Drop shot/spinning in the harbour: What could I be doing wrong?

[ebvahed]

Recently I've been fishing in durban harbour, targeting kingfish and sea pike. The predominant baifish are mullet, moonies, blacktails and glassies(from what I can see), and the water clarity is probabaly about 1-2m. I noticed the chases on the rising as well as the falling tide. So based on the bait fish and clarity(as if I know what I'm talking about) I decided to go for rapala x-rap walk 9cm silver, rapala skitter pop silver, Maria duplex 16gram silver, McCarthy olive pearl paddle tail 5 inch. I even tried some halco sourcerer to mimic prawn, Rapala slashbait orange(desperation), McCarthy goldfish jerk minnow, and some titan lures. All my soft plastics were fished with a 1/4oz jighead and 1/0 hook. And nomatter what I try, I had no success.

Most of the time I've been trying from the banks, and there ARE fish there. People use live blacktails and live moonies and catch kingfish, and I've seen someone catch a seapike on a popper. And besides, I can see the chases. I even caught a seapike on a sardine fillet.


In my most recent trip, I fished from a boat in the harbour, I was chased twice by a seapike in a popper, but it didn't commit. It actually followed the lure right to the boat.


I am using a daiwa regal 4000, Shimano schimitar 7', 15Kg suffix casting braid(bright orange) and a 8Kg florocarbon leader.


My big question is... 1) What am I doing wrong? Do you have any suggestions?


2) How do you fish poppers in the harbour? Is it the same as estuaries/rivers?


3) How do I fish the gullies? I notice that all the action happens in the gullies or on the edge of them.


4) Any DVD's or material you recommend? Is inside Angling available on DVD?


Any assistance will be highly appreciated, I'm sure there are more people in the same boat....


Tight lines

[Capt. Hook]

Durban Harbour colours are White, Chartrues and Pink

[Tommo]

Hi Ebrahim

Sorry to hear you are having difficulty getting fish on artificials. It sounds as though you have pretty much the right set up as far as tackle goes. So that is a good start.
I would definitely fish the harbour in the same way as an estuary, that is basically what it is, a big estuarine system. You are right, there are fish there, species such as sea pike, kingfish, garrick, springer etc can be caught in the harbour on lure.
At this time of year I would focus on the McCarthy goldfish jerk minnow on the 1/4 oz jig head for the deeper fishing. This does a pretty good imitation of a swimming prawn. Cast it out and let it sink right to the bottom. Give it a twitch, by lifting your rod tip fairly sharply, then let it sink down again. allow about 3 to 4 seconds between twitches so that it has time to land on the bottom again. Work the lure this way along the edges of drop offs, or fishing the holes near shallow banks. You need a lot of patience and perseverance, but it will get eaten.

For the evenings and early mornings, and also any time that there are active surface smashes try your 9cm Rapala X-Rap Walk, or any other similar sized surface walking lure. This must be worked fairly slowly with a twitching zig-zag action. I find that if you pause it between every four or five twitches and just allow it to float this often brings on a strike from certain species, particularly springer. This lure is good for covering water when you aren't sure exactly where the fish are, but feel that they must be in the area.
If you know exactly where the fish are, due to them making visible chases and are not getting any action on your popper or walking lure, then try a floating minnow, such as a small Shad rap. Cast it out and give it a short twitch, causing it to dive, then allow it to float to the top again, followed by another short twitch. This is a very slow way of fishing, but generates a lot of hits if you are patient, and the lure stays in the strike zone for a long time.

If the fish are smashing freely on the surface and it looks like there is a lot of action, then use your skitter pop. Again twitch it quite gently, you will hear it make a liquid sound almost like water bubbling out of a bottle. That is just the right strength of twitch. Again, give it three or four pops, then let it rest for a couple of seconds before twitching it again.

Estuary fishing takes an enormous amount of patience and self belief. You may only get two fish in a three or four hour session on some days, but you need to expect that strike on every cast.

You will find that the fish feed better on certain tides, and that things go quiet at other times. In estuaries I normally do well around the turn of the low tide near the mouth area, and with the first half of the push. Upriver the dropping tide is great, particularly after it has dropped for about 2 hours. It is usually very quiet on the lull between tides. Fish love current. Good luck with it, I am sure you will crack it soon and be posting some pictures of great fish on UA.   

[Nikao]

Great reply Tommo with good technique tips.  :shre:

Look forward to seeing some good posts from Ebrahim in the near future!

[Prego]

There you have it Ebrahim from the master himself, always willing to share his knowledge and experience.

  Tommo, what wonderful part of the world have you just returned from sir??

[Tommo]

Hi Prego, thanks! I am just back from a lovely long weekend at a secret location in Transkei. Sorry to not be able to divulge the name, but I had to promise in order to be allowed to go there... The fishing was excellent though. I will be putting a report up asap.

[Prego]

Hi Prego, thanks! I am just back from a lovely long weekend at a secret location in Transkei. Sorry to not be able to divulge the name, but I had to promise in order to be allowed to go there... The fishing was excellent though. I will be putting a report up asap.

Fully understand, sounds great.

[WalkersKiller]

Sorry to hear about your bad luck, all I can say is persevere... It took me a long time to get my first fish on lure even though the Kob and Garrick were smashing fish right in front of me.

What you need to do is change your retrieve speeds, fish smaller lures, more attracter colours might work as well...

Look out for the Alcock brothers DVDs they are amazing and will teach you everything you need to know about fishing a lure, also remember when fishing from the side the fish are often spooked by the slight bit of noise in built up areas, even in quiet areas, they will be feeding on their natural prey and bait but if they sense vibration on the bank and then a strange lure comes swimming past them, they might think twice.

All the best bru

 

[mohamed-a]

Hi ive been fishing in the harbour with artificials for a few years now and found that this little strike pro has had the most success from all the other lures ive tried. i mostly fish lures at yacht mole. the kingfish and pike seem to love them, but i can admit you will have days were you dont even get a strike...well thats fishing. this size in particular is a 7.5cm quite small but has caught me most of my fish. ive used the bigger ones like the 13cm but the only prob is that they swim a bit deeper and you can often get stuck with it, but the small kingies dont seem to take the big one but love the 7.5cm. i guess the size, but if you do get a strike on it its most likely you hav a decent fish. I only target the spring tides at full high, and fish on the bank side. there are some days wen there is a strong southerely wind and it can be quite difficult to cast wen fishing on the bank side, this is wen i try the opposite side were the yachts park dont under estimate this spot, some nice pick handles and kingies in that small bay area. As far as whats the best time to fish, i would say early morning and dusk. if the fish are on the bite and its getting dark dont feel shy to take a few more casts you will get suprized as ive caught kingies after the sun has set in the dark...yes thats rite in the dark. Dont feel shy to try different things and dont give up too easily your hard work will pay off. 

[Fritz]

Sorry to hear about your missfortune. But I will give you the same advise I gave a friend many years ago and today he gets more fish then I do.
 
Firstly dont bath for at least 3 days before you go fishing. Then on the day you are at the waters edge rub your bait in your crotch and cast. You will be amased with the results.
 
Sorry boet I could not resist that comment. Please listern to what Tommo said that is most certainly sound advise. What I could say thou is that I have had some good catches with the glow Mcarthy minows in the bay at night with the smaller Kingies and the lure that you have above worked for me in the esturies.
 
You could look for the Alcock brothers they have brought out some nice DVD's on this type of fishing but was all done in the esturies.

[REEFMAN]

Sorry to hear about your missfortune. But I will give you the same advise I gave a friend many years ago and today he gets more fish then I do.
 
Firstly dont bath for at least 3 days before you go fishing. Then on the day you are at the waters edge rub your bait in your crotch and cast. You will be amased with the results.
 

Always works!! 

[ebvahed]

Guys... thank you all for the informative, detailed replies. Really appreciate it.


I was never gonna give up, but I was definitely doubting my techniques. And with a noticeable amount of money spent, and just some bass and shad to show for it(Both of these fish would have smashed a shoelace at the time, so they don't really count for me), my hope was dwindling...


Nevertheless, armed with this new knowledge, I will most definitely put it to action, and hopefully get some results!


LOL fritz! Not with two treble hooks...einaaaaaaaa!   But while we on the subject of scent, what are the opinions?? So far, the only fish I caught on artificials were shad on berkley jerkshad and a ton of bass on a halco sorcerer. Cant deduce any useful assumptions myself as yet...


Hey Mohamed, is that a sinking lure or surface or what? Will definitely endeavor to acquire myself 1 of those....




Thanks again to all the guys, will definitely put all this knowledge to action!
 

[WalkersKiller]

  bru, please take some pics when you start nailing those fish!

[Tommo]

You ask an interesting question about scent on lures. I have fished with and without scented baits quite extensively, and find the following:

Scented baits have a definite advantage when fishing very slowly on the bottom. For this reason you pick up borderline predatory species more often such as grunter, sillago, pursemouth etc. The problem is it is the scent that gets these fish to bite, and not the action of the lure. For this reason I don't count fish caught on scented baits onto my list of species caught on artificials.
Unscented baits rely totally on action and presentation to get strikes. They do equally well as scented baits in most cases, except those mentioned above. Fishing them faster in midwater, or targeting proper predatory species there is no difference in the number of strikes on unscented baits. To me fish caught by the action imparted to the lure by the angler constitutes a genuine catch on artificial, so I am inclined towards fishing with unscented baits.

My overall impression is that scented baits aren't worth the high prices that they cost, unless you are specifically targeting species which generally aren't keen to eat artificials.

[WalkersKiller]

Very true Tommo, like your way of thinbking there bru!

[deezynking]

nice article.
Good luck EB

[deezynking]

any update ebvahed?

[ebvahed]

Unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to go fishing since my post. My weekday fishing adventures are finally over, as I have just started a new job-My first job. the weather on the weekend wasn't the best either. My only consolation is that I am going to Richardsbay on the 14th nextweek. Cant wait! Definitely going to try my luck in the canal and hopefully at the short pier.