Yip, the late winter is a happening with Jbay leading the war cry this morning as 6 to 8ft sets reel down the point. Supertubes has no less than a hundred crew in the water!
It’s a mellow old south swell and not quite hitting the supers section, but the top at Boneyards, it’s crunching, and also down at Impossibles, the south swell is getting right in there and breaking top to bottom solid.
The wind is still pomping and showing no sign of easing off. My fingers are frozen numb, can hardly type this! So the next few days are gonna tell a story thats for sure, especially as the front swings by and pushes the swell a bit more easterley.
Brandon Lange down in Jbay for the contest was witness to the shark attack on Mick Fanning today.
Fanning felt something touch his leg rope and so instinctively kicked back hard thereby avoiding the business end of a huge looking great white stupid, and probably saving his life! It does look like his leg rope actually got stuck in the sharks mouth as Fanning gets propelled forward. Then it seems to bite through and turn back knocking Fanning right off his board and into the water with the animal. He then proceeded to punch and kick out at the shark, again, probably saving his life, and then the jet ski ridden by Grant Spooner saved his hide.
Check the size of that fin!
Mick Fanning survives shark in attack in Jbay
And how about this JBay escape story, down at the gulley, where a dolphin gave it’s life to save a surfer?!?!
Bait and Tackle in Jeffreys Bay: It’s not just about surfing in this town!
Bait and Tackle in Jeffreys Bay run by Tinus, is easily found up at Fountains Mall. Tinus carries an all round range of tackle for rock and surf anglers who target the kob and big steenbras that Jeffreys Bay is favoured for. The estuaries in the area are great fun and Cape St. Frances is known for yellowtail and big sharks.
Jos Jantjies with a tasty kob caught down at Kabeljauw’s, down the point, in Jeffreys Bay (c) artsurfer.nl
Pop into Bait and Tackle and catch up on the fishing news and conditions for the area.
Check out https://thesardine.co.za/mydo/ if you are into catching kob like this featured fish. MYDO Lures make drops shots, spoons and bucktails, designed and produced locally – just for these fish.
Chelsifire (aka Chelsea aka Smellsea) gave us her rendition of ‘Miss You’, by The Rolling Stones. Chelsea is a long serving member of thesardine.co.za staff, her focus mainly on quality control and sales.
She is also a mean fishing dog and has pounced on many a hapless ‘couta, tuna, dorado…as it hit the deck. She also howls like this when a rod goes, the best ratchet sound I ever heard. It’s like a joy filled siren.
Chelsea has done many seasons at sea, her favourite fishing grounds are the Inhambane waters between Praia do Rocha and Pomene. She has helped boat quite a few marlin. She loves the water, and at one point, when we passed an island, she just jumped off, of her own accord, and swam ashore?!
Her best bait is a freshly crushed ghost crab. She can murder 5 in a 5 seconds, when the moon is full. Her pet hates (ha ha) are terns (my favourite birds), and she could chase them up and down the Barra peninsula all day long. I think she suspects by now that the mightily intelligent tern has been purposely leading her into the shore-break at full speed, all this time?
Well, in a cowrie shell…don’t go to work! The fishing is better than it’s been in years.
A few minutes ago my Dad on the Niteshift saw P.J. Botha and son boat a nice big ‘couta off the Umzimkulu River.
Last night Mike Stubbs got his kob. A big fish that went 32.5kg’s. (Photo coming soon). He was enjoying these amazing conditions fishing off the Sandspit in Port Shepstone, while just across the way, rock and surf anglers fishing from The Block, caught: yellowbelly and catface rockcod, a scotchman?!?!, during the day a bunch of garrick…
Darrell Hattingh has been having high adventures under water spearfishing the Hibberdene and Ifafa points. A Great White was spotted at Ifafa, a baby of about 3 metres.
And in the next pics, my other brother Darrell, I mean Marc, with Koos and Andre Viviers and a bunch of nice fish, mostly caught, but the grunter shot off Chakas right up from the Sandspit.
Then down at Mdumbi, I gave a few local subsistence anglers my new lure to try out, the Mydo Luck Shot #1, and check the pictures…
Check out the Mydo Luck Shot Mini #1 right in the shads mouth. News from the area is that Blue Shad are full up in amongst kob and garrick and all sorts.
Yes well I do also notice that there is one more shad in this picture than what is allowed, but heck, maybe there were two anglers? Either way, fresh fried shad is the order of breakfast everywhere in the good old Transkei. Many thanks to my good friend Thulani, for keeping us in the news and for fishing and catching with my lures…
Another fine specimen, of a Blue Shad. Fact: Blue Shad are just normal Shad, but as the fish go through their growth cycle, they turn blue in bigger sizes. But this is not across the population, some big shad are distinctively grey.
So, get to a tackle shop, tackle up, and GO FISHING!
(As for the rest of us working, I am in Pretoria right now distributing lures, we will keep the economy going while you guys all go fishing!)
