some perseverance, however, fishing in the Western Cape especially for edible fish during the winter can be extremely rewarding. There is nothing like running into a shoal of galjoen between the rocks, or hooking a steam train on an open white sandy beach that makes your reel scream like no other, or the unmistakable shake on the rod tip which a belman gives you when consuming your freshly presented prawn or worm bait.
Mid-August saw some south-easterly wind patterns and water colour, the start of the build-up. Spring is here with warming sea temperatures, and anglers keen for the arrival of the famous kob. They start dusting off their rods and get their kob traces, chokka and sardine ready.
V For any fishing advice, bait or specialised tackle, please pop into Fishing Republic, Strand. V Find Fishing Republic on Facebook @fishingrepublic or Instagram @fishingrepublicstore; or simply call 072 552 4400.
