The weather for the weekend was supposed to be good, but I felt like when I opened my car door I had emerged onto a different Oreti Beach than the one just out of Invercargill. The sun was a beacon in the sky, reflecting golden light off the small waves lapping onto the wet sand. It really was the perfect day for surfcasting!
We first droned out a few baits and ended up with a few decent sized rig which were released. I then braved the cold waters of the south and waded out before casting out some baits on a surf caster and retreating into the combination of the unusually warm air and bright sun. I was not expecting to catch anything, so was surprised to hear the drag on my rod scream and felt the weight of a fish on the end of my line. It ended up being a 70 cm rig which didn’t fight at all the whole time.
After a quick release, the line got straight back out there, and we were on within 5 more minutes.
This time the drag was screaming, and the rod got pulled onto the ground from the force of the take. This fish was bigger, more aggressive, and put up a pretty big fight towards shore, really coming alive. When I saw the fish It took me a few seconds to identify the fish as an elephant fish.
In the shallows the ellie came off the hook causing an instinctive reaction of me pouncing on the fish.
I knew nothing about elephant fish so didn’t realise they had a spike above their fin before it went into my shoulder. The pain got worse as the ellie thrashed around trying to swim back to sea.
After a quick photo, measure and stab in the arm, the 87cm elephant fish was released to stab someone else some other day.
The weather had now began to turn and it was only due to a tangle up of the long line taken out by the drone that caused us to stay an extra half hour than agreed on.
Right at the end we got a hit and were hooked up once again. “I know it’s not a kahawai” said my grandpa due to the fish not running at all. How wrong he was. We had somehow managed to pull in a nice 50cm kahawai out of the ‘treacherous’ Oreti Beach, which on this day was a haven for swimming and hanging out. The kahawai was kept and tasted great.
