The ‘Guardians of Hawke Bay Fisheries’ is a voluntary group of representatives from tangata whenua, recreational fishers, commercial fishers and environmental groups with the vision of a sustainable fishery in Hawke Bay, both now and for our grandchildren.
Well, not much to say really. I haven’t been able to catch anything this month. The Kahawai seem to have disappeared for some reason. We’ve had some real crap weather here in the HB and the seas have been muddy for nearly the entire month. Still, one should be able to catch SOMETHING…
Paddle crabs are about the only thing available at the moment. This last weekend I put in a solid effort over the two days on three different beaches, using a variety of baits, pilchards, skipjack, prawns, crab and kahawai fillets but the result was still nothing.
Ocean Beach is a dangerous place for vehicles.
Ocean Beach was reasonably clean, and although swellmap was predicting wave faces of less than 0.5 metre for Ocean Beach, they were constantly tall enough to block the horizon from view. I’d guess the wave faces were more like 1-2 metres. The more I fish Ocean beach the more I’ve come to accept that you can easily double any swell or wave info predicted for that area by swellmap.
The surfies seemed to be enjoying it though. Its a pity some of them are such arrogant sods! We cruised the beach looking for a likely spot to fish, and there was a guy surfing in what would have been a good fishing spot. So we moved on a several hundred metres and started fishing. Then he jumps into his vehicle and drives past us and stops not 50 metres away and proceeds to surf right next to our lines!
Ten plus kilometres of beach and he has to encroach on someone elses space. Perhaps he just wanted an audience…
Not that I think we would have caught much anyway, I just would have liked to have had a chance.
Bring on September 
Its been quiet, very quiet. Masses of rain and bitterly cold conditions don’t make for fun surfcasting.
For those brave souls who did venture out locally in the weather, the catches were predictably Kahawai, Baracouta, Spiney Dogs, and red cod.
Gurnard are still being caught further north on the other side of Mahia, but generally only after a few days of settled seas.
Cape Runaway Snapper - Photo: Mark Roberts
Further north at East Cape, Snapper are still available from the rocks.
Locally here in Napier the Kahawai are reasonably abundant, if not a little undernourished, it is after all the middle of winter and food might be scarce for them I guess.
Further South in Westport catches of Kahawai and Lemonsharks are keeping winter surfcasters happy.
It constantly annoys me that small sections of our society think they can impose their beliefs and rules on the majority.
In the 40 years that I’ve been fishing, I’ve seen many many freedoms lost. Things we would take for granted, and should still be able to take for granted!
Camping on the beach or river for a couple of days. Or even access to the beach or river. Our kids will no longer have that right. And a ‘right’ it is, and must remain.
And now some small sects want to ban vehicles from the beaches? Get Stuffed!
The politicians and local councils who listen to these groups, and endorse their stupid ideas need to be reminded that thousands of kiwis hunt, fish and VOTE! And they will be unceremoniously dumped in the unemployment cue if they upset us.
New Zealand is supposed to be a democracy where the majority rules. But do the majority ever get consulted? Fat chance.. These stupid people with their own stupid agendas get to make stupid rules that stuff it up for the rest of us.
I’m not just referring to the BOP issues. Its happening all over the place, closed access here, fees to pay there, inch by inch our birthright is been removed or held to ransom.
My partner who is from California is astounded at what we are still allowed to do here in NZ.
Drive on the beach? NO WAY!
Make a camp fire? NO WAY!
Fish any beach you want without licenses or permits? NO WAY!
If we want to preserve the status, and retain our birthright we need to get politically organised and kick the gov’t and local bodies where it hurts. Otherwise we will end up just like the US and I’m sure other countries where the rich own your rights.
The gov’t and local bodies work for you! You are their employers. If they don’t do what YOU want, Sack them.
Further reading about the privatisation and selling of YOUR RIGHTS – http://www.nzfishing.com/Articles/KiwiFishingHuntingPrivateorPublic.htm
A nice Gurnard caught at Aropaonui
June.. I haven’t been out much this month but one fine afternoon we ventured to Aropaonui just north of Napier for an afternoon fish.
We weren’t expecting to catch much more than perhaps a Kahawai but we were surprised by the catch of the couple of nice Gurnard.
I also dragged out a large conger that felt for all the world like a big snapper on the line, but my grin was wiped when I saw what it actually was in the waves. The Conger was released.
The Kahawai are back in large numbers this month, especially near the river mouths. A few red cod and baracouta are showing up as well.
Check here for discussion and hints on cooking these less desirable species.
Pania Surfcasting Club had their ‘Brass Monkey” one day comp this month -read about it here.
Conger eels feel like big snapper on the line
The weekends catch
May has (so far) been good. The seas have settled after the storm wreckage of April and a few summer species are still lurking. Water temp is still in the 16-17 degrees area so I’m guessing that’s why. A recent overnight trip back to Wakaki and Tahaenui produced plenty of Kahawai and a few small Gurnard from perfectly clean and flat seas.
There’s an odd mix of winter and summer species around at the moment with Red Cod and Barracouta (winter fish) showing up in the catches alongside Gurnard and the very occasional Snapper.
It was a Pania Surfcasting Club Mates Weekend and I was playing ‘mate’ to Aaron who is a club member.
I lost a nice Lemon shark in the waves while trying to land it, and my fishing mate Aaron got cleaned out by two monsters unseen. One we picked as a big stingray, the other set off at high speed and couldn’t be stopped, unknown species but definitely big and fast..
Aaron Vs the Stingray
Haumoana Coastline. Photo: Mark Roberts
I had intentions of making a last gasp attempt at catching something decent this summer before the really crap weather moved in. However I only managed two outings (without a bite) before the rains set in. Most of the beaches in Hawke’s Bay have been decimated by the storm. Vast amounts of flooding, land slips, and road washouts have made this an April to forget, and many of the beaches are unrecognisable from what they were two weeks ago.
Things have just started to settle, a walk along the beach littered with debris reveals many dead starfish, crabs, and other bottom dwellers that couldn’t handle the storm either..
Whakaki
March has been tough, I haven’t caught a fish this month, despite travelling north to supposedly better waters. Whakaki looked perfect, clean, calm, but for me at least, it was fishless. Just proves the point that you still need to find the right spot on any beach you visit. Finding the right spot on a beach is sometimes the difference between fishing and ‘catching’.
Heading into winter now. Weather is getting rough. Not that we’ve had a lot of good weather this summer anyway.
Still a chance of a snapper in April so I’ll get back out when the weather clears.
Small 'shoalie' Snapper
February has been a shocker weather wise. Wind and big seas have turned our local water brown which has pretty much killed off the chance of catching any good fish from the beach. Small Tope sharks are about in big numbers at the moment but at least the paddle crabs are taking a break.
Surfcasters further up the coast have been doing a bit better with some good catches of small pan-sized snapper and monster kingfish being reported. I managed two small snapper this month, my first for this season. No gurnard as yet but then conditions have been very anti-gurnard so that’s no surprise. Hopefully March will produce some settled weather and better fishing.
A baby Hammerhead shark.
January has been a bit of a dead loss really. No snapper, Gurnard, or Kahawai, not much of anything useful in fact. The seas have been very dirty due to the heavy rain this month. The only things still around in abundance are crabs and baby sharks. Mostly small Tope, but I got a surprise yesterday when I caught a couple of baby Hammerheads. Usually get a few of them north of East Cape, Bay of Plenty etc, but these were the first I’ve caught in Napier. I release all baby sharks if they’re not hooked too deep.
This large Kahawai ate a livebait intended for Kingfish. It couldn't swallow the whole bait.
Summer is here finally! After a stuttering start we now have (mostly) clean calm seas and a few fish about as a bonus. No snapper of any consequence yet, but lots of Kahawai and the occasional gurnard are showing up. Further north things are even better, in fact 20kg Kingfish can be caught from the beach if you know what you’re doing. Live baiting, or slide-baiting is what I’m trying now. The procedure is relatively simple. Cast out a sinker only, as far as you can. Catch your live bait ( a string of sabikis produce nice size liveys from the surf easily) Use about a 2 meter trace with a snap-lock style swivel and clip it over your mainline. let the live-bait slide down the mainline into the surf. With a bit of luck it will swim out towards your sinker.
Fishing is supposed to be a relaxing pass time, and most of the time it is. But very occasionally it just goes crazy and you find yourself running up and down the beach re-baiting, casting, fighting fish without pause. A recent late afternoon visit to Whirinaki was exactly that. Big Kahawai and Trevally had us running around unable to keep a bait in the water. When the fish are feeding like this you sometimes dont even get rod back in the stand before something grabs the bait.
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Blackhead Beach
Parore
Rough seas at Napier
Rough seas at Napier
full moon
Ocean Beach
Ocean Beach Sunrise
Red Cod
Aropaoanui
Aropaoanui
Paddle crab
Gurnard
baby lemon shark
Baracuda
Paddle crab
whirinaki
whirinaki
baby flounder
octopus bait
lemonshark
A baby Hammerhead Shark, TeAwanga, NZ
Kahawai that scoffed an 8inch long yem livebait
Michelle's Gurnard - Arapaonui
Aropaonui Conger Eel
Gurnard, Ocean Beach, HB, NZ
Trevally caught at Whirinaki, Napier, NZ
Michelle at Aropaonui
Michelle & Aropaonui Kahawai
