|
As well as being the season of moocher snapper and barracuda, winter is the time of tarakihi. Often miss-spelt as terakihi, these delicious 1-2kg bottom feeders are a target species during our winter months.. Further north, especially around the Three Kings, giant tarakihi, up to 5 or 6kg are not uncommon. I’m told they can be caught locally at times, but I’m not entirely convinced. I suspect that the bigger, gaunt-nosed locals are merely more mature members of the common species.
I was once told that their Maori name means “kiss of the sun: the kihi of Ra”. I’d love to know if that’s a correct translation. Certainly, from the way they feed “suck-kiss” and glitter in the sun, the name would seem most apt.
Delicious to eat, in my view they surpass snapper and are only pipped at the post by john dory and sucker puka. Because of their relatively fine heads, even small fish yield a reasonable fillet. That they are not more widely sought after has always been a puzzle. Certainly, in their own season, tarakihi fishing is much more reliable than snapper fishing. That’s if you know their favourite haunts. And perhaps that’s part of the problem. Tarakihi grounds tend to be in the more exposed and deeper parts of the Bay. Not the place for a few blokes and a tinny when the weather turns to custard. However, they can be caught in and around the Kerikeri Channel between Howe Point and Kent passage, right in Deepwater Cove, just out of Oke Bay and in close to Roberton Island at times. Yet Capstan Rock, Mita’s Foul and Skargins have been known to produce a few nice silver surprises. And even rock fishos catch the odd fish or three. So you never know your luck. To deliberately target these suckers requires a few modest adjustments in approach: except when they’re really on the bite, tarakihi kind of nudge at or suck on the bait. In deeper water (over 40m), unless you’re really on the ball, you mightn’t even notice their interest. Braid will overcome the sensitivity issue. You’ll need a short but fast action boat rod and a high-speed overhead reel to wind them up. Small, chemically sharpened long shank 1/0 hooks will do the hooking business for you. Both smaller and bigger can still work. Just remember that they have very small mouths. A ledger rig is the way to connect using two or more droppers. About an ounce or two for every 10m of depth is a reasonable rule of thumb. Err on the side of heavy to keep the line so tight that you can detect the most tentative of touches. Then strike. When you’re really hot, you’ll foul hook them as they check out your bait. Pretty satisfying too! As for bait: the best in my experience include tuatua, rotten pipi and the soft organs and gut of a long dead skipjack tuna. Have some fun out there. Tight lines!
|
|||||||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||||||
