It is ironic that as soon as anglers are allowed back on the beach and onto the water that the weather changes and fishing conditions become difficult.
After months of near-perfect weather and sea conditions, the first of the winter fronts arrived.
However the cold front may just be what is needed, as many of the popular angling beaches are badly sanded and the heavy southerly swell normally clears the sand pretty rapidly.
At the end of May, pictures were circulated of thousands of sea birds diving on shoals of sardines that were gathering off the Kei River Mouth.
A couple of days later, sardines were netted on the South Coast and these were probably the first of the pilot shoals.
As usual, the sardines suddenly disappeared and all was quiet until the end of last week when shoals were spotted again along the South Coast, but out to sea and not near the wave line.
The rough southerly swell at the weekend was the correct sea condition needed to move the sardines up the coast.
It is all a bit confusing at present because the authorities have mentioned that only commercial netters will be allowed to net and the public will be banned from interacting because of the lockdown rules. Judging from past sardine runs, I am not too sure how the crowds will be controlled as people caught up in the thrill of sardines being pulled ashore can be difficult to handle.
Just before lockdown, small shad came on the bite along the South Coast and at a couple of Durban beaches.
The ‘subsistence fishermen’ suddenly found that they could not move onto beaches to fish as their permits did not allowed them to.
Apparently, government does not recognise the category of ‘subsistence fishermen’ any longer and these anglers are now recognised as ‘low volume commercial anglers’.
This means that new permits were required because their permits are similar to those of the ordinary recreational anglers who were not allowed on beaches or on the water.
When these anglers found out that they had to re-register and then apply for new permits, they were reluctant.
There are certain stipulations that are contained in a commercial permit and this is where the reluctance stems from.
I am not so sure that surf anglers on the KwaZulu-Natal coastline can actually make any resemblance of a living, because basically the most prolific species along the coast is shad and they are classed as a non-commercial species.
This means that they may not be sold and there are catch and size limits imposed on the species anyway.
One cannot catch shad along the KwaZulu-Natal coastline throughout the year so how would these guys survive during the summer months?
On Saturday morning, I was at the beach at first light and there were a few off-shore anglers looking at the strong surf in despair.
Quite a few couta have been caught by the off-shore anglers the day after they were allowed back on the water.
A diver told me that he had speared several nice couta at Umdloti recently.
Apparently, the sea water has been really warm but the weekend’s cold front could change that if the cold water is brought in-shore.
Anglers fishing the bottom reefs last week also recorded some nice catches but I think that from now onward there is going to be too much food in the water once the sardines begin to move through.
The South Coast is always the place to fish in the surf at this time of the year and along with the shad, a number of edible fish have been caught.
A few shoal kob or salmon, one or two decent sized stumpies and even some early season garrick have been caught. In the rocky areas, there have been a few copper bream plus some sizable blacktail on the bite, plus the usual stone bream.
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