Julius Caesar had a bad day on March 14, but for the rest of us mid-March brings cooler weather and lower humidity. More >>

● Soon to be addressed by Exco is the taxi holding facility in Ballito and the fund raising for the R40 million deemed to be necessary, although the municipality will donate the land. A steering committee will be appointed for this process. More >>

There were some decent fishing conditions for a change last week and even the weather settled a bit except for the westerly on Saturday. Generally the sea was calm with some flat surf and only at the weekend the surf picked up a bit to become unpredictable at times.

At the weekend, I met an old fishing acquaintance who I had not seen for some time. This guy specializes in fishing among the stones especially in the La Mercy area. He seldom fishes from the sandy beaches and said that he had caught a couple of decent fish recently. Fishing among the rocks is an art because one needs to know what species frequent the rocky areas and also what the fish search for when feeding.

The angler told me that when fishing in a rocky area, one must check the growth on the rocks, as certain fish have preferences and bait available should be used. For example, when checking the rocky area where there is an abundance of mussels and red bait, these are the preferred baits to start with.

With baits such as red bait and mussels, the angler told me that he has had some excellent fishing in the past and had caught a variety of fish such as blacktail, stone bream and even copper bream.

When fishing a rocky area that does not have an abundance of growth, the angler said that he would switch to crab, sealice, prawn and even sardine with good results.

When using these type of baits, the angler said that he had caught pompano, stumpies, shad and even the odd salmon. He said that his best catch of late was from an area where there was not a lot of growth and was a kingfish of 11kg that took a whole crab bait.

I asked the angler whether he had tried the drop shot method of fishing, and he said that he was taught by his father who in turn had supplied the fairly large family with a regular supply of fish so was reluctant to try fishing with rubber or plastic. Last week, this same angler caught a few decent sized blacktail and two rockcod that weighed in the region of two to three kilos.

Word is that fish were caught at the Tongaat river mouth during last week and word must have passed around fairly quickly because at the weekend, there were a number of anglers fishing the area.

A couple of shad have been caught along with a few small salmon and one or two pompano. I also heard that one angler caught three medium sized stumpies on one outing but he was fishing further up the beach.

One or two small shad were caught in the Ballito area during the early morning and one angler told me that a very nice pompano just south of Salmon Bay was caught.

Anglers wanting to fish the Ballito area should look at Boulder Bay and even just off the rock pool. Other fishing areas in close proximity have been quiet and not much news has filtered back.

I had a word with a spear fisherman on Saturday morning and he told me that he had checked the water out from Salt Rock to La Mercy and had found that the water was cleaner in the vicinity of the La Mercy hotel.

However, once in the water, the diver found that the visibility was not great for spear fishing so he reverted to catching crayfish. He caught a full bag of crays at eleven to fifteen metres of water. He said that other divers had also had a lean time of late and only a few gamefish had been shot by the spearers.

While in the La Mercy area on Saturday morning, I saw that there were quite a few ski boats out at about two hundred metres beyond the dirty water line and a few shoal couta were caught. There is still a bit of a problem with sharks in the area and several fish were lost at the weekend. Last year at this time, some real crocodile sized couta were being caught but as yet, there has not been any news of any oversized couta being boated.

In the Durban area, offshore angers have caught a few snoek but there have been no major fireworks but one or two decent queenie’s have been caught further out to sea.

There have been a few yellowfin tunny as well as a few dorado boated. The guys travelling deep have reported several sightings of sailfish and marlin so the gamefish season still looks alive and well.

Looking at the long range weather forecast, some excellent fishing could be expected on Wednesday, the public holiday. No doubt, anglers will be out in force whether they be deep sea fishing or fishing from the beach. The sea should have cleaned up a bit so expectations are high.

Surf anglers should make sure that they are on the beach early before first light to have the best results but the patient guys should persevere and enjoy just being on the beach.

- Sealice

A couple of times a year, maybe more than that, someone will ring me up and say “I’ve got a great idea to make some money on the Internet. Can I come and see you?” More >>

Thank goodness for the rains at last. We needed some respite and we got it. It will cool down the hot-heads involved in the Boardwalk issues. More >>

The Honorary Rangers are a voluntary organization made up of individuals who are keen to help preserve our marine coastline by assisting Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife and by helping to educate the general public on marine conservation awareness. Honorary Ranger Matt Coningham will be sharing their news with us in this monthly column. More >>

At a council meeting held on February 27, expenditure was slashed by R7.7 m. The adjustment budget revealed almost R8m decrease in the revenue base.   More >>

“The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective”(James 5:16) More >>