Yesterday was shaping up to be a beautiful morning according to Windguru. I decided to give it a go, and despite having lunch arrangements, planned a quick morning estuary session with my mate Cliff. We left home at 4.30am and found ourselves on the water in our little Quintrex boat at 6.30.
The tide was on its way out, water was glassy smooth and the sun had not risen yet. Despite the most perfect of conditions there was little surface activity, compared to what one would expect at that time of the morning. Just a few mullet swimming around lethargically near the surface. The water was quite cold and very clean, with that sort of oily look it gets when two different salinities are mixing.
We moved straight up to the upper reaches of the river, where we usually get the best action on the dropping tide and started fishing. I started off with a MirrOlure surface walker called a Mirro Minnow, which looked so good as it zig zagged quietly through the glassy water. After a few minutes it was smashed by a small kingfish, probably a bigeye, which stayed hooked for no longer than five seconds before the hook pulled. I continued with the surface lure for a while, but no further smashes.
I then changed to a subsurface lure called a Mirrodine Mini, which I had recently bought and hadn’t tried yet. A really nice looking little lipless jerkbait, which I hoped would prove to be too enticing for the perch, which were suffering from lockjaw.
I flicked it right against the edge, over some submerged rocks and started working it, with tiny jerks and twitches. There was a very gentle take and I set the hook on a small perch, which gave a feisty fight, before being landed.
A few minutes later I was again working the lure over some rocky structure when I saw a perch come out and slowly swim up to the lure and gently inhale it. I set the hook and had a good tussle on the 8lb gear with a bigger, fatter perch, before landing it and getting a quick pic and release.
I was stoked that my little Mirrodine Mini was working on the perch, when they weren’t looking at anything else. I had ordered them in from Bass Pro stores in the states, as they are not available in SA shops.
I decided to try another lure that I had got in from Bass Pro, called a DOA shrimp. I am a big believer in prawn imitation lures in our estuaries, as prawn make up such an important part of our estuarine fish’s diet. There are far too few lures in our shops that imitate these tasty critters. I clipped on my DOA shrimp, and felt sure that it would get some result.
I had given these lures a bit of a practise swim in my pool at home, so I was pretty confident tht they looked good in the water. They looked especially good while sinking, with a natural horizontal sink, being weighted in the thorax region. They looked just like a swimming prawn sinking down gently to the bottom with legs extended.
I cast the DOA a few times, working it with a flick of the rod tip and long pauses in between to allow it maximum sink time and was rewarded with a hard take, whcih turned out to be a very enthusiastic little bigeye kingfish. This little kingie ate the whole prawn right down the hatch, luckily it is only rigged with one single hook and it was easy to get the hook out and release the little fella!
A while later we were drifting around some big boulders in the water and I was just dead drifting the prawn down, and giving it small flicks near the bottom when I saw my line flicker. Something had hit the prawn, but had not hung onto it for long. I made the same cast again and had the same result. Even though I was ready for it I missed with my strike as it was just too quick. I made a third cast to the same spot thinking that surely a fish wouldn’t be fooled by the sme lure three times on a slow morning, when sure enough the line went tight. I struck and was on, VAS. I had a good fight on the light tackle, and landed a lovely little river snapper which was clearly determined to have prawn on the menu!
Soon after that we had to pack up, as I had a lunch to attend, but it had been a very entertaining morning. I was stoked, as winter days are notoriously difficult in our estuaries, and it had been great to try out some brand new lures and to have had some success on them. It isn’t always about catching monster GT’s and Doggies etc even the little guys can give us entertainment on our doorsteps.
Area Fishing: South Africa
Discipline: Freshwater Fly
Species Targeted: Rainbow Trout, Brown Trout, Smallmouth Yellowfish, Largemouth Yellowfish, Natal Scaly, Tigerfish, Bass, Carp
Rhuan grew up in a fishing family and being raised on the banks of the Vaal River he spent many hours targeting anything that swims. He started out as a lure angler fishing with his father in local bass circuits and money trails. He caught his first Yellowfish on fly in the Vaal River and has been hooked on fly fishing ever since. Nowadays Rhuan spends his time in the KZN midlands fishing the pristine trout waters in the area and every now and then he visits his home waters of the mighty Vaal River.
- Fly Fishing for Bass - November 1, 2022
- “Indicators” of a Stubborn Angler - September 3, 2020
- I Met The GT’s of Farquhar - July 15, 2019