Fishing Reports

 

Very hard to know where this season will lead us! Nothing would surprise at this stage. Weather has and looks to continue to have a big bearing on things. Inshore Little change here. Plenty snapper of varying sizes in many locales. If you’ve got a favourite spot then you should fish it – should hold your dinner if n not a lot more. Many snapper appear to have finished spawning with condition decidedly lacking. The Motu region has gone off the boil but replacing the snapper is hordes of fat kahawai. They appear to be bursting out of their skins, maybe feeding on late season whitebait? Filling out the agenda are trevally, gurnard and terakihi. Offshore Kingfish still the mainstay around White Island reef systems. A few have been landed between 25-30 kilos but the majority remain around the 15kg mark. Hapuka fishery has been pretty steady with a mixture of depths producing the goods. As per usual, true hapuka favour the shallower (140-200m) with bluenose, bass and gemfish in the depths (2-300m). Ranfurly Bank A few boats visiting here despite some rugged conditions overall. Good results across the board although few were able to stay an entire day – getting chased back inshore by afternoon winds. Some nice bass and hapuka to 50kgs have been the highlight, some even taken on jigs. Some great kingi fishing up top (20-30m) with one boat reporting four over 35 kilos in an abbreviated session. The big news is yellowfin, and plenty of them. What may be left of them after the current blow is anyone’s guess. Many will hope they find their way into the BOP proper! Yellowfin Tuna What next? After the average weight tuna to come across the Whakatane scales standing at 66kgs, the first four in the annual Tuna Tournament were all under 20 k’s! Going into the last day of the contest there have been only 10 tuna weighed, two over 63 kgs, two underweight and the rest in between. The good news is meatballs of bait, both anchovies and pilchards, pushed to the surface in quantity just north of nearby Whale Island. The bad news, thus far, is its mainly small albacore and anchovies doing the predating. While things are looking good it’s still not a foregone conclusion we’ll have a tuna season yet. Let’s be positive and say maybe next week. Summary If ever there was an appropriate time to utter the well worn phrase “watch this space” it would be now. Things look promising but with an impending strong southerly forecast we may be put on hold yet again – it’s happened twice already. Here’s hoping. Will report again when there’s been a change – either way.

 

From Pursuit

Report type: Saltwater

Report date: 25 January 03