Winter fishing in the Coromandel.

It’s probably one of the more challenging times of the year to fish at the moment, when it’s on it’s great, but with the fish metabolism rate right down, they are often there, visible on the sounder, but you just can’t get them to bite. What can you do when it’s like this? Work harder! That means more patience, trying a variety of methods, waiting out tidal changes and bite times, investing more time and energy in berley trails, and just giving it everything you’ve got.

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Snapper are biting really well at the moment.  When you can identify where they are holding it’s not too hard to pick up some nice specimens pretty quickly.  Winter is the best time for stray lining we’ve found.  This is a great method throughout the year, but seems to really come into its own over winter.  At the moment, you really can’t go wrong stray-lining around the inshore reef structures of the Mercury Islands.

In fifteen to twenty metres drifting baits back into any good weed lines or foul, or the area where the foul turns to sand can be really productive.  There are so many good options around Great Mercury and Red Mercury Islands, it’s just a matter of choosing a spot that suits the wind and current directions to set yourself up.

Out off the sand in the deeper water around fifty metres, lures such as the big slow moving kaburas, are getting some really great fish.  The beauty of fishing these lures off the sand also, is that their small but strong hooks can be fished with a fairly light drag so you don’t pull them, and the snapper can’t get you into the foul, so it’s just a matter of working a good fish up patiently.

We also like change of light this time of year.  With such short days it’s not too much of a mission to fish both first light, and dusk, without getting up crazy early, or having to stay out all night.

Speaking of night, if you are keen to fish into the later hours there can be some really great snapper fishing this time of year if you are prepared to fish the dark.  Naturally baits are a better option than lures.  Just make sure you have good lights, safety gear and a familiar knowledge of where you are if you’re on a boat.

Berley has been the key.  This time of year the fish often need a bit of encouragement, and we have commonly found that as soon as your berley runs out, the fish soon disappear.

If you’re out fishing the kingie pins all day you can soon recognise and get a gauge of where snapper are holding.  Sometimes you’ll get a good snapper on the livies intended for kingfish, and other times the snapper are a bit of a pain stealing and chewing up live baits.  At least you know they are there and once they’re biting it’s easy enough to target them with some tasty cut baits or lures.

Since lockdown we’ve mostly been chasing kingfish and deep water species such as puka and bluenose.

For kings, we’ve been targeting the shallower pins rather than heading out wide to the deeper areas off the Aldermans and Cuvier.  These big deep pins have been a bit plagued by bronzies so we prefer to stay in a bit closer and fish the shallower thirty to fifty metre structures that are fairly easy to find on any of your nav charts.

Livies seem to be working a lot better than jigs, and fortunately they are not too hard to catch at the moment, so it really pays to get a good number of baits in the tank if you are looking for kingfish.

Slow trolling live baits is a great way to target kingfish and trolling around the Red Mercs using this method has been working really well.  During winter there are often fewer fish numbers, but you can get the odd good sized model cruising around.

Out deep, we like to target puka and bluenose, and have been doing pretty well on both, but there has a lot of gemfish around, and we’ve been catch plenty of these.  They are a good eating fish although very oily, so they can be great eaten fresh, but make a very good option for in the smoker.

We are generally travelling to the Mayor Knolls for targeting deepwater fish, and the puka have been coming up from around the 200 metre mark.  

The bluenose seem to be a bit deeper between 250 and 300.

The deep water species are really on the chew at the moment, and it’s often a lot easier to get onto these fish than the kingies, so if you are planning a day, it can be a good option to head deep, and maybe try and grab some snapper on the way home.

We had a sword trip last Monday, and managed to get hooked up, but unfortunately lost the fish as the hook pulled not too far from the boat.  Plenty of swords are being landed at the moment, so if that is your thing they are out there waiting.

We have heard that there are bluefin being caught east of White Island at the moment, but if you’re after these guys, a trip to Waihau Bay is the best option as they have been landing some barrels in the last few days.

Hopefully we see some good weather windows over the coming weeks, if you are keen to join us I look forward to hearing from you.

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All the best

Tom

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Fishing Report provided by Tom Maxwell

MAD MAX SPORT FISHING NZ

Bookings contact: 0274 165 903

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