Since all the hordes of boats have been going to the workups of Tiri we have decided to look for our own fishing grounds away from the hundreds of boats and cowboys who still drive through the workups. On Friday last week we were watching people chasing workups on Face Book (which my clients were pointing out), but I decided to head in the other direction out wide towards Coromandel. We found some good fish in the morning over by Coromandel harbour in the morning but it went a bit quiet so I decided to head to the barges to jig some kings. Well the kings weren’t biting and I was very tempted to head over to the carpark with the rest of Auckland. I made a plan with my clients Devan and Matt Vitali to head down the coast looking for birds and bait and they agreed to take the gamble! Well the gamble paid off as we found huge areas of bait with gannets rafted up on the water (either had fed or were going to).
We fished around them and it was all on with big snapper coming on board. Then the birds got up and started to work up a little away from us. Well by this stage we nearly had full bins so we moved over to the workup and finished off there. The Pink Slider 140g got the biggest fish but the Candy apple was also very consistent. Orange also good (third best).
I then ventured across here for my next charter the day later and while there were not as many birds around the fish were still here although on a more tentative bite. All of a sudden I saw a workup forming in close off Fantail bay and headed over there. I have noticed that we get the bigger snapper in closer out of the main current under these workups (and we did)!
I think I will go back and concentrate on this area again this year as there is always a backup of late arvo/early evening workups that form on the 40mtr confluence on the way home (often we drive past them with full bins, but still a good back up plan to have for tougher days).
Nik Key is a tutor, guide, lure tester and charter skipper
Cheers Capt. Snap (Nik)
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