Index Archive January 2010 to June 2010
(29-Jun-10) June News
Johns report from June is up. Check it out here. Basies report from Aliwal and Marks reports from Coffs Harbour are also up.
(22-Jun-10) Upcoming Comps
Martin Victor (Border Undersea Club Spearfishing Officer 2010) asked us to anounce "BORDER OPEN HOLE IN THE WALL will be held on SAT 2 OCTOBER 2010, details and entry forms closer to the time". This as always will be a great event.
FreeDivers will be hold the Bluewater Gamefish Challenge 2010 at Sodwana bay on the 7th and 8th of August, The Zululand Coast is Prime gamefish area. You can download the the Entry Form here.
(02-Jun-10) Hibiscus Underwater Club Comp
The Hibiscus Underwater Club Presents the Gamefsh Open Competition on the 26th June! These are always great fun and they are offer a R5000 cash prize. You can download an entry form here.
(01-Jun-10) Notice - BUC AGM
"The Annual General Meeting of the Border Undersea Club will be held on: Friday 4 June 2010 at the BUC Clubhouse, Orient Beach at 7pm Finger snacks will be provided by the club Subscriptions are due before the meeting: R250 individuals R300 family Please make every effort to attend! See you there! BUC Committee"
Johns news from may was posted today, some good fish around with garrick already coming out in the lower South coast.
(31-May-10) Photos
Luke and Marcus sent through 3 photos of a good haul of fish, photos are up in the gallery.
(12-May-10) Nationals 2010 Results
We have the results from the Nationals held recently in an xls file, click here to download it. Also a report back from John about the competition.
News from Coffs harbour from Mark is up now from Aprils happenings.
(06-May-10) News from April
Thanks Andrew for helping out with a report back while John was over in the UK. April was a quiet month ...
(30-Apr-10) News from Coffs Harbour Ausstralia
Lots happened in Coffs Harbour in March, Mark has sent through news on the competition and other happenings last month.
(03-Apr-10) A look at March
John has some news on what happened in March.
(25-Mar-10) NOTICE
Individuals are being asked to “make themselves and their views known”, here is a Notice sent out by the Dept. of Enviromental Affairs.
(19-Mar-10) Down Under
Mark kallman has sent through some news from Coffs harbour in Australia and also a report back on a spearfishing trip to the Great barrier Reef.
(04-Mar-10) Durban Harbour
Durban Harbour is currently being widened to 220m from 130m and deepening by 16m from 12m. This project, being undertaken by Group 5 has been underway for about 11months as at this date ( Jan 2008) and is due to be completed by early 2010. A series of monthly photoshoots will be taken and presented here over the next two years. Follow the progress of this huge project.
(02-Mar-10) Licience Fee increase
There is a lot of talk of the huge price increase for permits, John has a more in his monthly report.
News from the Shoal, Basie has post his news and happenings at Aliwal shoal for February 2010.
We also have some new images in the Gallery.
(23-Feb-10) SA Records
We have put the lastest spread sheet with the SA Records up for people to download. It is always interesting to see what has beeen shot and to get an idea of what size fish can get to.
Great White shark experience by Sheldon Posthumas
Great White shark experience wow. We started spearing on a reef called GSPOT in Southern Mozambique. There were three of us on the boat at the time. Myself ( Sheldon Posthumus ), Ryan Daily and Justin Blake. Both these guys are shark researchers for Ocean Researchers and are both part of Shark Life.
Aaron was in the water still trying to get that last fish in. We saw what looked like a shark swimming toward him and we still debated about it being a tiger or zambezi shark. All of a sudden Aaron started shouting for us to fetch him with the boat which we soon did. Frantic to know what the fuss was about, he said he had to jab the shark with his gun it came so close and then he said it was a massive great white shark. Pretty crazy but without hesitating we donned our fins and masks with the shark on the surface again and we slowly slipped into the water. As we entered, there it was +- 2m away from us she came in for a look an easy 3 to 4m long beauty. She just stared straight at us for about twenty seconds then swam down to the bottom where she disappeared into the dirty water at the bottom.
Date 05 February 2010
Sheldon sent a nice photo of a 54kg Sailfish shot off Southern Mozambique.
(15-Feb-10) 63kg Ignoblis
Well done to Emil Pirzenthal for the 63kg Ignoblis Kingfish shot on 12 Feb 2010, its a pending South African record. We have a photo in the gallery.
Basie sent trough a report back on January 2010 at thee shoal.
(09-Feb-10) No Vertical Jigging at Isimangaliso Wetland Park!
The link will take you to a statement recently issued by the Park authorities with regard to the vertical jigging method of fishing. I am very happy that this has happened and hopefully it will be policed as these guys were killing everything they caught whether they tried to release it properly or not.
This is the reason why spearfishermen still make the same catches on Deep Scottburgh they made twenty five years back. We can only hunt fish to thirty meters and that is for the top guys. All fish below that depth are protected by the mere fact that we cannot get to them. These are the fish that continually re-supply the shallower reefs and maintain the status quo.
Fishermen are not regulated by depth and once one depth range of reefs has been fished out they move to the next. So when you dive Number One reef and Deep Scottburgh you do not see fishing target species as they have been fished out. There are no protected deeper reefs to re-supply these reefs as the deeper ones have also been fished out.
The vertical jigging method targets deep water fish and has opened up a whole range of previously unexploited reefs to fishermen. These deep water reefs can be likened to our over thirty meter reefs and probably act as important feeder reefs. It is a pity that this form of fishing cannot be banned world wide as our oceans need all the help they can get
Coffs Harbour
Mark sent us News from Down Under at Coffs Harbour, interesting as always.
(02-Feb-10) Beached sharks!
Unusual happening down the South coast, Whales Sharks Beached at Umzumbe Point.
Report back from John on the first month of 2010.
(13-Jan-10) Coffs Harbour!
News from Mark has been posted here...
(12-Jan-10) Shark attack in Ponta do Ouro!
Many thanks to Elaine in Ponta do Ouro for news of the shark attack, here's a more...
On Tuesday 22 December 2009 at about 14h00 a juvenile Tiger Shark came swimming into the bay of Ponta do Ouro and attacked a young man on holiday here who was playing in the surf with some friends on an inflatable lilo about 2 meters off shore.
The skipper from Simply Scuba, Wayne, and James a staff member from Scuba Adventures were busy working in the launch area when they saw this guy come stumbling out the water bleeding heavily. They immediately rushed to assist and phoned Sandy from Brittlestar Guesthouse for assistance.
At that stage Sandy was in Manguzi but she referred them to Karl who immediately got hold of oxygen and rushed down to the beach where the guy had already collapsed because of shock and blood loss. He had been attacked by the shark and was bitten on the upper arm/shoulder area and on his hand. Fortunately the wounds were not severe, but the poor guy was in shock and had to be stabilized.
Wayne and Petro from Simply Scuba stayed with the victim while he was taken to the local clinic for attendance Daryl, a paramedic and skipper for Gozo Azul helped to get the patient stabilized but failed to get a drip inserted into the victim's arm. He then decided to just stop the bleeding and bandaged up where needed The local commandant of police, arrived at the scene and gave permission for the patient to be airlifted by helicopter and taken to hospital in Manguzi. Colin, a resident of Maputo who owns a holiday home in Ponta fortunately had his helicopter in Ponta and could assist immediately. The man was flown to Manguzi Hospital and transferred toEmpangeni Hospital from there.
He is fine after the incident but holiday makers were furious with the shark and tried to catch it with their fishing rods from the beach right in front the Beach Bar. The Tiger launched out the water twice and the spectators enjoyed the view although with aggression. The shark remained in the shore breaks for the rest of the day where it was visible to all, while fishermen tried to catch it.They had it on their hooks twice but both times the shark escaped.
This incident was discussed in all earnest with the head of marines (MPA), Miguel and Antonio the Port Captain for Ponta do Ouro. This incident was due to happen some or other time, due to the negligence of fishermen throwing fish remains over the sides of their boats after cleaning their catch in the Bay of Ponta do Ouro. Of course this will attract sharks, and if this is not going to stop immediately more unfortunate incidences like this might happen in future.
Ponta do Ouro is a very safe and tranquil village with no shark attacks for the past 15 years since 1994 when a guy lost a foot. This is because we are naturally protected by the school of dolphins permanently staying in Ponta area. They will drive away all sharks from their territory. People must not get upset about this unfortunate incident, but fishermen have to be informed of the dangers when they throw the remains of their catch out into the water in the bay. Many thanks to all locals in Ponta involved in the very quick and rapid assistance to this poor guy. We all appreciate the wonderful way in which this was done.
(05-Jan-10) A Wet South Coast!
The South Coast has been very wet, Basie sent through a report back on the happenings on the Aliwal shoal through December.
Vetchs Pier is under threat! More about that here ...
(02-Jan-10) Happy new year!
A very happy new year and all the best to all our readers for 2010!
Our last report back for 2009 is up, John has all the news as usual in his last report.
