Fishing: Bad news for Gulf's sex-sated snapper

By HARVEY CLARK

From the Far North to Auckland, the snapper schools have arrived in force, the fishing has been excellent and a bumper season is expected, especially for the Hauraki Gulf.

The news could not be better for entrants in Auckland's first major fishing contest of the summer, the Gulf Harbour tournament next weekend.

"The snapper fishing has been firing up big time," says one Auckland angler after an evening trip on the Rangitoto Channel where his party of four caught five fish each in 20 minutes, all of them in top condition up to 3kg.

Hauraki Gulf specialist Bruce Duncan, a firm believer in cyclical patterns, says the fine condition of scallops and shellfish and the early arrival of snapper in the channels indicates a top season.

"Generally the fishing has got a lot better in the past eight years, especially since the quota management system started and in the Hauraki Gulf the fishing has never been as good as it is now. It's going to be a great summer."

From Doubtless Bay to the Hauraki Gulf, the snapper have come into the coastal waters for sex. It's the spawning season. Apart from having balmy sex in warming seas, they behave aggressively, feed voraciously and are caught readily if you're among them.

In recent years, as pressure on the Gulf fishery has intensified, sea anglers have been taking a leaf from the troutfisher's book and slowly tuning in to the conservation practice of catch-and-release.

This is the time of year when catch-and-release is most beneficial, and it's the big ones full of eggs or milt that you should put back. They are the breeding stock. They are the future of the fishery. Why keep a snapper of 7kg or more? As a table fish its flesh is inferior to smaller snapper, which are sweeter. And as a trophy fish, a large snapper is ugly. Nothing looks more like a fish out of water than a snapper mounted on someone's lounge wall. Wouldn't a photograph be enough?

As Duncan says: "It's the breeding season, so let's respect it. Take enough for a feed and let the rest breed."

A few words of advice if you are heading out on to the Gulf this weekend: outside the channels (which have been fishing well at the ends), the best catches have not been over reefs but over sand and mud containing worm and shellfish beds, where you should use berley to concentrate some action.

Successful Gulf fishers in the past week recommend between Motutapu Island (off Home Bay) and Waiheke; on the northern side and at the bottom end of Waiheke; around Tiri and in the Tiri Channel; at the top end of the Rakino Channel and off the northern tip of Rakino; just north of the Noises; around Kawau and anywhere from there down past Rangitoto; the Motuihe Channel "which is starting to fire", according to Duncan, and four miles northeast of Gannet Rock where "there are some beauties waiting". Close to home, the Rangitoto Channel was fishing successfully this week - try at the top end, and at Rangitoto Light and around A buoy.

The Gulf Harbour Yacht Club hopes for 500 entries for its 11th annual contest next Saturday and Sunday. Tickets are selling at 12 Auckland and North Shore outlets. The competition will be based at Gulf Harbour Marina and the prizes, which total more than $40,000, include a trip for two to Fiji with four nights' resort accommodation.

Those 500 anglers between them will cast at least 20km of fishing line attached to 45kg of sinkers and 1000 hooks piercing 3000kg of bait that will be gobbled - much to their detriment - by 6000 fish.

To counter all that expended energy, the 500 fishers will eat 3000 sandwiches, 100 or so dead chickens, and backslappingly congratulate themselves in the humid weather by drinking 6000 cans of the cool stuff.