Fishing Pomene

Fishing Pomene: the best of Mozambique! This place has everything. A huge estuary. Cooking surf spots. And a very deep blue ocean beckoning to you to come fishing in it all day long. And all right down the drag from Bazaruto!

Rock n Surf

All along the front of the Pomene Sandspit is Natal Stumpnose territory. You may be lucky enough to find the delicious Speckled Snapper. Or it’s cousin the Bohar, or Mangrove Jack. Springer and bonefish also utilise this drag strip as they hunt whiting and sprats in the shallows too.

Day and night. However, nighttime is the right time. And it is very comfortable and safe fishing.

The Pomene point is a radical promontory that sticks right out into the Indian Ocean. Many trophy fish have come off these rocks. Instead of drones, local kayak anglers will paddle your bait out for you. A few hundred metres! And then drop it off. You can watch all that in the following video.

Estuary

A shape-changing delightful body of water.

Acres of kingfish. Water frothed to white. And they are on a clock!

Once you work out their pattern, you will be in the game. As with all estuaries, it takes a day or three to dial into what is going on. Where the bait is hanging about. What time does the tide push the hardest? Where is the most concentrated section of the estuary?

Once you have been able to formulate a picture in your mind as to what is going on, you can adapt your days to suit.

Walking along the inside of the sandspit north, with a little fly-rod in hand, might be one of the best walks you ever take in your life. Ultra-light will yield the same level of stoke for the less experienced. A while ago, along this exact piece of sand, on a horse riding adventure, was discovered, two big yellowfin tuna. They were over 25 kgs each. They were right up on the beach. And leading to them were two long skid marks in the sand. These two massive fish (for any estuary) had beached themselves as they rocked through a shoal of bait in the shallows. This was on the inside!

At low tide, you can very clearly see the narrowest part of the estuary. Inland is made up of peat banks and mangroves. And the seaside is soft sand that tries to bury you with every step. There is a deep gulley running from the north side, that converges right here too. This makes this a hotspot. Fish paddle tails or a bucktail for widest range of target species.

From this corner, if you are on a boat or a kayak, drift out with the tide into the middle of the shallow basin right there. Down in this basin are sunken old trees. They get covered up by sand. And uncovered. Depending on the mood of the estuary. If you can find one, with your echo sounder or by looking over the edge, anchor up and start having fun. These old trees are fish magnets and if you find one, and stay there a while, you will get strikes.

Once you go past the lodge and into the channels at the back of the estuary, you will find there are just too many netters and fishers there to have fun. That said, a spring high tide in this area will produce results and amazing spectacles as the clear blue water rushes right into the mangrove forest that lines the entire estuary.

Deep Sea

Being barely a hundred kilometres from Bazaruto (you can see Baz on a clear day, from the beach at the point) these waters see a great deal of big fish activity.

Acres of bait. Reefs dotted all over the place. The continental shelf is not even far. And Bassa da Zambia is within reach. Another incredible undersea mountain. It connects to the Sylvia Shoal by a dotted string of proper reefs and pinnacles. And it’s only 17 kms from Pomene by sea. It is fished commercially, and plundered occasionally by unidentified ships, who disappear in the early mornings. But as an undersea feature, it is immense. At the north part of the reef, it gets a bit deeper, like 20m or so, and pinnacles pop up all over the place. Snorkelling with the current down the shallow part is exhilarating. They even got sharks at Zambia!

Kayak

To fish shallow, for Queen Mackerel and kingfish and things, you can slow-trawl nice little fillet baits along the backline. Paddling towards the point keeps you protected and in the bay.

There can be a strong current on draining spring low tides at the point. The entire estuary drains in this direction but this is what brings on the shoals of kingfish. All sorts. Brassy. Blacktip. GTs. Big-eye. These fish congregate at the point and google themselves on the whitebait (sprats) that are trapped in the current.

You can paddle around the point, for a few kilometres, to find a really substantial strip of reef. There are actually two clearly identifiable ledges here, a deep and a shallow. Great for Queen and King Mackerel and the odd sailfish is known to hang around here. The current goes south from the area so take that into account.

It is tactically better to fish north of the point on a kayak. Far more controlled and easy. You get to fish that fun little backline reef halfway down the point. It is made up of a bunch of boulders strewn about the place. In about 20 feet of clean, warm water. These rocks attract the bait big time. So you can drop an anchor here (mainly to stop being blown out to sea by the offshore), catch a few lives and pin them right there. Kingfish dominate this reef but I have caught deeper water fish like Green Jobfish here too.

• Note: Launching…is very easy at this huge long sandy point. And all along that vast beach towards the north and the river mouth. There are little nooks and crannies all through the tides that you can utilise to launch and retrieve. And even leave your boat floating right there in a completely sheletered sand bay on anchor.

Spearfishing

You can swim out anywhere at Pomene. But the hot spots are the halfway backline reef. And the point. There is only sand on the floor all the way around the point but the promontory is big enough to yield traffic. You don’t need to swim too far off the point to find yourself in 50 feet. Once again, watch that current or you might be in for a very long walk home.

Channels

https://youtube.com/@Brucifire – highly entertaining  surf reporting

https://youtube.com/@thesardinenews – neva miss a single  sardine

https://youtube.com/@fishbazaruto – 1000 pounds plus

https://youtube.com/@mydotackletalk – highly technical  sport fishing

https://youtube.com/@surflaunchingsouthernafrica – getting out there safely

https://youtube.com/@waterwoes – complain here

Websites

https://umzimkulu.co.za – self-catering right on the Umzimkulu River
https://umzimkuluadrenalin.co.za –   sardine run coming up
https://thesardine.co.za – never miss a single   sardine
https://masterwatermen.co.za – news from deep down
https://brucifire.co.za –  surf and conditions reporting
https://fishbazaruto.com – your dreams are out there
https://mydofishinglures.co.za – technical  sport fishing

Mydos Fast vs Slow

Mydos Fast vs Slow: Two factors are being affected when you choose your perfect MYDO Baitswimmer for the job – depth and speed. And you have two variables to work with.

Weight. And blade size.

Weight

If you have a big bait that you want to sit right underneath your spread or chum slick, use the Bluefin Bomber at 4 or 5 ounces.

For casting your paddletail into the teeth of a howling offshore, you can go right up to 3 ounces with your 6 inch paddletail.

For sailfish, kingfish, tuna and all the other surface feeders, you need to be as light as you can yet still swim your chosen bait right.

These fish use the bait silhouette against the surface to ambush from below. And when your offering actually breaks the surface, it increases the visibility of you bait by miles. This is why it’s so cool to crank your bait fast enough for it to pop up and out of the water every metre or so. That splash leaves a trail for predators to follow.

Surface feeder gallery…

Blade Size

Big wide blades produce a lot of drag and therefore action. But you need to work out your speed parameters. Too fast and the thing starts breaking bad. Swims all over the place.

Smaller blades enable faster trolling. And more of a surface silhouette and disturbance as you drag or cast ’em around at varying speeds and actions.

Conclusion

There are many factors to take into account when choosing the right MYDO Baitswimmer for the job. The task at hand might be so technical that only a MYDO can do it. Like swimming huge baits down deep. Or combining a plug effect with a paddeltail to take full advantage of the versatility of these Mydos.

Either way, the right tool for the job is the message of this video.

https://youtube.com/@mydotackletalk

https://youtube.com/@thesardinenews

https://youtube.com/@waterwoes

https://youtube.com/@Brucifire

https://youtube.com/@surflaunchingsouthernafrica

Websites

https://brucifire.co.za

https://thesardine.co.za

https://masterwatermen.co.za

https://umzimkuluadrenalin.co.za

https://fishbazaruto.com

https://umzimkulu.co.za

mydo #baitswimmer #baitswimming

MYDO Figure of Eight Leader System (again) – extraordinarily fast and reliable braid to leader

The braid to leader question has been answered a thousand times. Simple fact is, that you can so easily tie two simple uni-knots back to back and you will be fine. However, there some fantastic joins to learn and this is but one of them…

The Art of Tying Fishing Knots

Anybody’s right-of-passage is the famed Bimini Twist to create a double-line So good-looking. So strong. You can get fast enough too, this knot can take seconds if you practise. Well, at least 30 seconds.

Then there is the traditional fly-fishing knot – the Albright. Which we adapted to become the Albright Special. Since it gets a bit of shoulder bolstering at the end part. Which takes the pressure off the main part of the knot, as the leader system traverses the rod guides. Increasing longevity remarkably.

But after years of being in the thick of things, we settled on this next combination. That we learned fishing the Southern Natal Light Tackle League in the mid-80s.

Braid to Leader with the MYDO Figure-of-Eight Leader System

A surgeon’s loop is quick and strong. If your leader knots are going to go through the eyes of the rod during the cast, then this loop has to be built tiny. Like an inch only. If its a trolling rod, take the full length of double-line allowed. 5 ft up to 20 lb line class. 10 feet over that line class. Please correct me if I am wrong again — they keep changing the rules them IGFA chaps.

Then, funnily enough, the exact same knot in one end of the pre-cut leader. But this time using only the single leader line. As you tighten, you will see a very clear figure-of-eight materialise right in front of your eyes.

Now we need to thread the double line up through the bottom hole of the figure of eight, from the inside. When the loop is through, pass the entire pre-cut leader through said loop. Gently close the loops up. You have now created a cats claw join. Very slick!

Lubricate the figure-of-eight and tighten using the tag end. If the double line is not equal at this point, just pull on it and it will become equal. Tighten real tight – I like to melt the line and the braid together!

I sure hope the video helps explain all this, and that that sub-par audio is compensated ok by the sub-titles.

You can buy Mydos at https://thesardine.co.za/mydo if you live in Southern Africa. That website is in Rands. This one is in USD and takes international deliveries into account.

Now this is Baitswimming

An Introduction to Baitswimming: legendary lure designer Brian Davey came up with the baitswimming concept, way back in the mid-eighties.

Brian developed a complex and thorough thesis (inches thick) written on the hydrodynamic principles that allow big fish to swim with such speed and power. Relating the fish’s body to a wing foil that generates highly efficient thrust with each slight, or massive movement. And so the bigger the fish, the faster it can go!

And with this, Brian suggested that by instigating movement in the “baitswimmer” head, the swimming motion will transfer via the swinging hook or pin, and impart to the bait. Brian was awarded patents worldwide for the design and he also trademarked the brand Mydo.

“Bait swimming is the art of imparting realistic action to your bait – with a bait swimmer head.”

Mydo Designer – Sean Lange

The lures were originally made of a lead composite alloy and were very difficult to make as well as being rather damaging to the environment.

Composite construction

And so as of the past few seasons we have changed to a composite epoxy/resin combination. And a number of other lighert and weighted materials that we hope are also a lot more lightweight on the environment. We will be using recycled plastic in the manufacture of our lures in the very near future too.

The new designs certainly do add a new dynamic to the baitswimmer as the hook which used to be incumbent on the lure before – is now free to impart that swimming motion just like it should.

The heads are through rigged they connect the head to the first single hook the main single hook on the trace that goes back up through the head and gets tied with the uni-knot (for infinite adjustment) and that creates the pin-like effect with which the action of the head is imparted to the bait.

Having this joint slightly loose and articulated really adds to the motion and the lure swims better and better as you fine-tune the setup.

So this is bait swimming. Choosing the right weighted baitswimmer head for your bait. And getting the perfect swimming action by adjusting speed and retrieve.

Right bait

Baitswimmers were originally developed to swim a badly behaved shad or pesky spinning sardine. Well, man do they work! Shad are notoriously bad swimmers once dead. But the Mydo #3 weighing in at an ounce and a half, will have that shad swimming straight and true.

By fishing a plastic bait on a single hook rigged Mydo, you enter the realm of drop-shotting. However, now you can choose the exact hook that you will be needing for the fish you are targeting.

Choosing a longer shank hook can get that hook right back in the bait for you…

Where the fish bite!

Right weight

Mydos Baitswimmers come in many shapes and sizes. You can choose more weight in the same form-factor and size as you specifically need it. Bearing in mind that the less weight you deploy, the better action you will get from your bait. Getting the balance right is easy with baitswimmer sizes ranging from a quarter and ounce right up to 5 ounces.

Right speed

Mydo Baitswimmers operate at all speeds. But generally, the faster you go, the more you get from the rig. A good solid bait like a halfbeak will swim perfectly at marlin speed all day until it gets eaten.

Throwing an erratic, slower action at the lure, when rigged for dropshot, produces wild results. Veering left and right, up and down – but never spinning.

Angle-of-Attack

Choosing where to pull the baitswimmer related to the position of the knot or choice of hole.

For high speeds, use the very front hole, down on the keel. You would also be using a slightly heavier weight for baitswimmer size, for going really fast.

Move to the front top hole for slower speeds or for more action.

Slide the uni-knot backward to increase to a really radical angle of attack.

But beware.

For this is how you can end up spinning your bait. Too much speed, not enough weight, and too much angle of attack.

Which MYDOs to take to BD Point aka Bartholomew Diaz aka Nova Mambone aka Rio Save

Which MYDOs to take to BD Point aka Bartholomew Diaz aka Nova Mambone aka Rio Save: featuring Captain Duarte Rato

Captain Duarte Rato addresses a ski-boat MYDO-laden crew on their very merry way to Bartholomew Diaz. Aka BD Point. Aka Nova Mambone. Aka Rio Save. North of Vilankulos. And even Inhassoro. In Mozambique. This very month…of April.

Duarte lives and operates the most successful charter operation in this area. FishBazaruto.com. And has been since the war times. During which Duarte was doing charters out of Maputo and its surrounds. Duarte has settled now. From his globetrotting. Happy with taming the billfish off Vilankulos. With his lovely wife Gretha. And two fishing berzerk kids, Duarte Jnr, and Dario.

Who both feature in this feature as one of the clips features Duarte Jnr bagging his very first marlin. Being cheered on by Dario. And the other kid on the boat too – Diogo (Diablo). Off BD Point. At 7 years of age! Right at Bartholomew Dias Point.

BD is a lovely place to fish. And don’t even think about giving those rock salmon up the creek a miss. They are there and waiting for your live bait. But it’s the nature of the underwater topography out front that makes the place so much fun. Since it is the foot of a rather substantial delta, the area out front of the mouth is nice and shallow. You can see the bottom on most reefs that you fish on.

10 Metres or so is ideal for those wily gamefish like snoek and couta. They circle these reefs and pick off the bait as they go round and round. There are luckily acres of bait in the immediate area. They also like the shallows and the sediment coming down the Save River. And there is a surprisingly wide variety including pencil squid and cigar mackerel.

There is literally no limit to the species that might wander into these bait-rich waters. Sailfish and marlin abound some days. Small marlin are especially fun with their super-acrobatics. And snoek and small tunas shoal magnificently, causing whiteouts and things.

In the MYDO Box for BD Point

Are a couple of MYDO StripBaitSwimmers. Which are used to gauge what is going on right at the start of the day. Chuck a nice juicy fresh fillet on these rigs, and send one out far, and keep one about at about 12m.

Then take out the duster-fitted MYDOs and choose the exact right length for your halfbeaks. Halfbeaks are impeccable baits. They are easy to rig. They stay on (sometimes they need an elastic or some cotton or wax thread to keep then on the MYDO front hook/head). These guys come much closer to the boat. I like to hang them on the lower outrigger clips where possible. One each side, slightly staggered. With two konas/big baits out the very far back, leaving me the closer spread to work within.

Now with 6 offerings already, it might be time to slow down. But I would now build my fillet baits next, and run them right in the white water down the middle. A metre apart and staggered the same. By adjusting the angle of attack, and choosing the right weighted baitswimmer, you can get these guys down under the white water. Swimming in and out of it in a blurry flash that gets the better of confused and excited gamefish.

And now you can still turn sharply and chase a shoal of bait. And you can react according to whatever strike you get. Leave the back kona/big baits in until last. They also could be replaced with a big old strip baits at these speeds (3 to 4 knots). And leave them out there since most times you can just keep the boat moving forward (VERY NB), and fight your fish within the constraints of the now-limited spread.

If the big back baits get hit, it’s very easy to clear the front baits. In fact you can leave the halfbeaks where they are – right out of the way held there by the outriggers. At this point, I should reiterate that these two baits stay very close, at all times (6 – 8 m from the outrigger clip). You will be very surprised at how they perform. When the boat slows to a strike – these things drop in deeper and act as swim baits immediately. Transferring from surface skip baits in an instant. They do not need elastic bands in the release clip either, they can just run in the clip at 2kgs of drag. Or less even.

This is the MYDO Fishing System. Double-functioning. Contingency planning. Opportunity maximising.

Included in the box for BD, is a MYDO Spoon. Dont, need to say anything about that thing. And then a bunch of MYDO Silver Bullet #1 and #2 heads. That are for chucking little plastics and things. At shoaling snoek or bait.

More MYDO information can be found at…https://thesardine.co.za/mydo.

We can take you fishing at https://umzimkuluadrenalin.co.za and you can stay with us at the Umzimkulu Marina – right on the river at https://umzimkulu.co.za.

MORE YouTube Channels

Mydo Fishing Lures – https://youtube.com/@mydofishinglures
The Sardine News – https://youtube.com/@thesardinenews
Surf Launching in Southern Africa – – https://youtube.com/@surflaunchingsouthernafrica

MYDO Silver Bullet tied as a jig head for dropshot

When the dropshot craze hit, I was sucked in hook, line and stinker. I bought so many plastics. And so many jig heads. And this is where the problems came in…

The jig heads that I was getting ahold of, were really dodgy back then. None of the jig heads available were made for kingfish. I lost so many decent fish to straightened hooks after an hour long tussle, that I had to change to my own design.

Luckily I had some old style MYDO Baitswimmers with me at the time, and so I started to experiment in the Pomene estuary up on Mozambique. Where I work often. Every experiment went wrong in the beginning too. Until eventually I realised that I could ‘through-rig’ the number one baitswimmer, and tie a hook on. Any hook!

The problems with regular jig heads

The MYDO Silver Bullet solves these problems with regular jig heads…

1. the hook is far too far forward on regular jig heads. Every video I have ever shot of a strike shows very clearly that high-speed gamefish attack from behind. If you have the tip of your hook in the front half of your bait, you will miss many, many fish.
2. many of the jig heads available, cannot handle an angry GT. But with the MYDO Silver Bullet, you can chuck a big old 8/0 O Shaugnessy or Kendall Round in there and you will get your fish out.

More advantages of using the MYDO Silver Bullet as a Jig Head

1. You can also rig in a second hook if you copy how the Australians rig for couta. Open the eye of the second hook, slide over the first hook and pinch close the eye again.
2. You can choose the same jig head, but in many weight configurations. The number two as an example, is available from 2 ounces, right down to a quarter ounce. And even in semi-floating configuration for suspended baitswimming in the surf zone (coming soon to the website).
3. You never have to take the jig head hook out of your plastic bait to replace it every time destroying the plastic a bit more. Just thread in the hook, and leave it there forever. When you want to change plastics, just retie onto the MYDO.

And so the MYDO Silver Bullet series was developed from the experience of adapting the old number one baitswimmer to drop shot fishing. Changing the materials to a composite material mix that still includes some lead, made for an extraordinary new baitswimmer series.

You can order your MYDO Silver Bullet baitswimmers at thesardine.co.za/mydo for South Africa and mydofishinglures.co.za for internationals.

Secrets of the halocline by Professor Anthony Turton

Secrets of the #Halocline off #PortShepstone with Professor Tony Turton and #MYDO #Lures #TackleTalk

Good crew are hard to find so when Professor Tony Turton took the bait to go marlin fishing with me and Digby Smith, I knew to clear some memory. (Un)Fortunately, we had such a busy day that we only managed to get a few clips of not fishing in.

This is one of them…revealing the secrets of the halocline.

Tony has already got his shark fishing colours way down in the Transkei. He gave that up years ago. But a big marlin is still on his bucket list. We came close to one fish but the hooks pulled during the strike. The rest of the time we were dealing with shoal after shoal of yellowfun tuna (small ones) and skipjack. The skipjack were wild and they can really put up an argument. But between us we must have caught and checked back, about 30.

We did swim a skipjack live for marlin in the 200m area but it never lasted long enough to entice a fish in.

This clip features Professor Turton as he unpacks the intricacies of the halocline. Tony has studied the halocline and its effects on the estuaries on oceans as it moves in and out of the open ones. So he sure knows what is going on.

Underpinning the fact that free-flowing rivers are the lifeblood of places like the Protea Banks and natural phenomena like the annual sardine run. Sardines and other larvae and things eat the stuff that is in the brown water – it is all nutrients and stuff like plant matter.

This brown water feeds the ocean and balances out its acidity. The prevailing Agulhas Current disperses this massive food source down our coastline and ultimately into the southern oceans. Many fish and other small marine organisms like plankton, phytoplankton, and zooplankton, rely on this food source. And in turn, the fishies eat them. And so on it goes until we end up catching a nice big couta at the end of the food chain line.

Without functioning estuaries that work on the halocline migrating in and out of them, we won’t catch that couta.

More of this cool information can also be found on The Sardine News. Come fishing at umzimkuluadrenalin.co.za or fishbazaruto.com. Pop on over to our YouTube channel at https://youtube.com/@mydotackletalk.

MYDO Silver Bullet kayak spread for Elton Cuthbert north of Durban

MYDO Silver Bullet kayak spread for Elton Cuthbert north of Durban: It is fantastic to get an order from a friend! Thank you Elt!

Elton fishes from a kayak the last time I checked. Aka a ski. This is the way we should ALL fish! Man against the elements and fish.

And so I have provided enough MYDO variations that are purpose-built for fishing from a ski. Which is generally slower than the usual 6 knots we go when we have two huge outboards on the back.

Elton got my ever-green little wired daisy chain – that takes a fillet or two. He also got a proper MYDO Stripbaitswimmer – check the video – this thing comes with a baitswimmer and a duster. Elton also got a MYDO SS Spoon – for catching snoek and tuna – and bonnies!

With a huge live bait swimming rig for that bonito – heavy fish and heavy tackle. Luckily the whole range from this monster rig to the strip bait swimmer, have been covered in Elton’s order. Which includes baitswimmers at the right size and weight, to swim mackerel and sardine and all sorts in between.

The next order I am putting together is for none other than another wave-hungry oke called Gavin Spowart! Turns out all surfers eventually become avid anglers. The list is extremely long. Gavin fishes out of St. Francis and his chief quarry are yellowtail.

And that’s for the next vid!

Thank you for watching!

Buy your own MYDOs in South Africa at https://thesardine.co.za/mydo where there is a big WhatsApp button floating about on the site somewhere. FREE delivery over R500.

For internationals please visit https://mydofishinglures.co.za where there is also a WhatsApp button.

Stay in touch with the ocean at The Sardine News.

Get your MYDO kit online.

Get your MYDO kit online. Integrating with Teespring, as set up by The Sardine News and TLC, we are able to offer you some really cool and well-presented merchandise nowadays!

Check it out!

The kit is drop-shipped from the US somewhere. Where it is put together and posted to you anywhere in the world. In just a few weeks from order to printing to delivery. Teespring have been around for quite some time now, and have nothing but good reviews and great results. And this really high-speed delivery service level of nowadays, will surprise you with its accuracy and timeousness.

You can browse our TeeSpring Storefront by following this link:

https://teespring.com/stores/mydo-fishing-lures

Please let us know how it goes if you do make an order. So we can make sure of your 100% satisfaction! There are many ways to get in touch with the MYDO team on the Contact page.

From The Sardine News

If you would like any assistance in setting up your own online drop-shipping store, contact Sean on umzimkulu@gmail.com or +27793269671. The Sardine News provides web services like programming and hosting through our marketing and AI Company Tiger Lily Consulting (Pty) Ltd. We do a lot better of a job than Facey and the rest of them with your advertising budget and your bottom line too.

Try us out!

The Sardine News is also featured on YouTube with a jam-packed set of playlists and channels. Like and subscribe to see more, in the meantime, here is the latest in Sardine News this sardine filled July 2020…

Liking and subscribing keeps up going. We can also advertise your business for you – to our super select audience. On our many available platforms and content channels. Complete websites to classifieds ads.

Post by The Sardine News for MYDO Fishing Lures.