Possible SA Record Kingfish

 On Saturday 29^th August 2020, George, Geraldine, Patat and I launched “Cyclone” off St Lucia. We were hoping to catch a few snoek and any other critters playing around the shallows.

We stopped at the bait marks and filled the live well with maasbanker. As we started running south, George spotted a few birds working so went to investigate. There was a big showing so Patat and I sent down sabikis. Both of us came up with full strings of red eyes. After spending some time on the shoal, the icebox was full of beautiful baits.

Our next stop was at Crayfish Corner where we put out 2 fillets on 4kg rigs and 2 drones on wireline. It didn’t take too long before both drones went on with small kingies which we released. While putting the lines back out, we went on with another small king on a fillet. This was followed by a saladfish and another small kingie before we moved away from the shoal. It went very quiet, despite there being some life around. There were milkfish, dolphins, flyingfish and maasbanker shoals everywhere, but no snoek. At one point, George made a slightly deeper turn to avoid some big surf. As he straightened out, one of the fillets smoked off. Hoping it was a big snoek, we told Geraldine to take the rod. With all the lines cleared, I followed the fish and after 15mins, it was near the boat. The tail beats on the rod tip indicated one of 2 things, either a tuna species or a kingfish. Hoping for the latter, Geraldine inched the stubborn fish closer to where we could see a number plate of a kingie. This made things interesting as we knew the ladies SA record was vacant and this could be a contender. Eventually the fish gave up and came within range of the gaff and George lifted it into the boat. It looked to be over 4kg so we were pretty chuffed.

6.36kg GT on 4kg line

Trolling continued but there were no further pulls so we switched over to live bait and trolled back along the backline through the areas that we had seen action. We had just gone over the spot where the kingie had eaten when the far livie went away. George took the rod and had to hold on as the fish stripped a lot of 10kg line off the reel under decent drag, straight into the backline. We had no option but to increase the drag to 5kg to try and turn it. By some miracle, the fish turned deeper and out of the backline. There was a chance. Not knowing if there was any damage to the line for the rocks, George backed off the drag when we were in the clear. Most of the line was back on the reel and I was slowly backing up on the fish when, under no major pressure, the line parted halfway to the fish. We were gutted, but could not do anything about it and rerigged the baits.

Our Mystery fish

It was extremely quiet, so we headed north towards the launch site and put in a few fresh baits. As we were passing the end of Mapelane’s reef, George went tight on a bucktail jig and managed to release a small kingie. We carried on working north and soon had a pull on the close surface bait. Geraldine was on strike and had to hold on as the fish smoked off line. The lines were cleared as I followed the fish and we got some line back. The fight was very strange and every time it came close to the boat it took a strong run with big slow head nods. After half an hour the leader was out the water but we couldn’t geta good look. Only after the fish was truly tired, could was get it up and take a look. All of our guesses were way, way out. It was a sandshark of around 35kg. Talk about a disappointment. It was released after taking a few pics.

The rest of the afternoon produced no pulls, so we packed up and headed home. The kingfish weighed 6.36kg and has been submitted for a ladies SA and All Africa record on 4kg line.