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Bad Wind
With Gale Force warnings and very rough seas – even for the inner Waitemata harbour, let’s just say the fish have had a reprieve from too many lines in the water lately. Wind howling in from the east with big swells to accompany it has meant very little fishing and a lot of surfers appearing along the Bays. Apart from during the most recent storm there has been a few fish caught, mainly inner harbour stuff, entirely due to the choppy sea state. Northerly and NE’s have prevailed keeping most trailer boats wet, but on the top sides with fresh water with not salty hulls.

When the fish steadily on the bite it always seems a bit cheeky to me. Cheeky to be sitting in a boat and enjoying some pretty calm waters, within eyesight of the Auckland car crawl, with hard charging good sized pannies coming aboard. Good currents lately, but the not so good moon has meant the bite time can be a little limited, but if you are out there where and when it’s happening, a binful is not uncommon. Tiny tinnys – like the ever faithful 12ftr (and now an ever increasing number of kayaks purposefully, and beautifully set up for stealth fishing) have been seen out right along the north shore bays on first light.

Casting baits into the shallow reefy areas, or silently drifting along with an SP dangling around the last few metres of the water column often equals success. First light and after work with the tide running have generally been the go. And some of these areas can be very smooth to fish from even when out further it’s just plain nasty with a virtually guaranteed chiropractic appointment needed afterwards, if in anything but a 30ft plus sized launch.

 

The high boat traffic areas have been turning up trumps for catching a good feed during the late afternoons, again the cheeky aspect provides its own rewards when bent rods are seen, followed by the gleaming Snapper coming aboard by passing yachts, ferries and even the car drivers! Nothing like the cheek factor when fishing close to road – a suburban route or even a motorway – hooked up, the line gear max’d out and the canned jaffas clearly visible taking their attention off txting or yakking on the mobile (oh yeah, I mean driving) to quickly stare in amazement at the fishy proceedings. Classic.

 

The weather is bound to throw a few tantrums again, but with that is coming both brief and longer periods of blissfully calm flat seas, sunshine and Snapper ready to feed hard.

So head to the shed or the garage and sort the gear if needed. Lots of fisho’s have gone through a lot of gear lately, so a few repairs and maintenance, a visit to your favourite tackle shop, some re-rigging and re-stocking is all good, getting ready for when the Snapper start whispering again. Later this week looks good, very good.

 

Cheers

Espresso

www.catch.org.nz