Fishing Reports

With the slowly cooling water, the Snapper are feeding up large in the Gulf at the moment. Huge schools of fish are out in the middle of the Gulf feeding on worms, shellfish and the large amount of bait that is out here too. Gannets are the key indicator to finding these schools as they prey on the baitfish that get pushed to the surface by Dolphins, Whales and Kahawai. The Snapper of course are never to far away from the scene as they feed on the left overs. Closer in and around the islands like the the Noisies, Rakino, Tiri and Kawau there are fish feeding in the shallows sometimes really aggressively. This shallow water fishing is great fun but often you will have to exercise a little more patience and work a good burley trail.

Here’s what we’ve been up to:

Like I just mentioned the middle gulf has been our home for the past 2 months and the weather has been a contributing factor in our successes out here. Drifting small baits on ledger rigs or flasher rigs is the go and although we have tried the “big baits – big fish” techniques out here they just don’t seem to be as successful as the smaller baits. Often the smallest bite turns out to be the bigger fish and we are using recurve hooks on both the flasher rigs and the ledger rigs for this reason. 5/0 -7/0 hooks are the size we prefer at the moment. Cubes of pillie, squid and skipjack are best.

When the wind has got up and we have had to fish elsewhere we are spoilt with choice. Kawau offers great shelter and has heaps of options. Flat Rock has been fishing OK for Snapper, Trevally and there are a few large Kingfish around with 1 of our Skippers pulling a 27kg fish off a towed Rapala a week ago. Late April and May can be good for targeting Kingfish in this reef system and the best way is with live baits or towing rapalas. Now livies are cheap, rapalas are not, so I tend to fish with heavier gear (15 – 24kg) when using them.

Recently on 15kg I have was dusted big time up here and lost a favourite rapala only to find it was no longer made or available. It was a CD 18 in black and purple and was a consistent catcher. Other colours that have been working well in the same stable are the mackerel and pilchard colours along with a proven red head model. The mackerel Jaw Breaker I use has also been successful. Around Maori Rock and Takatu are also producing the occasional Kingfish along with the usual Snapper in the passage.

Little Barrier was hard work the other day and it involved a number of location changes to finally get fish coming aboard. The full moon may have had something to do with it. The deeper reefs out here have been pretty good still and it will really fire up around late may and june when the fish move back onto the foul for the winter stay over. Drifting these reefs with large baits is the go.

I had the time to play with a few soft plastics up here on 1 trip and caught 7 different species on a number of “softies” including the “sand worms”, “lumo worms” and “Gulp crabs.” Also managed to shred a softie too in battle with a ‘Couta (the first ‘Couta I have seen for a while) and lost a few to the Snapper that were scoffing them down. I have also been casting the larger soft plastic baits to the odd kingfish that show up in the burley but so far had not had huge success doing this. One 1 occasion we had the head and body part on a Bluefox 12 inch Garfish bait from a Kingfish strike.

Tiri has a few fish happening too as does Whangaparaoa Bay. Behind Tiri on the deeper reefs has been producing Snapper, Trevally, John Dory. small Kingies and Kahawai while out in the bay there are good numbers of “pannies” to be had, both on the drift and when anchoring. Burley helps in securing a few of the larger specimens in the area. The channels and islands around Motuora are fishing ok too for those in close at the change of light. The Kingfish are mostly small but there are a few 5-15kg fish around the top of the island and along the coast of the Mahurangi through to Kawau.

That’s about it from us at this stage as we have been camped out in the same area for so long I can’t honestly comment on too many other areas! In saying that though I did get a break from dragging fish out of 40+ metres the other day when we did a little 3 hour fish in 4 metres of water, over a little reef with the current ripping across it. We burleyed the surface and the bottom so we had the whole water coloumn covered (it was like a fast running soup!) and used lightly weighted strayline rigs and pillies and squid for baits.

We set a couple of livebaits under balloons on 2 meters traces and away we went. Snapper, Kahawai, John Dory and Trevally came aboard quickly and when we were done we pulled the gear in and towed 2 rapalas through the reef we had “souped up” and managed – just managed a 20 kg Kingie. We had to back the boat up on the fish as it was very close to exposed rocks and whack the drag up to sunset and drag the fish out to 12 meters and over a sandy bottom. It was touch and go for a while there.

Don’t ya love it when a plan comes together!

Give us  bell on 021 2446346 or flick us an email to deepsea@clear.net.nz if you want to get out on the water for a trip. We have plenty of options both for groups and individuals.

Cheers

Damian ( Damo)

The Charter Connection – Where fishing is catching!