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The water off the coast is going to have a much more stable temperature than the harbour does but likewise the shallow water in the harbour will cool down much faster as the year progresses. That should bring hordes of gurnard in to munch on shrimps and crabs as they hunt the edges of the flats. It’s still more than possible to catch a good gurnard in the harbour now but your chances will keep improving until we hit mid winter.

My good fishing buddy Skoti is something of a big snapper expert in the harbour and like me he prefers to target those big fish from now right up until August. His biggest to date is 19lb and I’m pretty sure a bigger one will come his way one day. I’m not hearing much about kingfish in the harbour but I’m sure they are there and will be around for at least another month.

The west coast has been kind to snapper fishers, with success stories from in very close out to the 30m mark. Finding those fish isn’t always easy and the bite time may be short but there are some very nice fish around. I know of a couple of boats that have experienced some amazing snapper fishing, reminiscent of spring time rather than the closing stages of summer.

Marlin are in amazing condition, not that I have caught any but I’ve seen a fair few at the Te Toro weighstation, the biggest stretching to a tad over 166kg for the boys on Scirocco. Most success seems to be between the 90 to 120m range but that may well have changed over the last two weeks. I haven’t seen big schools of tuna around but anywhere you see birds working from 50m out it is well worth your while towing some tuna lures behind the boat.

With the current social restrictions that we are living with we haven’t been able to run our flagship competitions this year so we have instead planned a few ‘sweepstake’ type events. We can’t commit to tens of thousands of dollars if the anglers can’t or won’t turn up so a sweepstake where the vast majority of ticket sales goes into the kitty to be divvied up is the way to go. That way we can easily limit numbers to meet the legal requirements yet still have the chance to run a full on competition.

We’re planning the annual Grunter Hunter at the moment and that will be happening on June 5th. We’re unsure of the format at this time, but we’re preparing to run a full scale event and if the law doesn’t allow us all to gather at a venue then so be it but we will be putting on a good show regardless. It’s a very popular event and I’m really looking forward to it once again.

Good luck out there and stay safe.

Smudge.

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This Manukau / Auckland west coast report is supplied by Michael "Smudge" Parker and supports the Counties Sportfishing Club​

For more information on the Counties Sportfishing Club visit its website here.

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