Moriti Fishing and Wildlife

Just a quick post about a new adventure fishing/safari website, which has recently been launched. It’s called Moriti Fishing & Wildlife and it offers some amazing deals specializing in fishing tours, fishing lodges, self catering game lodges, canoe safaris, wilderness trails, houseboats and exclusive flying safaris for people wanting to see Africa in style!!

Africa!

Each activity and lodge has been hand-picked by the owner for its value for money and service. Packages include everything from guided fly-fishing trips to the Vaal river and tiger fishing in Kariba to steelhead fishing in British Columbia and Peacock bass on the Amazon!

Bass!

Some of my favourite packages available are guided fly fishing trips to Dullstroom targeting bass, Nile perch in Egypt, and lower Zambezi tiger fishing packages at Mvuu lodge.

Surf Fly!

They also market simpler packages such as bass fishing at Mongena game lodge in Limpopo and day trips for bass fishing excursions near the Kruger National park.

Alaska!

Have a look around at Moriti www.Moriti.co.za, summer is on its way and I think that they may just have something to offer you for the holiday season.tight lines…

Huge Tigers!

HUGE KOB!! (Kabeljou)

Just look at this Kabeljou that this man, Jonathan Timm, landed at Haga Haga in the Eastern Cape. It was apparently measured at 1.83 meters which, by formula indicates a weight of about 66 kg. THAT IS A MASSIVE KOB!! I don’t think iv ever seen one this large. Apparently the fish was taken on pink prawn at midday on very light tackle, which is even more impressive. Well done Mr. Timm!

Giant Kob

Sometimes All You Get Is Bass

Bait Poacher

Just a short post about the weekends fishing. We hit a wind torn, pre-frontal Bronkies this past Sunday, the 18^th April 2010 in pursuit of the GIANT barbel that we know lurk in the depths of those waters. Sadly, no Barbel came out that day, without even an enquiry from our whiskered friends. Interestingly though, we managed to land 3 ok sized bass, which could not stay away from our Barbel bait. Who would have thought that Bass, our favourite target species, could actually be a nuisance? I guess it’s like the old saying goes: “Sometimes you go out to catch Bass, and all you get is Barbel. Sometimes you go out to catch Barbel, and all you get is Bass”.

Small Fish

Success!

Aaaaah, our new secret fishing hole… what a spot. A magnificent, unpressured body of water endowed with a thick perimeter of wide leaved lily pad fields, all surrounded by a beautiful landscape characteristic of the untapped Highveld. Oh and the fishing, well, it is not a particularly large dam but the fishing is simply phenomenal. Our recent excursion took us there on a day when most might have rather left their rods undisturbed in their dark cozy hideouts, and their lines high and dry. Put simply it was not the ideal outdoorsy day that we had been longing for the entire week leading up. None the less we braved the cloudy, near-cold, sunless-Saturday in pursuit of our large-mouthed fishy friends.

Bass Buggers's Bass

They obviously weren’t expecting us on such a near-miserable day as from the moment our lures began exploring the sub-aquatic dwelling of our aforementioned slippery friends, we were into the fish. Bang! The first largemouth bass took a dunebug Super Fluke with a distinctive thump. That was a little soon, I thought, but took a solid strike at it anyway and sure enough the first fish of about 1.1 kg’s was boated. Next it was “The Bass Bugger” Shaun Taylors’ turn. A weightless dunebug Dead Ringer was his weapon of choice, and obviously the order of the day for him as most of his catches were taken on this particular rig, with the odd exception of the few takes he managed with a dunebug Senko. For me it was the fluke which seemingly taught me a thing or 2 about fishing, the fish took it so readily it was as if I hardly had to make the effort of a cast. In fact there were times when we each had a fish on the line and in the boat simultaneously.

Dunebug Killer

An extremely soft cast towards vertical grassy structure near the bank, which was complimented by the lily pads seemed to entice the bite, with most of our catches being taken on the fall, and if not on the fall, then on the sloooow upward movement of the bait that we inspired with a gentle upward motion of the rod tip. All-in-all we took a total of 16 fish for the day, one of our better bassing days I might add, with most of the fish recorded around the 1 kilo mark. The largest weighing in at 1.4 kg’s and the smallest 500g’s.

An old Zimbabwean friend once told me that when all else fails, switch up colours to dunebug. Well I’ll tell you it is fast becoming my favorite colour, and in a situation where you are completely stumped for lure selection, I would turn to a weightless dunebug fluke, or light-texas rigged dunebug 7” worm of whatever variation you are confident with, whether it be Berkleys Powerworm, or my favourite Zoom U – Tail worm. A larger variation of this (that also proves to be a killer) is the Zoom Mag II worm. I have personally had much success on that Particular lure with a lightly jigged texas rig presentation. In saying that , it was not ONLY the dunebug lure variations which brought us success, the Aruka shad Lipless crank also demonstrated its bass attracting power…

Aruka Shad: Awesome

For those who either throw lipless cranks regularly or who want to experiment with that kind of technique for the first time, I would highly recommend the Spro Aruka shad, colour selection and size is purely up to you. Simply throw it into open water around structure, and crank it back. Once you become comfort able with that basic action, start varying your retrieve. A little jerk here, a pause there and the bass will be smashing your lure in no time, in fact I have even heard stories of this lure performing in winter. So give it a try, I know I will… Good bassing.

NYAMINYAMI

Lake Kariba: open water

There is an ancient tale, well known to many, of a mythical creature that once looked over the great Zambezi River and all those that resided dependently on its shores. The Tongan people of the Zambezi valley often speak of “the Protector”, a water-born, god-like creature, with the head of a fish and body of a snake, who they knew, or rather know as Nyaminyami. Showing himself at times of need and famine, it is said that the great Protector allowed the shore dwelling communities, of the Zambezi valley, to cut off chunks of meat from his body. It was only by the separation of the Nyaminyami from his wife, brought on by the building of the great Kariba Dam wall, that the desecrated serpent disappeared to the murky depths of the old river channel, supposedly, for the last time…

Then one night a traveler, named Gregor, lay face up on the deck of a house boat, which rocked ever so slightly on the shimmering surface of the great Lake Kariba. As he lay sleeping under the billions of bright stars, which seamlessly illuminated his surreal environment, he heard a faint buzzing noise just a few meters away. Drifting in and out of consciousness he ignored the sound to return to his tempting dream world, which was soon to be grossly challenged by the series of real events that were about to unfold. Just a few moments later, the traveler was pulled out of his deep sleep by the once buzzing, but now screaming, sound of what turned out to be line stripping off the reel of a fishing rod he had set up, and cast out, just hours before.

Peacefull sleep?

He rushed to his rod dazed and dreary, pulled the rod out of its holder, and with knuckles clenched white tried to hold on in absolute amazement. His eyes grew and grew as line peeled off his reel and his rod bent as if unbreakable. No longer dazed and no longer dreary he struck in defiance, lifting his rod tip sharply in orientation of the mystically large moon above. The moment he struck, his entire body was thrust forward by the force that opposed him, as if a creature of mythical stature were on the other end. As if… He held on for what felt like hours, and as he fought back against whatever was on the other end of his line, the world around him momentarily disappeared, only to return with the sound of hurried footsteps rushing towards him on deck. It was at that moment that the fishing line went slack, as the creature without warning, nor reason, now swam towards the boat. Once it was near enough, two strong arms, belonging to a newly made friend known as Mike “PissedAlways”, leaned over the side of the boat and hurled the beast from the water and onto the deck.

Head of fish; body of snake

With its fish-like head and snake-like body the massive 34kg “Vundu” lay motionless, gasping for air, belly to the stars. Unable to raise the “fish”, with his now weak and wobbly arms, Gregor stood next to “PissedAlways” who, with difficulty, had raised the beast off the deck for him. Finally, with his imagination running rampant, the traveler, Gregor, and the creature, which stared eerily, back into his wide eyes, shared one last moment. Shortly after this, the serpent-like fish was gently submerged back into the glossy water and with one final grunt and shimmer of his smooth fleshy skin, the majestic beast was once again lost to the murky depths of great Kariba.

All photos supplied by Gregor Rohrig