February 2010 - Part 1
Bay of Islands Fishing Report
6th February - The swell had not dropped as much as we hoped today. Although it was only about a metre it was sloppy and it felt like you were in the middle of a washing machine so we were forced into seeking shelter amongst the islands. We tried a number of different spots but apart from some Kahawai the fishing was rubbish. We had a couple of highlights - Mary caught a yellowtail mackeral, within two minutes of her putting it out as a live bait something took everything (hook, line and sinker.) Then later in the day Colin caught either a large stingray or a bronze whaler shark. His line was peeling off at a fantastic rate. Unfortunately, after about 10 minutes of battling his Penn reel seized up (Colin's gear not mine thank goodness) and shortly after that the line broke. We never got to find out what it was but it was a very powerful fish.
The swell is dropping slowly so we're waiting until Monday before we go out again. We think that the middle ground is where we need to be to get the good fish. Anywhere else is a waste of time.
8th February - Still a swell but definitely a lot gentler than two days ago. We were able to get into the middle ground which was a big help. We tried a few places without success and were starting to believe that the big Snapper had spawned and left during the rough weather of the past week. The water has definitely warmed up with the Easterly winds and taking into account that the spawning season is three months overdue, it seems reasonable to assume that as soon as the water reached 18 degrees, the fish did their thing and got out of Texas. Just when we had lost hope of getting anything decent, our very last spot produced the goodies (thank goodness.) At 1pm, the fish came on the bite and the size that we were catching instantly improved. Nothing really large but by the time we got home we had a good number of very good eating Snapper around the 2-5lb mark.
10th February - The swell has almost disappeared and once again it appeared that the Snapper had too. There is no bird life at all except for a large number of starving Sooty Terns (adult Muttonbirds.) We tried Centre Foul and The Quarry without luck. Not one fish was bigger than 32cm and none of them had the distinctive red of the School Fish. We did catch one good fish at Centre Foul, it is easy to recognise as it has my best rod and reel still attached to it (definitely not my favourite part of the day.) Our last spot was a stab in the dark and it paid off. At 1205hrs we got our first good fish. At 1206hrs it was all on. Snapper were coming on all over the boat and I was rushing around helping people get their fish on board. We caught a very good number of great fish along with three rat Kingis.
From the left: Jacques Du Plooy with his best snapper of the day, Phoebe scored this nice Kingfish and the flamboyant Scott Hanley kept us amused and still managed to catch his fish.
We had some real characters on board today. The day was only marred when my best rod and reel disappeared over the side attached to a fish. From the left: Alick who kept us amused with his stories (his teeshirt gives a few clues as to his personality), Mary who was determined to get at least one decent fish for tea (and a better fish than husband Jim). Newly wed Matt who has a wife that fishes as well (a good start) and our Scottish lass who (I've forgotten her first name) left the baby with her husband to get in a day's fishing.
