Manukau - October 2009

Snapper move in

This snapper, weighing just under 7kg, was taken in 45m of water off Piha in late August – typical of the nice coastal fish that have moved in.

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In the first few weeks of September the coastal snapper finally started making an appearance.

Not only were they present, they were good-sized, hard-fighting fish. A possible reason for this was a temperature increase of 2°C, which I noticed between recent trips on the coast. There have been reports of several fish over 4.5kg, with a few even getting up to 7kg – a good start to the snapper fishing. These fish were caught in depths ranging from 10-50m, and seem to be coming from north of the bar, off Piha and Murawai.

A tip would be to place berley bombs near the bottom to get the fish around. On a recent trip out deeper, it was very noticeable that once the berley was down the fishing started to improve markedly, especially on the bigger fish.

Along with the arrival of snapper, we saw the departure of the sharks, but unfortunately the barracouta were still present, so if the baits or soft-plastics were slow getting to the bottom, gear loss was common.

Over the bar the bigger gurnard are found just behind the break, but not in great numbers, with the deeper waters producing gurnard of a much smaller size.

Snapper are still to make their annual migration into the harbour; keepable fish should begin to be caught in the coming months. The gurnard and kahawai are still present in reasonable numbers, and make up for the lack of legal snapper in the harbour.

The scallop season has now been underway for a month, and their condition should be improving, with nice fat orange roes becoming more common.

It is with great anticipation that I remind us all that the game-fishing season is getting near. So, for those of us that way inclined, it may be worth starting to get those reels re-spooled, leaders replaced and knots tied before the season starts. When the gamefish arrive, we want to be able to grab the gear and get out amongst the action straight away. And who knows, they may arrive a little earlier this year…

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