The past weekend we had a club competition at the Vaal dam on the property of Kees van der Waldt. With no GPS coordinates at our disposal and the lack of information available on the internet we decided to take the road down to Trichardtsfontein dam near Secunda for a practice run and a weekend of social fishing.

Saturday started rather slowly and we had to be satisfied with only 5 fish for the day. Because of the bad weather we didn’t fish during the night and decided to start early the next morning. Sunday started much the same as the previous day and Willem suggested we target the smaller fish by applying smaller pieces of dough using a combination of banjo and kap-kap. We eventually ended the day with a total of 32 fish weighing only 5.78kg. I do however have to add that none of our neighbours caught any fish, just stressing the important difference smaller fish can make to your results during a club competition. As suggested in our previous post (The importance of accurate casting) , accurate casting in combination with the correct targeting strategy can greatly improve your success rate.

The importance of accurate casting is an aspect that is not always understood by inexperienced anglers and often the reason for unsuccessful fishing sessions. At a recent club competition I was competing against anglers with a lot more experience and really had to focus on my accuracy and bait choices.

My day started off recently well and I caught three small carp within the first few minutes, then the wind speed picked up and the bite rate slowed down. My neighbour suggested smaller hooks and I changed my dip choices from FX to garlic which seemed to do the trick. At the end of the day I weighed in a total of 11 fish with a combined weight of 5.35 kg. When the overall winner was asked about his bait choices, he simply replied with the following: “Accurate casting…”

Another drowning occurred this weekend at Kwena dam near Lydenburg. Henry Visser drowned while taking out his lines. This is the second drowning this month and we have to stress the importance of wearing a life jacket when out on the water. In our last article we reported on Andre Joubert that drowned at the Vaal dam

To read the full story of the drowning at Kwenadam (previously Braam Raubenheimer-dam) as it was written by Beeld, click here

If you have been following our blog, it’s common knowledge that bass fishing is something we only started with recently. So when the opportunity presented itself to visit De Voetpadkloof , I jumped at the opportunity and decided to try a popular bass bait, the jig. The bass at De Voetpadkloof are most active in the late afternoon and I struggled to catch anything during my first morning session.

I was sceptical about moving away from the bait that performed so well on my previous trip here and rigged the jig bait with more than just a little hesitation. With the dark blue junebug packed away and a watermellon and purple colored jig bait at the end of my line I started probing the areas near the reeds and was soon rewarded with a few beautiful bass.

The main difference between the catches produced on junebug and the jig was that the jig bait produced a smaller amount of fish with a greater weight. The bass is truly a great predatory fish and I can’t wait to learn more about the behaviour of this fish.

Part of the dam at De Voetpadkloof

Following our visit to Kolobe it became clear that I had much to learn about bass fishing. In my previous post Bass fishing, journey from beginner to pro I made some lure choices that seemed logical at the time but that was far from ideal for the conditions we were fishing. Fortunately for me and Willem, we gathered some valuable information from our trip to Kolobe and I were on my way to De Voetpadkloof to take advantage of my newly found knowledge. At Kolobe Andrew gave us quite a few tips on how to go about fishing for bass at a new venue. Let’s have a quick overview of the conditions I faced:

1. The water was a brownish color, but still clear enough to see to the bottom of the dam close to the side of the bank.

The coulour of the water at De Voetpadkloof

When fishing brownish, unclear or dirty water, a dark colored lure is most affective while a bright colored lure is most affective when fishing water that is clear. So I decided to use a dark blue junebug with a red number 4 worm hook.

The dark blue junebug used

Unlike carp angling where we prefer to use the smaller hooks to ensure great bait presentation and good hook-ups, the best results are achieved with big number 4 or 5 worm hooks when fishing for bass. According to some of the experts, red hooks are most effective because of it’s visibility, or rather lack thereof. Apparently bass is incapable of seeing red. My inner pessimist questions the prior statement and brings up the age old question, myth or truth? I wasn’t prepared to take any chances, so I took the statement with a pinch of salt and bought myself 2 packets of red hooks.

2. The water temperature was cool to cold.

The cold water conditions at De Voetpadkloof

When the water is cold, try fishing the shallower spots, the bass usually prefer the warmer water early morning and late afternoon.

3. Quite a few anglers were fishing various spots around the dam.

Try fishing the spots not frequented by other people. Taking my chances with the one or two leopards prowling around , most of my bass were caught at a small secluded section of bank at the opposite side of the dam.

My fishing spot at De Voetpadkloof

Taking into consideration all the above mentioned conditions I were hooked into my first bass within the first few casts.

My first bass

The bass at De Voetpadkloof is in great condition and even the smaller ones gave me a good fight on the lighter tackle.

Another beautiful De Voetpadkloof bass

Unfortunately I also lost one or two good looking fish on the jump. Let me explain, bass will often jump out of the water once hooked and although this causes majour excitement and a preview of what is at the end of your line, they sometimes succeed in getting rid of hook, line and sinker!

Putting my new skills to the test

Most of the bass were caught between 4:00 PM and 6:00PM, with the occational exception of course.

Night time fishing at De Voetpadkloof

As mentioned in Bass fishing, journey from beginner to pro, I’m a beginner bass angler myself and these posts are written to aid my fellow amateur anglers in mastering the art of bass fishing without being overwhelmed by the enormous amount of information they are bombarded with.

The bug have bitten

So lets have a quick overview:

1. Have a look at the visiblity of the water. Use dark colored lures for dark colored water and visa versa.
2. Use red number 4 or 5 worm hooks.
3. Test the temperature of the water. Opt for the shallower fishing spots in cool to cold water.
4. Avoid fishing spots that is frequented by other people.

PLEASE REMEMBER that the above mentioned points are just some guidelines and that bass as any other fish species can be unpredictable.

My last bass for the weekend

I’m not a fan of compititions for a variety of reasons but mostly because of the types of people that these events attract, this year however I decided to move away from my comfort zone and join Willem and Karmen early Saturday morning to obtain some valuable input that can be shared with future first timers. I had some work to finish Friday night and decided that the 3 hour drive to Forever Resorts would probably not be the greatest of ideas after the customary three beers after work. So I went home , slept for a few hours and left for Loskop dam 2:00 AM.

Arriving at the resort I quickly handled the necessary admin and went looking for the bank were we were supposed to fish. This was our first trip to Loskop dam and to be honest we were not exactly sure what to expect, non the less the excitement was building! Following the signs, we quickly experienced a familiar feeling when arriving at a closed gate.

Waiting infront of the closed gate

Driving through the gate I was looking for some kind of grass bank, sadly there was none, it was just… a tar road???? Surely this couldn’t be the bank!

The bank at Loskop dam

We walked over to our neighbour and he too had an expression of disbelief on his face. For a few minutes we stood, weighing up our options. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the neighbour walking restlessly up and down the tar road, finally comming towards us with a map of the resort. He introduced himself as Chris and asked if we can keep his fishing spot while he drive around the resort looking for a better bank, so we exchanged numbers and he assured us that he will give us a call as soon as he find a better spot. 10 minutes later the phone rang and we were off to claim a part of the spot Chris found.

The new spot Chris found

I felt much better paying the R200.00 for the competitions as we started preparing our rods and I could see that everyone was in a much better mood.

As we were targeting Kurper, we decided to try something we read about a while back, to mix Boeliebeef and Pronutro into our mielie bomb.

Mielie Bomb mixed with Boeliebeef and Pronutro

The Boeliebeef provides something meaty for the Kurpers while the Pronutro is an excellent binding material.

The mielie bomb

The day started of slowly and Chris caught the first of a number of smaller fish on some earth worms. Willem caught a few smallmouth yellows of his own while I teached some boys the fine art of casting.

The first small mouth yellow caught by Chris

Willem's first fish

Unfortunately as with our previous trip I blanked and had too keep myself busy with other ‘recreational’ activities.

Keeping myself busy with other recreational activities

Chris and his wife kept pulling out fish every 10 to 20 minutes and even though we all used the same bait and fished at the same distance, none of us could keep up with their tempo. I guess it’s true what a wise man once said: ‘location…location…location’.

Chris with descent size Kurper

Overall the competition was a great success with some great prizes.

Some of the prizes

A loskop Dam Blue Kurper

In my personal opinion Loskop dam is not a bank anglers venue and should be fished from a boat as most good fishing spots can not be reached from the bank.