30 June 2024 7 AM Durban Beachfront Update by Adam
30 June 2024 7 AM Durban Beachfront Update by Adam: over to Adam for today’s on-the-spot update broadcasted directly from the Durban Beachfront. Where it looks like it’s all happening.
Over to Adam for his comprehensive roundup and forecast for today…
Durban in the Morning
Morning guys, it’s Sunday the 30th of June 2024, time is just past 7. 30, as you can see we’ve passed a low tide just after 4am, we’ve got the incoming tide now, next high tide will be around 10. 30. Windguru shows settled conditions, very little wind, low swell, long swell period, so lovely fishing conditions.
Current wind is 10kmph. Northwest. Temperature is 17 degrees. Pressure is 102. 2 and stable. Wave net is showing water temperatures off Durban is dropping. Still a little too warm for the sardines but at least it’s in the right direction. Sardine action yesterday. There was netting at Pennington and Scottborough.
Still plenty of sardines around. Lots of shoals in the deep. Next, we’ll have our sunrise view. So these are the conditions off Durban. Beautiful settled conditions. Not much of a wave for the surfers but Lots of boats launched today. There are still about 10 boats out at the bait spot at the North Breakwater.
And I counted about 15 boats fishing at the Blue Lagoon, Virginia area. I don’t know if there’s Garrick action there, or if everyone’s trying for snook this morning, but lots of boats on the water. I’ll be heading out to sea later, and stay tuned for more updates. If we come across shoals of sardines out at sea, we’ll definitely post to thesardine.co.za.
A Week of Sardines by Kevin in Qora 28 June 2024: thank you Kevin!
?How’s it, everyone? This is Kevin at Qora Mouth, just north of Mazepa Bay in the southern Transkei. Well, what a beautiful day down here. Slight breeze blowing, beautiful warm day, and life is good in the Transkei. But anyway, let’s talk sardines. That’s what we’re here for. As we’ve heard, Multiple nets have come out this week.
Pennington, Winklespruit, and we’re hearing of shoals of sardines stretching the whole way up the south coast. There might even be some reports of around Ballito Bay that there’s a lot of dolphin activity. Whether that’s just bait balls of other bait fish, or whether that actually is the sardines, we haven’t had confirmation of yet.
But we can say that these sods have done exactly as we forecast they were going to do. So let’s really just try and break that down quickly for those people that haven’t watched any of the previous videos. So when these shoals of sardines, and this is obviously the mother load that has come through this winter time, and what they do is that they travel in a cold plume of water up the east coast of Africa, and if the water gets too warm as they reach the Durban area, then what they tend to do is that shoal, even though it might be fractured into smaller shoals, they do definitely move out into deeper water where they seek a little bit of colder water, but they’re migratory instincts are still telling them to head north.
So they’re not going to head out into the deep and jump on the current and head back to the Agalus Bank, because we’re still right in the middle of winter. So they’re heading north either way, and for about a week they headed out deep, and that’s because the water around Durban was around the 24 25 degree mark, which is way too warm for these sardines.
What has happened now is that in the last 3 4 days that temperature dropped drastically down to around 19 20 degrees and apparently it’s very stable now around 20 21 degrees, which is perfect for these sardines. We did also have a south swell that came through here down in the Eastern Cape. And that south swell is probably hitting Durban around now.
It’s been pumping the last two days here. And it’s now a decreasing swell. So that south swell is starting to dissipate down here by us. But it’s probably just reaching Durban by now. And as we know from previous videos, this is Ideal situations for the sardines because they, they move very close in shore because the closer they get in towards the land the more energy is released by those south swells due to friction with the shallower water and then those sardines come right to the surface right next to the coast and they start using that energy to help them move forward against the current because the current is the north to south. The Benguela current and the south swell is moving from south to north. So yeah, that’s exactly what’s happening. And yeah, I think chaps, we can expect a lot more next nets to be coming out over the next week or so. I don’t think this is the end of it. I think this is just the beginning because there’s so many shoals offshore and yeah those are all going to move closer and as they start moving up the coast past Durban around the bluff they’ll keep marching up the north coast until they reach warmer water which is when they will then dissipate or move out into the current and that would be in about two to three weeks time.
So anyway lots of actions still ahead chaps. Well done to all the netters. You guys having a bumper season and we’re so happy for you because we know you wait all year for this kind of a situation to happen and thank you for the public that we’ve had reports that the public are really you know listening to what we’re asking and they’re staying back giving the netters some room so the netters have actually thanked us for for just bringing it to your attention so yeah Life is good guys.
Life is good. This is the Sardine Run 2024. It’s in full swing. So let’s keep it real. As we always say, conserve and protect. Keep those beaches clean. If you’re out there watching the sardine action and you see some trash on the beach, please just pick it up. It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t yours. It just means that we’re keeping these beaches as they should be, pristine and beautiful for everybody to enjoy.
So cool guys. That’s all we got for today. And the weekend is upon us. I hope you guys all have a safe weekend. And I hope all those families that want to see the sardines, I could say that the best areas to go to are going to be between Pennington and the Bluff. You don’t need to go very deep south coast now.
I think these sides have all moved up much closer towards the Bluff. So any of those areas, I think you could expect to find something happening and at least get to experience the sardine run, even if it is from the top of the beach and watching what’s going on. Anyway, thanks for watching. That’s it.
Over and out from me. We’ll keep you updated as things change. Cheers.
SARDINES netted at Winklespruit NOW! 9 AM on the 27 June 2024
SARDINES netted at Winklespruit NOW! 9 AM on the 27 June 2024: Go get ’em!
The Sardine News breaks on YouTube first. If you go to https://youtube.com/@thesardinenews you can Subscribe so you never miss a single shoal of sardines!
Good morning. It’s 7. 30 a. m. Thursday, the 27th of June, right now on the high tide and the next low tide will be at 1. 26pm. Moving on to Windguru. Shows partly cloudy conditions this morning with nice settle sea. Current conditions off Durban, wind blowing westerly 13 kilometers per hour and air temperature 18 degrees.
Our atmospheric pressure at the moment is 1032 hectopascals. WaveNet shows sea temperature. It’s still quite warm, around 21 degrees. We’re hoping for the water temps to drop, and for the sardines to move closer to the Golden Mile. And next, we’ll have the sunrise view. And here we have a view of the Golden Mile.
The sun is up, but it’s overcast today, so it’s not peeping through. But lovely settled conditions. We had reports of shoals, patchy shoals, swimming past the bluff yesterday. There were a few shoals off Amshloti even. So, the fish are out in the deep, uh, they could be mixed red eye sardines and sugar mackerel, but there’s definitely sardines in the mix and on the way as well.
Keep watching and keep listening, thesardine.co.za.
#Pennington #Sardines netted at 11 AM today 25 June #2024 #sardinerun2024 #sardine #run
#Pennington #Sardines netted at 11 AM today 25 June #2024 #sardinerun2024 #sardine #run: head down the south coast today and try your luck at ambushing your very own shoal of sardines.
Hot spots are…
Pennington
Scottburgh
Warners and Winkle
Toti
The Bluff
As the tide goes out, many shoals will be trapped in the gulleys, channels and pools all along the wondrously jagged Kwazulu Natal South Coast.
R300 a crate
Starting price on the 250 or so fresh crates of sardine is R300.
With sardines being netted at Pennington, and many smaller shoals all over the coastline, this afternoon should turn things around completely with a very strong incoming tide.
High Tide Sardines
As the tide comes in and pushes over the sandbank, many sardines will go the same way. Netters often find success on high tide launches. Although the launch and entire operation goes up quite a few notches on the danger scale. You do not want to be near a full sardine net in any decent-sized shorebreak.
Rubbish
Why are shad anglers so dirty? Umtentweni has trash all over the rocks after today. You know who you are.
Sunny Sardine Afternoon Report 24 June 2024 by Kevin in Qora
Sunny Sardine Afternoon Report 24 June 2024 by Kevin in Qora: Kevin is back in studio with another highly sought after synopsis and forecast as to what the sardines are up to right now.
Sunny Sardine Afternoon
How’s it chaps? Yeah, this is Kevin at Qora Mouth, just north of Mazepa Bay in the southern Transkei. Thank you for all the messages wishing me well and that I get over the flu. I’ve been inundated with them today. since yesterday’s report, but thank you guys. Appreciate it. I’m feeling much better. But in the news today, yo, Winklespruit, huge net, huge net just came out, and that’s wonderful news that these sards are moving much closer to the coast again, and it’s about to be game on.
Yeah, it’s it’s going to get real now, guys. The water temperature still in Durban is hovering around the 20 degree mark. There’s some colder patches out there and that’s good news because that mixes in with the warm water and keeps the temperature stable. So yeah, let’s hope over the next couple of days these sards around the bluff, which I’m saying they’re going to do.
Winklespruit is not very far from the Bluff. It’s right there. And once they’re around the corner and they get onto the Durban beach front, then chaos, chaos. But as you guys can see in the video The public, you guys are getting a little bit too close to these nets and you know, it’s dangerous.
Really, it’s it’s not something you want to do. Keep away from these netters just because of predator activity. You guys are wading in deep into the water to get the sods that are escaping from the nets and that’s not safe. It’s not safe at all. So we don’t want any tragedies. We don’t want anybody bitten by sharks.
There’s a lot of predators around and yeah. So that’s all we can say about that Durban area.
Transkei Wild Coast
But let’s talk a little bit about what’s happening here down south in the Transkei. What we’re seeing here is a lot of birds, a lot of gannets, and the water inshore is actually quite warm right now. Which I’m gonna say is actually just that current that moved through Durban of about 24 25 degrees has now reached the Cape, the Eastern Cape, and our water’s sitting at about 22 degrees right now, which is quite warm for the Eastern Cape, but But what I can say is that there’s lots of gannets, and they’re not flying in formation as we discussed earlier.
They’re not traveling big distances. They’re single birds moving around, looking for the sods. And what I’m seeing out on the horizon is lots of whales breaching. And these whales that are breaching are Brydes whales, they’re not humpbacks. Humpbacks as we know are plankton feeders, they don’t feed on the sardines, even though they are very big.
Present during the sardine run because they’re on the wintertime migratory path, which takes them up to Mozambique, but out deep, I’m saying about five to six kilometers out, I’m seeing plenty big splashes and that’s all Brydes whales that are playing, having fun and just jumping right out of the water, breaching and landing.
And those are the Brydes whales are feeding on sods. So if they’re evident, you can know that there’s sods around. So yeah, let’s I think there’s a lot more sardines still coming through from the Eastern Cape but they’re way deep out here. But yeah. Time will tell. Anyway, that’s good news for the netters.
So yeah, guys, let’s just hold thumbs and hope that this is just a bumper crop this year, which I think it’s going to be still lots of sods coming through. Anyway, that’s all I got for now. Keep it real. Keep the beaches tidy. Guys that are fishing, please guys, we’re hearing some reports of really a lot of trash being left on the beach.
If you can pack it in, bring it to the beach, then take it out with you. Clean up your areas where you’re fishing especially nylon and line, which seabirds get tangled in and it’s a hazard, hazard to the public as well, if there’s hooks and stuff like that around. So yeah, keep it real, conserve and protect.
Look after our marine environment. That’s all we got. Cheers.
