The sardines are prepping for their annual suicide run up the east coast of Southern Africa right now.
And so will be illegal fishers. Preparing to gorge them with their huge purse seine nets and get them into a supermarket near you.
That the overall population is dwindling as rapidly as every other fishery we on earth have depleted since mechanisation, is but one reason the sardines don’t get right into Natal waters anymore.
There is another reason. Foreign and local fishing pressure. The poor sardines barely make it to Port Edward these days, as illicit, and sometimes even legal – fishing operations, suck them all up.
I have been getting offers of US$70 per tonne in my inbox?! And the season hasn’t even started yet?! By months!
Reports filter through perpetually, concerning trawlers and the like, being spotted off the Transkei Coast.
I sure expect the powers that be recognise the tourism value per sardine, and keep at chasing those trawlers right out of our waters…
What to do?
https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:27/centery:-35/zoom:6 (this shows the legal ships off our coastline. So if you see a ship, you can verify it’s being and purpose. If it ain’t on the AIS maps, then it is definitely illegal, and the incident needs to be reported immediately).
Report these type of incidents to as many places as you can.
A box of Mydos in the mail! Order your Mydos online at thesardine.co.za
Wish I was getting a box like this one, in the mail! Order your Mydos online at thesardine.co.za #mydolures #thesardine!
The Sardine News shop is back open to the public, in order to reach those anglers, whose tackle stores don’t stock our decades old and highly proven homegrown brand. It’s a huge market. which Mydo team was leaving out, in order to rather distribute through the tackle stores around the country. No chance. But for a few really cool shops and distributors, The Mydo just cannot break into certain areas, without the support from the tackle store owners. Except by internet.
We are operating on an EFT basis. We have taken down our credit card payment facility completely, which benefits both us and you, in every transaction. They also take days to clear funds, and take a big bite. And we have had charge back and other problems with that payment system too. When the funds clear in our account, you get your stuff. Sometimes this means the same, or next day service!
We use good old Postnet. And they handle worldwide!
The shipping is calculated by weight to which zone, and is actually quite reasonable. Postnet have partnered with Aramex in order to supply this efficient and reliable service.
Delivery takes a few days internationally depending on many, many things, but your parcel will arrive. The table here is for out of South Africa deliveries. South Africa deliveries cost R99 per 5kg’s. Too easy! Your Mydos arrive at the Postnet, they call you, you pick up…you go fishing!
The MYDO range consists of the …
Baitswimmers
Luck Shots
SS Spoons
You can read all about The Mydo on the Mydo website at
And see a list of dealers that are supporting local.
Finally, a big, very big thank you, to these shops, for stocking us and allowing us a channel to our loyal markets that have been using Mydos since the eighties. When Brian Davey first invented and marketed them. Respect!
After a great time catching eel and barbel in the flood waters recently, the rains have finally slowed and the Umzimkulu River is cleaning up!
So it’s gonna be all about the rock salmon, grunter, perch, kob, flagtail and kingfish as the waters become that murky green the gamefish love to ambush in.
Looking through old albums I found a bunch of photographs of catches and scenes that never made it to be published or even be part of a story…so they have been captioned rather…
Liam Gallagher
Ian Logie – on the phone telling his mates already. Ian got this lovely garrick at night time on a live mullet!
The Umzimkulu River gets that clean green estuary colour right through winter.
Fighting a something early bells
Pat Murray
Square tailed kob caught in the freezing early hours of an all nighter on The Umzimkulu
Ian Logie is top weight for the mighty Rock Salmon in the Umzimkulu
A tiny cute baby rock salmon caught in my cast net and let go healthily. Great release!
The crabs of the Umzimkulu
Sharene Berry kob killer on the Umzimkulu River
Even me!
Sharene Rock Salmon Slayer
Sean Lange MYDO Luck Shot kob – night time is the right time
Live prawns Umzimkulu style. Be careful, they pinch hard!
Join us this winter down at The Umzimkulu Marina for some filled fish chasing days and nights.
Contact Sean on umzimkulu@gmail.com, or call +27 79 326 9671.
Flashback to 17 June 2007: A brace of couta at Hibberdene by the Posthumous brothers
A brace of couta at Hibberdene by the Posthumous brothers: The sardines had come at last.
Trucks, cars, bikes, planes…were buzzing up and down the lower south coast of KZN Natal like bees. Every man and his dog was on the chase. The scent of sardine hung in the air and it was making people a bit crazy.
The Posthumous brothers with their ultimate brace of couta. Ask these brothers about ways to catch couta!
But not the Posthumous brothers Louis and Dawdie.
They were completely focused on their umpteenth sardine run. But they weren’t after sardines. They had their big sticks ready to fly with perfectly maintained and serviced ancient Penn reels. These are two of the best anglers I have ever met. Total dedication. Perfect equipment. From bay to bay the two brothers hunted. Headland to headland. Lookout to lookout.
Eventually the trail led further up the coast to Hibberdene, and the Posthumous brothers were onto it. They parked their car in the old carpark, and scrambled. Guns loaded. Hibberdene is a great spot for an ambush and as the two brothers got to a place in the rocks they could cast from. A bait ball of sardines boiled on the backline.
These guys cast. Huge casts, and perfectly aimed every time. Time after time. They were fishing their own couta spoons. The same ones they use so successfully off the ski-boat. Moulded at home. Hand tied with wire. Double everything. Heavy duty. Huge hooks. For heavy duty fish.
Oh yes, and very shiny! Using secret methods to get the metal glass smooth and ultra-reflective.
The two brothers let fly at the same time. The twin white metal missiles went straight for the early morning sun and the sardines boiling the surface up. The pair of spoons landed on the glassy ocean and bounced, and dropped into the clear backline water.
They both hooked up. Simultaneously!
Two big and angry crocodile couta!
The fish screamed off together threatening to burn each other off.
For 40 minutes they each fought their quiet battles.
Both winning – they pulled their twin fish up the beach!
A brace of couta at Hibberdene by the Posthumous brothers.
(BTW, I sure I hope I got this story all exactly right, it was a long time ago!)
The recent cyclone and weird weather may have had something to do with things but Bazaruto has been absolutely off the scale. Yellowfin tuna as far as you can see in every direction, with bonito and skipjack filling in any spaces.
And the marlin and sailfish are still around for a fight, it’s been one helluva billfish season up and down our coastline.
Here is a link – Baitball Article – to a contribution Captain Duarte Rato of FishBazaruto, made to a great article that ran in the January issue of Voyages de Peche magazine.
The article, which is about bait balls or where and when large masses of bait come together along with its predators, was put together by Julien Lajournade, had as it´s collaborators Duarte along with well know photographers Jessica Haydahl Richardson (Yellowfin & blue runnes in Cobia Panama), Pat Ford (tarpon and others on mullet at vero beach Florida), Marc Montocchio (great photograph with tarpon and silversides in the Caymans) and Scott Kerrigan (on sailfish and sardines off Isle Mujeres – Mexico).
You can read and see more of Duarte’ss amazing experiences with these bait balls right here…
Bait balls – massive amounts of bait and predators – it is all happening at Bazaruto right now, here is an email I received from Duarte recently…
“Hey mate, hope all good…
As you know after the season I have chilling with the family and finalizing all the bookings for the rest of the year for Bazaruto and Cape Verde. But, after cyclone Dineo (which as you know was much kinder to us here in Vilankulos / Bazaruto than our friends further south in the Inhambane area) we finally have had a spell of absolutely gorgeous weather and my boys at Bazaruto told me about excellent light tackle game fishing. So, yesterday decided to take my boy (that´s Duarte´s oldest son which just turned 4 years and is obsessed with fishing – I hear he prefers to watch fishing videos than cartoons – wonder where he gets it from) out. Man, it was absolutely unbelievable from when we got to V-mile area yesterday morning until midafternoon when we come back was going mental. I think all the churning caused by the cyclone as just moved up all these nutrients and the ocean is alive everywhere you look. Between V mile all the way to the north of the Island at any given time you seeing 5 or more schools of Yellowfin tuna, skipjack and bonnies gorging themselves on tiny oceanic anchovy! It´s all small stuff (what we in season call bait) but great fun on the light tackle. Perfect stuff to target on the light spinning rods.
We had nonstop action from the start and everyone hooked up simultaneously all the time. It looks like a slaughter and we did take a lot of fish out but we released much more and we were all with our freezers empty and brought some fish back for the boys. Funniest thing was Duarte Jnr, who we have now nicknamed gaffman, who at a stage did not want to take any rod but just wanted to gaff the fish, every single one of them…hilarious! And he knows when they really small he was like ´´this one we throw back “! By 10am he was so tired he was falling asleep but kept being woken up by screaming reels and he just could not resist. To let him have a much-deserved nap (he did wake up at 4am), and despite the water being horrible dirty and green I decided to fish for Marlin for a couple hours. We first put a live YFT but that did not last long and we were hooked up to a shark within 20 minutes, which obviously woke him up againJ! I decided to put the lures and head out wide in search of blue water which was not to be seen up to 500 meters out! It was green and we never raised one, did get a decent wahoo for Rafi tough. When we come back early afternoon it was still going wild and the mayhem continued before we decided to call it a day at 3pm. We have a strong SE moving in on Sunday which should push in the blue water and I am sure some fish with a sharp nose with it…there is enough bait to make them come! Until then we will just have fun on the small stuff, back at it tomorrow…
Cheers mate…attached a couple of pics from yesterday. Back at it tomorrow, and the next day!!!””
Some guys have all the luck!
Thank you Duarte…
In amongst and all around the Bazaruto Baitballs are gamefish
Dudas Jnr winding the bonnies
Duarte Jnr looking ready with the gaff off Bazaruto Island
And now this…
After mastering the necessary gaffing skills to be on the boat with his Dad, young Duarte was seen at the helm of his first vessel – a surfboard, at Tofo!
Oh oh, better catch some waves now before he grows up
