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I OFTEN receive calls from anglers asking me about the best local fishing areas to visit during winter and have also been asked by many anglers to publish a map indicating these different fishing venues.

I have in the past published numerous maps of popular local fishing areas which is a great short cut to hot spots for novices and experienced anglers.

The re-publishing of the map is a difficult request to grant because of space constraints within the newspaper and because we have published them before, but I will see what we can do about the situation at a later date.

Most of the older anglers feel that one will never know enough about all the local fishing spots and the only way other anglers can find out about them is to observe and question other anglers and pick up tips from them.

Another way of finding good angling spots is to examine the reefs, pools and beaches in our area at low tide to see where the gullies and other good spots are. Much is also learned about the layout of different terrain by snorkelling around these areas and marking them by the use of prominent landmarks on the beaches and rocks.

I have often found that the safer popular areas always yield sinkers and other broken-up tackle like spinners, hooks, swivels and line.

Other areas where one is able to find traces and line are deeper gullies where bait fish and other fish congregate.

Clean gullies
By removing tackle from these areas one does not only score free sinkers etc. you also help clean out a specific gully or popular spot, making it free of line and other things which could hook other anglers up again.

Another way newcomers can find good fishing areas, is to join a club where the experienced and older anglers will pass on some of the knowledge to them.

Good news for boat men and lovers of Snoek is that there was plenty of Snoek around during the past weekend. These fish were spread from Hout Bay to Cape Point and right into Buffel's Bay.

Many Snoek boats had up to 100 Snoek per man and Earl Fenwick on Whale Rider told me they caught over 400 Snoek. He said that most of these Snoek were fairly large and all were in excellent condition.

One of the Gordon?s Bay boats, Three J's, ventured out into the Canyon area off Cape Point (43.08) and had four Yellowfin Tunny as well as a number of Long Fin.

Further afield in the Struisbaai area, well-known boatman from that area, Trail Whittuhn and crew, had excellent catches of Silverfish and large Mackerel from the halfway House area.

Other Struisbaai boats also reported good catches of Red Roman and Red Stumpnose from the Lighthouse area.

It has been a long time since large Mackerel have been caught in the Struisbaai area and these catches sparked some lively debate among the older fishermen.

There were however no Yellowtail catches reported from Struisbaai or near Cape Point and anglers are of the opinion that these fish may have disappeared for a while.

Cape Point
While talking about Cape Point, a number of Cape Town shore anglers reported catching their quotas of big Galjoen from the Platboom and surrounding areas.

Shore anglers fishing in the Struisbaai area have been catching some good size Kob and Steenbras on the Struisbaaiplaat using bloodworm and prawn baits.

A few nice size Kob were also caught in the river mouth on live harder baits which anglers caught with throw nets in the river.

One or two boats from the Strand had some small Kob and the odd bank fish such as Dassie and White Stump from around our bay, but there was no real fireworks.

A number of anglers, including Western Province and National team anglers, have frequently asked me if if I could not muster up some support for a re-think of opening up the Strand beaches for the collection of prawn and worm baits.

These anglers believe that it is now time to re-open the beaches for bait collecting, as it was closed for this purpose about 15 years ago.

Many of these anglers, including myself, know that the beach is saturated with prawn and worm and believe that by removing some of them, in a controlled manner, would be a good thing.

Also having more anglers on the beach collecting bait would be good for beach goers in general, especially after the recent spate of attacks on our beaches.

The more fishermen on the beaches, the safer the beaches will be for everyone and there will be less chance of people being attacked and mugged.

Angling clubs and social anglers should get a petition started with as many signatures as they can and then approach the local authorities or marine conservation and see if they can get them to again open the beach for bait collecting.

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