Kosi Bay Mouth Trip

Written by John Stedman | 14 February 2007

Kosi Bay:  15 to 19^th January 2007

Mention Kosi Bay to any half decent angler and “Kingfish” will be somewhere in their reply.  The mouth and adjacent surf zones are synonymous with Giant Kingfish, with there numbers being highest in the warmer summer months.  The system however supports a myriad of other life forms, above and below the water, and more importantly from an angling point of view, acts as a nursery for many other fish types as well as giving millions of baitfish shelter, which in turn attracts the predatory fish.

We arrived at Teba Cottage on Monday 15^th January 2007, four days from springs.  Our plan of attack was to notch up as many new species as we could over the next four days.

Monday afternoon, in blistering heat, our 4 day Kosi Mouth Dropshot crash course began.  Not surprisingly Garfish were first to discover the tasty soft plastic baits.  They tend to be a lot bigger here, and there are a lot more of them.  Although proving notoriously difficult to hook, provided us with hours of fun over the next 4 days and once hooked providing you with more air time than your service provider. 

The adjacent surf zone produced nothing but a bluebottle sting; the potent little bastard put me on my back for about half an hour.  If you react badly to bluebottle stings it may be advisable to wear long quick dries in the surf.  On returning to the mouth we had two Kingfish hook ups in quick succession.  Greg all things being equal, was unlucky to loose a beaut of a Kingie at his feet.  I managed to land a Brassy of around 1 ½ kg’s.  Both fish had fallen for 3” ‘zoom’ flukes.

Tuesday morning saw us back at the mouth at first light.  Not long and we were both into fish, Greg a stubborn Brassy which made good use of the outgoing water almost reaching the surf zone.  I landed a fair sized Bastard Mullet.  The strong outgoing current forced us to move on.  We crossed the centre sand bank and arrived at the channel below first fish traps.  It looked as good a place as any to prospect for Grunter, the tell tail signs all being there.  Half a dozen Pouter later and the price of Gulp shrimps considered we returned to fishing minnows.  Greg immediately hooked up into what probably was the fish of the trip.  A beautifully conditioned Oxeye Tarpon exploded out of the water, gill plates rattling, trying to rid itself of the nasty little fish stuck in the corner of its mouth.  After a tense 5 minutes Greg slipped the fish over the drop off and onto the bank.  The tarpon pulled the scale on the lip grip down to 2½ kg’s.  The fish was quickly photographed and released.  We spent the rest of the morning fishing the same area with Garfish and juvenile Kingies making up the bulk of the catch. 

We returned after lunch on the pushing water; crossed the channel to fish the drop off on the opposite bank.  The action was furious; on average a fish on every third or fourth cast, and at times even better.  I managed 3 Kingies in 3 casts.  My best fish of the afternoon was Rock Salmon of 1.7 kg’s which fell for a 3½” sensation minnow.  The majority of the fish caught were juvenile kingies with the odd sea pike and Garfish.

Wednesday morning we woke up to a stiff South Westerly accompanied with rain.  On the low water we crossed mouth and fished the ledges south.  This proved unproductive, with only one small Kingie for our efforts.  These ledges however looked awesome and under better weather conditions would have been more productive.  The afternoon session around the fish traps, Gulp shrimps and sandworms produced Stumpies on almost every cast.  The fish were all small, but it was a new species none the less.

Thursday morning produced no fire works.  A dozen or so fish all small Stumpies, Kingies, Sea Pike and the odd Gar fish.  We spent the afternoon and evening fishing with heavier tackle in the surf.

Friday before leaving, we had a short session in the mouth and adjacent surf zone, which produced a Bastard Mullet, a handful of wave Garrick and a small Kingie.

Our stay at the Mouth produced 13 different species; and well over a hundred fish in total.  In four days we were just able to scratch surface of the DropShot potential of this diverse system.  The system is however under increasing pressures; one only has to look at the maize of ever increasing fish traps which fish have to navigate to enter the lakes.  There is talk of illegal gill netting and fishing the lakes commercially rather than on a subsistence level.  All things considered Kosi still produces quality fishing and catch and release should be par for the coarse when fishing here. 

In my opinion the sheer diversity of this system makes it the ultimate South African Dropshot Venue.