It takes many, many barrel rides, to finally get one this good, on video.
Sard, well done, fantastic ride…and see you in the morning!
Other than Sard’s fantastic ride today at an undisclosed faraway location, practically every surf spot on the south coast fired today. And it looks to be that way for the next two weeks solid!
Productivity week!
Musselcracker on light tackle: Video
Photo 1: Robin Beatty, Jarda Kolar, Renske Massing, Brian Lange, Michael Moye and Candice Kolarova with 15kg Musselcracker caught with Niteshift Charters, Umzimkulu Marina, Port Shepstone (c) Xona
The 3:30am call time was difficult to process into action, but we did, and our morning crew featuring Jarda Kolova (CZ), Robin Beatty (Aus) and Renske Massing (Ned) found themselves heading slowly down river in the pitch dark. Clouds meant that first light was slow in coming, and after checking the launch through the gloom, we went for it.
Brian Lange steered us out of the mouth and parallel to the sandspit, at full tilt. 55 Seconds and a bunch of foamies later, and we were on the backline, rigging baits. The ‘couta still make it down to the Kwazulu Natal South Coast, and Feb is normally a good month for them, so we went straight for mackeral rigged on MYDO baitswimmers, MYDO stripswimmers with fillets, a daisy chain and a surface bait rigged with a float. Looking very good we headed north into the current. Jarda, the keenest fisherman in Czeckeslovakia, was flicking a rig of yo-zuri type jigs, and came up with a shoal of tiny red-eye sardines, which we promptly put out live.
There have been very few dorado this year, and only a few ‘couta have been coming out (sign of the times?), and after being beaten backwards by the strong current, we turned around and headed for the reefs just south of Sheppy, and dropped anchor. Light line fishing for soldiers and rockod in the current, is challenging and heaps of fun. Jarda started off with a few and soon we wee all catching delicious red soldiers. At 26 metres or so, these reefs often produce gamefish so we had three trap sticks flopping around out the back, when a nice little Hammerhead Shark came to investigate. We pulled the daisy chain rigged with redeyes away quickly enough, but he made short work of the fresh sardine on the outrigged rod and before long, Jarda was having a good old sweat.
Then Renske felt something on her 6kg line light tackle rig, an Okuma 555s and a beautiful Daiwa estuary type rod. She pulled and pulled, and the fish pulled and pulled. Brian mentioned Musselcracker due to the way it was fighting, and with about a 2kg drag, it looked to be a long and anxious haul. Remember, we had Jarda on the Hammer still, so crossed lines and burnoffs were on the cards. Eventually, after a good 15 minute fight, Renske popped up this beautiful Musselcracker (Poenskop, Black Steenbras). It was her first and it was quite deep, so we put it in the hatch as we released the Hammer, and packed up heading for home before 8am!
Watch the video of the action here…
Click below to book a trip on the Niteshift…
https://thesardine.co.za/classifieds/show-ad/?id=27
Cptn Brian Lange takes us through the Umzimkulu River Mouth launch and fishing for the morning. Using MYDO lures and livebaits, we only managed a nice Tiger Shark that Mike Stubbs filmed up close and personal with his GoPro camera, which was then nicely tail swiped by the angry shark. A clean release and back home through the river mouth in stereoscopic video – not quite 3D but you definitely get the picture.
The first drift yielded not a touch on our awesome spread of live baits. Until we reached the southern pinnacle on Protea Reef, off Shelley Beach. Funnily enough the first beating was taken on a plug with the drag set to 8kg’s the yellowfin swam around the boat as if it was still hunting. Only when it went right around us and behind the motors did it take off. Mike Stubbs and I wrestled the rod between the other sticks with the huge Finnor spinning reel smoking and screaming blue murder. The hooks pulled out on that blistering run and all of a sudden the bait sticks started screaming.
We were three sticks away dancing around the boat each with his own set of problems. Luckily mine came off and I was able to help gaff and boat the fish my Dad (Brian Lange) and Stubbs were fighting.
The moon was silver bright and we never needed a light as the sun disappeared in a sky of red and the fish went wild. Free jumping and swimming tuna all around the boat but the bigger ones were just being so violent as rod after rod screamed.
I was beaten up by a monster eventually handing the rod to Stubbs who in turn gave ot to my Dad until the line parted.
We hooked and battled many big tuna and luckily a few small ones which were easier to boat.
Protea Reef is an incredible place but very difficult to fish with a 3 to 4 knot current prevailing, huge sharks and jagged reef – not to mention the outsized fish. Even though the yellowfin seldom get over 35kg’s here, they fight double as hard in the shallower waters and tackling up is the only solution.
In a wierd twist within the Osearch Shark Tracking story we started to follow last week, one of the tagged Great White Sharks was caught and killed by the Natal Sharks Board at none other than our favourite surfing beach – Sunwich Port, down here on the south coast of Kwazulu Natal!
The beautiful fish weighed 300 odd kilograms and was taken to the NSB headquarters in Umhlanga for analysis and whatever else they do to the carcasses there.
The shark took a drum line bait and must have died a horrible and gruesome death…much like a snared wild animal poached in a game reserve.
The Natal Sharks Board have systematically decimated the local shark population of Zambezi, Tiger and other sharks here on the KZN south coast and unfortunately, pelagic sharks like Great Whites also fall prey to their killing methods.
Drum lines are a move towards lessening their indiscriminate impact on the environment…but gill nets are still deployed up and down the beautiful Kwazulu Natal South Coast. These gill nets have been killing dolphins, turtles, rays, sharks (lethal and non-lethal) and other forms of marine life like whales for the better part of half a century now.
A bureaucratic organization – funded by municipalities and the tax payer…the Natal Sharks Board and it’s staff and management can be credited with the most cruel ocean animal killings imaginable.
All to protect the tourist dollar as inland punters flock to the Kwazulu Natal coastline each school holiday.
The shark nets do not cordon off a beach from sharks at all – many, if not most sharks are caught on their way back out to sea…on the inside side of the nets. What the nets and drum lines do is reduce the local population of lethal sharks in an area…seriously unbalancing the ecology in that immediate area.
Twisting the story even further…another shark attack was recorded at Port St Johns, down the coast in the Transkei. Port St. Johns has the highest incidence of shark attacks in the world.
Solutions? Many solutions to the shark attack problem are available. Shark spotters are deployed in the clear waters of the Cape…sonar has been proposed to the NSB as a monitoring system in dirtier waters of KZN, but was ignored completely…
Observation and avoidance using technology would far outweigh simple killing and eradication.
Check out the Osearch project here…https://thesardine.co.za/?p=1153
