In January I went up to Kosi Bay to fish the lake system with Ewan Kyle. I was very excited to do this trip, as I had fished Kosi Lakes in years gone by, but hadn't been back for some time. Ewan grew up at Kosi, as his Dad, Scotty, is the resident Ezimvelo scientist, based at Kosi. I only had three days to spend at the lakes and was confident that with Ewan's local knowledge we would have a good time.
We had some crummy weather while we were there, with plenty of South Westerly wind, some rain and lots of cloud, but we didn't let that get in the way of our fishing. It was good to see the area again, one tends to forget just how breathtakingly beautiful Kosi is.
The fishing started off slowly, with no bigger fish to speak of, apart from a river snapper of around a kilo and a half that I managed to catch next to a fish trap in second lake on a plastic shrimp imitation. Many of those fish traps are virtually the only structure in the lakes, as the bottom is mainly sandy, so the fish use them as structure to hold next to, especially the smaller fish. There are species such as river snapper, kingfish, seapike and barracuda hanging out around the sticks making up the traps and feeding on the concentrations of glassies, moonies, mullet etc which live there.
It is worth casting around the fish traps with small surface lures like Storm Chug Bugs or Zara Puppies. I also had some fun working 5cm Rapala Shad Raps slowly there, just twitching them and then letting them float back up to the surface and leave them to lie still for a few seconds.
We saw some birds diving near the entrance to the channel leading to first lake and went over to take a look. There were a bunch of small kingfish smashing tiny baitfish along the current line that had formed there with the outgoing tide. We cast around the current line and caught some small bigeye and greenspot kingfish and dropped a springer as well. We were throwing a combination of tiny stickbaits like Storm Fluttersticks and Strike Pro sprats, as well as small 3' soft plastic jerk minnows. The fish were small but we had some good fun with them.
On our way back after sunset, just after entering 3rd lake, we saw a patch of dark red near the dropoff. Ewan said that this was a shoal of big river snapper. I had never seen big snapper schooloing like this, but Ewan told me that they do this sometimes in the summer as pre spawning behaviour. I picked up my heavier outfit and cast a surface lure at the shoal. The water exploded and I was onto a hard fighting fish. Thank goodness there is very little structure there, because I could not stop the fish from taking any line. I landed it after a hard fight and was thrilled with a good sized river snapper!
Ewan then had a cast with a Rapala Subwalk and got hit as well. He also landed a nice snapper.
The shoal moved out into deeper water and it was difficult to see them, but Ewan kept his eye on the fish and directed me to cast at them. Now I was shaking with excitement. River snapper are my number one estuary fish and I could not believe that I was getting the opportunity to cast at such good quality fish! I cast again and the water exploded as if someone had thrown a truck battery onto my lure and I was on again with another hard fighting fish! Thank goodness I had rigged my lure with strong VMC inline single hooks, if I had been using trebles I don't think the fish would have stayed on. I landed another magnificent snapper, which was enough to put a smile on my face for at least a week. Interstingly the coulour was very different on this fish, it had a beautiful coppery colour.
No sooner had we released the fish and I had another throw, by now I was determined to make the most of the situation and catch what I could. Once again the water exploded and it was game on. I must tell you that these fish pull like nothing else in an estuary, and really put the tackle to the test. Once Again I landed a great snapper, which was a different colour. This one had a dark back and was more red in colour, a beautiful fish!
I couldn't believe the action we were having. This was like a dream come true for me. I had travelled to places like Madagascar and Kenya looking for these sort of quality snapper and here I was catching my personal best fish right here in South Africa! The biggest weighed 15lb on the boga grip and between Ewan and I we landed five out of that shoal before it got too dark to find them again. I went back to the lodge and had a couple of beers a very happy man that evening!
The tackle that I used for the snapper was the following: The rod was a Shimano Trevala 7' MH, with a Shimano Sustain 5000 reel on it. This was loaded with 20lb Sufix 832 braid and the lure was a Rapala X-Rap Walk 13cm, rigged with 6/0 VMC 7266 inline hooks. The tackle was perfect for the job and handled the fish the way good tackle should!
The following day we went out early and we saw some fish swimming close to the surface. I cast the X-Rap walk at them and they followed, but didn't hit. Ewan had a cast with a GT Ice Cream and also had a follow. He stopped the lure and it got hit while lying still. After a good fight he landed a lovely sea pike.
We stopped in one of the channels and had a fantastic snorkel in amongst the tree roots along the edge. It was great just to drift and look at all the baitfish and some very nice river snapper cruising around in the clear water. The water in those channels between the lakes is so clean, you can see fish moving out of the way of the boat as you drive through.
Later that afternoon Ewan had a good strike on a soft plastic minnow that he was fishing weightless on the surface with a fast flicking action. The fish fought very hard and kept him busy for a while. When he landed it we were happy to see a good quality GT.
All in all we had a great trip to Kosi. I was very happy to see that the lakes still have some quality fish in them. Conditions were not ideal, but the fish were there and that is all you can ask for!
My advice to anybody planning a trip to Kosi for this type of fishing is to contact Ewan and hire him for a day's guiding. He offers a guiding service and with his local knowledge, his input is invaluable. His email address is ewankyle@gmail.com
The first show that we filmed during that three days at Kosi was shown two weeks ago. The second one, which is a show just about river snapper and includes most of those big fish will be on the 18th of May on SS8 at 7pm. If River snapper fishing is your thing be sure not to miss it!
