With the start of the month the Southeast took a strong grip on the fishing here with windspeeds mostly oscillating around 20 knots. Occasionally predicted short windows of slightly less often enough turned out a hoax as I suffered myself along a single attempt to jig a few kitchen fish. Add the seasonally very low number of tourists along that first fortnight and you have all the ingredients for fishing activity at level zero. Only mid month things changed a little to the better. The tourists started to come in and the windows of lesser wind became a bit more frequent though neither reliable nor lasting. On the 19th I tagged along with Sandro on Frenzy and German father and son Enrico and Julian for the first ever big game trolling experience and it was as calm as it can be at this time of they year with only around 12 knots and waves of about 1.5 meters. Nice on top that the area behind the Sisters was loaded with Sailfish. Just that they would not bite. We raised I think 6 along that half day trip but they all just came for a single knock with the bill and buggered off. Meanwhile all the other smaller gamefish including the everpresent Bonitos seemed to have disappeared. So we were lucky to have caught this Wahoo from the single clear strike of that half day trip

Still it wasn`t boring at all as under those many small flocks of birds one could see the Sailfish swimming and finning lazily. Hitting them when feeding and not so skittish would make a feast but they remained difficult as the time since showed. With the rather plenty tourists now some more trips took place or often rather were attempted and cut short as the hopeful anglers had to realize they could not stand the swell. Some managed though and the odd Sailfish then made a mistake like this one caught and released by Sandro.

The guests were a bunch of ladies and Sandro was impressed after wards how well these coped with the conditions. A couple of smaller fish rounded off their day nicely. 

Some other boats managed a Sail here and there, too, but it so far never got consistent. But one has to admit that trips actually done have still been very few as most tourists having reached Praslin by ferry had had their share of boating upon arrival. Inshore also had little to offer these days. The wind and drifting weeds limit area options pretty much to my house bay and a few anglers who had asked for info found out what I had been telling them: at this time there is usually no bait and thus chances for a bigger catch are slim. Actually I have not seen a single reasonable fish here in the bay for the whole month and subsequent were my own catches on fly and even spin from the drifting boat while the mentioned guest anglers also found only the usual small stuff. Even Antonio from I think Italy who has been fishing long hours for many days and also from a kayak only once scratched the 2kg mark but was at least rewarded with a nice variety.

Yesterday the wind was just calm enough for it so I tried popping the high tide at noon a few miles offshore. Found the water all green like a frog pond and not a single Fusilier on the surface so no big surprise that along 4 hours not a fin or scale showed up. Today it is still decent but I have to fulfill my duties here. Guess a few charter boats must have this rare and valuable spell and anything noteworthy from their end will be featured here next month.

For the preceeding reports check the archive.