WSAC Newsletter 2 201617 season

WSAC Newsletter No. 2 2016/17 Season

December 2016

New Club Record Spottie shark

Zac Livingston - 21.65kg In This Issue •

Presidents Message

•

Winter Pairs Results

•

Captains Report

•

Shore & Boat Comp Results

•

Upcoming events

•

From the Editor

What’s Coming Up 13th & 27th December

Social Fish Fishing from 6.30pm – 9.30 pm. For location check your email / Facebook on the Monday night before. Otherwise call Gary Whitaker H. 589 5103 M. 027 240 1685. No cancellations. We fish in a group, one rod pp, new members and novices welcome.

21st & 22nd January

5th Shore Competition Commences 1pm Saturday with weigh-in at 1pm Sunday at

28th & 29th January

4th Boat Competition Commences ½ hour before sunrise Saturday. Weigh-in 3.30pm Sunday. No fishing in hours of darkness (1/2 hour

10th January & 24th January

Social Fish Fishing from 6.30pm – 9.30 pm. For location check your email / Facebook on the Monday night before. Otherwise call Gary Whitaker H. 589 5103 M. 027 240 1685. No cancellations. We fish in a group, one rod pp, new members

1st Feb

Club Night Evans Bay Yacht Club 7.30pm – All Welcome

11th & 12th February

5th Boat Competition Commences ½ hour before sunrise Saturday. Weigh-in 2pm Sunday. No fishing in hours of darkness (1/2 hour after

11th & 12th February

6th Shore Competition Commences 1pm Saturday with weigh-in at 2pm Sunday at

18th—25th February

NZSFC Nationals http://www.nzsportfishing.co.nz

4th—8th April

NZACA Nationals http://www.nzaca.co.nz/

Meet David...

President’s Message Season’s Greetings all. It’s hard to believe but Christmas and the New Year are almost upon us, and with it summer - finally. The first few months of our season are behind us and after a slow start (and some challenging weather) things are really starting to get going and the fishing is starting to hot up.

Club President - David Harvey

The fish is a popper caught Barracuda - not to be confused with our local Barracouta/Cook strait Sailfish from my recent trip to the Solomon Islands. One of the many toothy critters I encountered, it was a spectacular surface strike with crazy aerials during the fight.

As for me, I’ve been a member of the club for just over 7 years since moving to Wellington. I’ve been a member of the Club Committee for the last 5 or 6 years and am into my second season as President. Prior to that I’d been shore points recorder for a number of seasons.

Originally from Auckland I grew up chasing Snapper and had never caught a Spiny Dog or Red Cod till I landed in Wellington, my life is now complete! In terms of fishing I’d say I’m a Jack of all trades and master of none, enjoying all forms of fishing: surfcasting, LBG, boat fishing (straylining, softbaiting, jigging etc), fly fishing for Trout, coarse fishing and even a little bit of game fishing. I’m an avid tackle collector and find new shiny things irresistible.

Over the last few weeks we’ve had a club record Spotty Shark landed, another donkey West coast King (from you know who), and a big harbour Moki which has set the bar high for heaviest Moki of the season. And with the improved weather over the last few weeks the water temp on the West coast has responded accordingly nudging 18 degrees and with it the Snapper have started to show in some good numbers. All in all we have the makings of another great season!

We’ve only just dipped our toes in the water with the shore and boat comp’s held to date which have been tough going. With the lions share to come in the New Year the field is wide open, with the improved conditions and the best of the season ahead of us it’s time to get out there and do it.

For those of you who’ve not stuck your nose into the club rooms for month or two we have a new and long awaited addition to our wall... Mark Pandelidis’ club record Kingfish is finally with us. It’s a hugely impressive fish and a great mount, so check it out. We may have another addition to the wall pending, so watch this space.

It’s been great to see so many new members coming through this season and taking part in the clubs nights and social fishes in particular. Please don’t be shy of making yourself known and taking the opportunity to meet some new people and learn a few tricks. The patronage at club nights by members, old and new, is really encouraging and we’re seeing numbers not seen for decades! Our new club captain Dave Pye is doing a great job with a good mix of informative and social events, and no doubt there is plenty more to come - no pressure Dave.

Gary W and Anthony S have done a great job with our regular Social Fishes, providing a great opportunity for new and old members to fish, socialise and learn. Thanks also to Gary and Anthony for organising the recent Bach outing.

This event was a great success with over 20 clubbies taking advantage of our spot on the South Coast to enjoy some fishing, BBQ and a few sherbets. It’s a tough environment around the South an there is a bit of maintenance work required on the Bach to keep her ship-shape, so if any of you are keen to get involved or have any useful skills just let one of the committee know.

And a final note of thanks to our new Matt, our new club rag editor. It can be a thankless task and require plenty of cat herding. He did a great job on his debut and I’m pretty sure he has a few more tricks up his sleeve. Of course any support you can provide through pics, stories and any material of interest will be gratefully received.

In closing I’d like to wish you and your families a very happy Christmas and a great New year. Keep safe in your travels, if you manage to fish good luck and above all else enjoy yourselves. See you next year.

NZACA Nationals come to Wellington!

This season we are pleased to welcome the NZACA nationals to our region. We’re hoping for great support from the club this year. If you’re interested in finding out more speak to Anthony, Gary or Craig. WSAC will also dedicate a forthcoming club night to discussing the plans for the nationals so keep a look out for further info. We hope for a really good turn out in all sections so please spread the word!

“Our Nationals Committee have provided us with a very positive and exciting proposal for the 2017 Nationals in Wellington. This event is also the celebration of the 60th Anniversary of the NZACA so I am looking for each and every Club to have members in attendance. The time to start planning is now.” - NZACA President More info will at http://www.nzaca.co.nz/

Meet Dave...

Club Captains Report Club Captains Report

Club Captain - Dave Pye

” I have been in the club for 27 years and enjoy all facets of

The Christmas trees are looking great, Pohutukawa’s are blossoming meaning the snapper and his/her’s mates will be biting in mass. The season started with some good catches from the boats, of Gurnard around Fitzroy Bay areas and out wide with Bluenose catches. These have followed on from the shore with good Gurnard numbers being caught in the harbour along with Nick Polak’s harbour caught 6.1Kg Moki on the second comp. On the third shore competition Zac Livingston achieved a club record Spotty Shark of 21.65 Kg with a host of other species, coupled with reports of more snapper and elephant fish starting to be caught and the anticipation of the Kingfish.

This really makes Wellington harbour a true honey hole. The 1st Boat comp. saw a 7kg Snapper come to the scales. The 12 th 13 th November saw our first combined shore and boat competitions. With the barbecue cranking, many club members enjoyed a combined 2pm weigh in with a mixed bag of species weighed or released from the shore and boat. Richard Newton-King braved the eye of the Southerly from the shore, and produced a nice bag of Moki, Trevally etc. For all those that have fished our recent competitions, well done!

fishing. I started fishing the Wellington Wharves as a young adolescent and joined the club in my early twenties.”

Gary and Antony have kicked the social fishes off with focusing on high tide fishing, especially for in the harbour. The weather has played a big part in these events and will only improve as the months warm and settle. We have future social outings booked in, and will inform closer to the dates.

Thanks to Jim O’Brien and those that attended another enthralling Open Night, on fishing West Coast beaches. These beaches can and have produced those magic 20 to 30 pound Snappers. There is always entertainment and gems of knowledge on these nights.

There is now several club members keeping one eye on the water temperatures up north as they unwrap their Marlin lures from a long winters storage.

Will New Plymouth match the catch numbers from last season? Will Waihau Bay have the huge Blue Marlin frequent in numbers? These are the buzz words at present. A big Marlin or a big Blue Moki, it can all be relative on the day.

February 18 th to the 25 th 2017, is the Simrad New Zealand Sports Fishing Nationals. If interested, now could be a great time to start planning teams and strategies for this event. Rules etc. are on www.nzsportfishing.co.nz or venture into Steve’s Fishing Shop and have a yarn about this or other fishing goals.

Have a great festive Christmas everyone

SPOTTY SHARKS A HISTORY AS OLD AS WSAC It’s around 2 am on Sunday morning, 13 November 2016. A gale force southerly is blowing itself out but the driving rain persists. Just the very conditions that brings the staunchness out in WSAC’ers on a comp day. And it is right at this time that Zac Livingston, fishing with brother Zeb hooks into a strong fighting fish that has taken his carefully prepared crab bait at spot X in the inner city harbour, just 15.3 kilometres as the crow flies from Naenae wharf. Ten minutes later, brother Zeb is at the water’s edge making valiant but unsuccessful attempts to tail (for weigh and release purposes) what predictably turns out to be a stroppy spotty shark. This fish however is not going to co-operate and gaffing is necessary. Only then is it realised that the fish just might be a new club record and a not so friendly gaff shot seals the spotty shark’s fate and a quick check of the scales confirms their suspicions. The boys are elated and now not so concerned they couldn’t release the fish as they had done with a fat specimen just prior to this catch.

Zac’s record spotty shark catch is good enough reason to give a bit of a potted history of how and why spotty sharks have always been a special fish to WSAC anglers. The real interest in catching spotty sharks by club members was heightened somewhat when our snapper fishery went pear-shaped in the 1980’s and the recognisable fighting and eating qualities of spotty sharks meant WSAC’ers would begin to target this species. This was a quantum leap in angler interest as from the 1950’s WSAC fishers would only target this species from Lyall Bay beach and from the iconic Burnham and Miramar wharves. Bait in those days was paddle crab but a few spotty sharks were caught as a by-catch on pilchard bait, as happens occasionally nowadays. Catching paddle crabs in pots is a relatively new way of obtaining bait – prior to this you could gather a good number by wading into knee deep water at Lyall Bay and, using a slab of kahawai attached to a line, you could draw the crabs to the surface and quickly put a bucket under them before they dropped back into the water.

Right up to the 1980’s, catching spotty sharks from outside the harbour was quite rare – simply because no one thought they existed in any numbers, and early fishing exploits in Palliser Bay , for instance, rarely saw anyone using a bait that would appeal to spotty sharks. But there was one very keen WSAC’er whose fishing dimension included lots of thinking outside the square. His name was Iain McDonald a.k.a. Johnny the wild Scotsman, and a very good fisher he was too. He began fishing the “spit” at Palliser and using crab bait on six kilo nylon he began weighing in pretty decent and unprecedented catches of spotty sharks, often collecting bonus line and weight points and being the envy of us all when he turned up to the weigh-ins with his catches. In those days the bonus weight for spotty sharks was six kilos and quite often Iain would reach this mark. Envy or jealousy, the bonus mark quickly went up to ten kilos and remained there for a long time, until the club reduced the maximum catch to six fish and brought the bonus weight back to six kilos.

Iain was not one to be overly secret about his fishing posies or his methods for that matter and soon most clubbies who wanted to be serious trophy points contenders would fish places like the spit, and they have been refining bait and terminal rig presentation ever since. But Iain just took another look outside the square and began targeting species, starting with large sharks from the spit. Here he would fill his reel spool to capacity with braid and drift huge baits with the aid of rubbish bag size plastic floats, up to 1,000 metres off-shore. But that is another story.

Without doing many hours of painstaking research on the progressive club spotty shark records since the very first one, a good place to start is March 1998 when, in the space of three weeks, firstly Jason McMahon caught a 14.8 kilo fish from Wainuiomata Beach only for this record to be quickly eclipsed by Steve Foreman with a 15 kilo fish taken at Pencarrow. Just two hours later this record was history when Bernhardt Schiftner caught a 16.75 kilo fish from the same beach. The story doesn’t quite end there for on the same weekend both Bernhardt and Roy Crothers were broken off by other big spotty sharks.

Steve Foreman holds a 15kg spotty shark caught in march 1998 from Pencarrow Beach to break the then club record of 14.8kg held by Jason McMahon

Just hours after Steve caught his fish , Bernhardt Schiftner eclipsed his record with this 16.75kg beauty taken from the same beach

Fast forward to April 2001 and Dave Gilroy, fishing from White Rock beach landed a 19.10 kilo spotty shark on 6 kilo line which established a new club and NZACA New Zealand line class record. When Dave weighed the fish on the beach it was a kilo heavier than the present club record, but Dave knew that spotty sharks can lose a considerable amount of weight overnight. He hit on a unique way to keep the fish fresh up to the next day’s weigh-in and that was to put the shark in the spa pool along with copious amounts of ice. And it certainly worked in this case. Another example of why spotty sharks are held in such high esteem by WSAC members.

Dave Gilroy is one happy chappie after catching his club record 19.10 kilo spotty shark from white rock in April 2001.

Words and pictures courtesy of WSAC Patron, Jim O’Brien

Early Season Shore &

& Boat Competitions

Recent Club Events Casting - Some recent distance casting pin achievements

+170m for Colin Natrass

+190m for Matt Balkham

+200m for John Tritsarolis

For those that don’t know some club members fairly regularly get together to practice casting. These sessions focus of technique, timing, equipment, weather conditions and heaps more and give a chance for us to improve our distance and accuracy. The photos above are from the accurate measurement of the distances achieved and count towards official club pin badges which officially mark the achievement at a range of distances.

Anyone interested in finding more should speak to Gary Whittaker

RESULTS OF SHORE COMPETITION No.3 12th & 13th November 2016 Moon: 3 Days Weather: Rain Saturday afternoon better Sunday morning. before full

Tide: High 15:16 Scores as follows:

Name

Points

Details

Zac Livingston

1069.8

Richard Newton-King

649.7

Collin Nattrass

410.2

2 Cod - Red, 2 Elephantfish, 5 Kahawai, 1 Moki - Blue, 7 Red Gurnard, 2 Shark - Spotted 5 Cod - Red, 6 Kahawai, 2 Moki - Blue, 2 Shark - Spotted, 1 Shark - Spotted Spiney, 1 Trevally 2 Cod - Red, 1 Kahawai, 3 Red Gurnard, 5 Shark - Spotted, 1 Witch (Brill)

Jim O'Brien

382.7

4 Cod - Red, 1 Kahawai, 4 Red Gurnard, 1 Skate - Rough, 3 Tarakihi, 1 Treval-

Craig Boyes Steve Reed Felix Wenzel Thomas McCabe Riki Nunez Mike Iorns Tim Henley

342.0 306.7 236.0 221.3 200.8 148.4 147.1

2 Cod - Red, 3 Kahawai, 1 Kelp, 4 Tarakihi 1 Barracouta, 4 Kahawai, 3 Shark - Spotted 5 Red Gurnard, 1 Snapper 1 Conger Eel, 2 Eagle Ray, 1 Kahawai, 1 Tarakihi 2 Eagle Ray, 1 Kahawai 1 Cod - Red, 3 Red Gurnard, 1 Tarakihi 2 Cod - Red, 1 Kahawai, 1 Shark - Spotted, 1 Shark - Spotted Spiney

James Bennie Matthew Renata

133.2 124.2

1 Cod - Red, 1 Conger Eel, 1 Shark - Carpet, 2 Shark - Spotted 2 Cod - Red, 1 Kahawai, 2 Red Gurnard

Matt Balkham Zeb Livingston

89.9 70.8

2 Cod - Red, 1 Conger Eel, 1 Kahawai 2 Red Gurnard

POINTS TABLES AFTER COMPETITION No.3 Count

Average Pts/Fish

Zac Livingston

10

45.7

Jim O'Brien

8

28.9

Collin Nattrass

8

37.1

Thomas McCabe

7

28.2

Craig Boyes

7

35.2

James Bennie

7

50.2

Tim Henley

6

37.0

Richard Newton-King

6

38.2

Gary Whitaker

6

25.4

Anthony Sanger

5

29.2

Matthew Renata

5

28.7

Zeb Livingston

5

35.1

Steve Reed

5

35.8

Mike Iorns

4

34.5

Riki Nunez

3

48.5

SPECIES SENIORS

Points

Zac Livingston

1829.0

James Bennie

1003.0

Collin Nattrass

963.2

Craig Boyes

774.5

Tim Henley

703.5

Steve Reed

609.2

Mike Iorns*

414.1

Zeb Livingston

385.8

Thomas McCabe*

366.2

Gary Whitaker

355.6

Anthony Sanger

321.5

Riki Nunez*

290.7

Matthew Renata

257.9

Nick Polak

240.3

Felix Wenzel

236.0

James Wells*

130.8

Dave Brown

94.4

Matt Balkham*

89.9

Richard Cryer

84.4

Hugh McCabe*

52.5

Matt Balkham

3

22.5

Andy McEwan

2

16.2

Hugh McCabe

2

26.3

Felix Wenzel

2

39.3

James Wells

1

43.6

Nick Polak

1

240.3

Dave Brown

1

47.2

Richard Cryer

1

42.2

POINTS TABLES AFTER COMPETITION No.3 SCALE

Points

NON SCALE

Points

Zac Livingston

1047.5

Zac Livingston

781.5

Jim O'Brien

641.0

James Bennie

482.0

Tim Henley

604.6

Collin Nattrass

420.7

Richard Newton-King

564.8

Steve Reed

298.3

Collin Nattrass

542.5

Craig Boyes

260.7

James Bennie

521.0

Riki Nunez

149.2

Craig Boyes

513.8

Zeb Livingston

143.5

Mike Iorns

414.1

Thomas McCabe

135.1

Steve Reed

310.9

Gary Whitaker

103.1

Anthony Sanger

285.9

Tim Henley

98.9

Gary Whitaker

252.5

Richard Newton-King

84.8

Zeb Livingston

242.3

Jim O'Brien

53.6

Nick Polak

240.3

Hugh McCabe

42.8

Matthew Renata

239.2

Anthony Sanger

35.6

Felix Wenzel

236.0

Matthew Renata

18.8

Thomas McCabe

231.1

Matt Balkham

7.5

Riki Nunez

141.5

James Wells

James Wells

130.8

Andy McEwan

Dave Brown

94.4

Felix Wenzel

Richard Cryer

84.4

Dave Brown

Matt Balkham

82.4

Mike Iorns

Andy McEwan

80.9

Nick Polak

Hugh McCabe

9.7

Richard Cryer

VETERANS

MOST MOKI

Points

Richard Newton-King

2 1 1

Jim O'Brien

694.6

Zac Livingston

Richard Newton-King

649.7

Nick Polak

Andy McEwan

80.9

CHAMPION OF CHAMPIONS

PAIRS

Points

No.

Points

Z.Livingstone & Z.Livingstone

2214.8

J.Bennie & T.Henley

1706.5

Zeb Livingston

183.9

A.Sanger & C.Nattrass

1284.7

Jim O'Brien

53.1

G.Whitaker & C.Boyes

1130.1

MOST SNAPPER Felix Wenzel

J.Obrien & M.Renata

952.5

No.

S.Reed & A.McEwen

690.1

1

R.Nunez & T.McCabe

656.9

Fish of the month - October Category

Weight

Species

Line

Name

Location

Date

Place

SHORE

SNR Shore Scale

2.27

Trevally

8

R. Cryer

Wgn Harbour

23/10/16

2nd

SNR Shore Scale

6.1

Blue Moki

10

N. Polak

Evans Bay

29/10/16

WINNER

SNR Boat Scale

7.06

Snapper

5

D. Pye

Kapiti

9/10/16

SNR Boat Scale

26.94

Kingfish

24

M. Pandelidis West Coast

BOAT

23/10/16

2nd WINNER

Recent Club Events Boat Competitions

Boat Comp Number 1 With the weather not playing the game, it was hard for boaties to get out and have a fish. Strong Northerly winds on Saturday, dying out Sunday morning only to be replaced by twenty to thirty knot southerlies didn’t give much opportunity for fishing. The hardy few that went out on Sunday had the weather drive them in within thirty minutes of leaving the ramp. The only fisho’s that weighed in was our Club Captain Master Fish Dave Pye with a nice 7kg Snapper caught on the West Coast.

Results Name Dave Pye

Points 197.04

Details 1 Skate - Smooth, 1 Snapper

Boat Comp Number 2 With Saturday fishing out due to thirty knot southerly, no one was able to get out but with southerlies dying out overnight, Sunday was the day. And those that made the effort caught some very nice fish.

Crazy yako Eddie Ski caught some good Tarakihi and some nice Snapper. Considering he is fishing in a kayak , its not the first time Eddie has shown us all how you don’t need a big boat to catch very good fish. Well done Eddie. Marty and Brian went out on the West Coast as well, and both caught very good fish with Gurnard and Trevally making up the bulk of their catch. Over all there was some very fish caught buy those that made the effort.

Results of Boat Competition No. 2 Name

Points

Details

Martin Jeffrey

727.00

6 Kahawai, 8 Red Gurnard, 1 Shark - Carpet, 5 Shark - Spotted Spiney, 3 Trevally

Brian Bee

438.50

6 Kahawai, 4 Red Gurnard, 3 Shark - Spotted Spiney, 1 Trevally

Eddie Szalkowski

384.88

1 Red Gurnard, 4 Snapper, 3 Tarakihi

Boat Competition 2016/17 Scores to date Angler

Competition Number

Total Points

Total Species

Average Pts/fish

Martin Jeffrey

727.00

5

31.61

727.0

Brian Bee

438.50

4

32 43

438.5

Eddie Szalkowski

384.88

3

48.11

384.8

Dave Pye

197.04

2

98.52

Points by Bernhardt Schiftner

1

197.0

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

Recent Club Events Club weekend at the Bach Over the weekend of Saturday 3rd December and Sunday 4th September the club enjoyed an outing to the Bach. Another good turn out helped by reasonable weather and fishing. Best fish goes to Craig with his Blue Moki pictured below.

A reminder that the Bach is available for use by clubbies. Ask a committee member if you want more info.

Recent Club Events Social Fish Social fishes happen throughout the season. Starting after work and typically finishing a little after dark, they are a great way to meet a few more clubbies and learn a few sports around Wellington.

Sometimes we even catch a few fish as you’ll see below! Keep an eye on your emails and Facebook for the latest info on timings of these events and we hope to see you at one soon.

Meet Matt... “ This slightly out of focus (it was a self take on a tripod) is not my finest photographic achievement, and this fish in not the highlight of my fishing career, but this is one of the first fish I caught since moving to NZ. Caught last year in the harbor it was the start of my learning shore fishing in NZ. I’ve learnt a lot since then mostly through the generosity

Newsletter Editor - Matt Balkham

From the Editor Second newsletter finished (at last!) and the season is really starting to get going. The weather is picking up and the fish have started biting.

Last weekends joint boat & shore comp saw a huge array of amazing fish weighed in (look out for those in the next edition!)

of fellow clubbies who have given there time to the club (and me) and taught me so much already.

I’m looking forward to

It’s great to see so much going on at the club. Good turnout at club nights and social fishes and plenty at the weigh-ins. A reminder please do take photos of the events that you attend. I can’t be everywhere and always love to receive photos and reports from other club members. If you have an idea for an article, would like to write a few words about a fishing experience (club related or otherwise) then do get in touch and share this with the other clubbies.

continuing to learn and hopefully eventually catching a few better ones. In the meantime I’m loving the journey!“

If you do catch a trophy fish I’m more than happy to come and take some photos for you. If you want any pointers on using your camera, editing photos on the computer, which gear to buy or anything photography related I’ll try my best to help you. Come see me at a club night or drop me an email or message on Facebook.

Lastly no entries were received for the ‘Just for fun’ competition run last month which either means no one is interested in such a feature or that the photos and clues were too difficult! If I do receive any entries I’ll publish them next edition. Otherwise I’ll scrap the feature!!

Get in touch via mbalkham@gmail.com

Last but not least!

Kingie joins the wall of fame!

Contact Us For more information and up to date news visit us on facebook at www.facebook.com/ wsac1958/

Follow us on Instagram @wsac_fishing Or contact us via email at: wsac.inc@gmail.com

For those that might not have seen, do check out all our mounts downstairs at the Evans Bay Yacht Club.

Wellington Surfcasting and Angling Club Wellington, New Zealand

WSAC Wellington’s premier fishing club!

From: Wellington Surfcasting and Angling Club Inc., PO Box 3060, Wellington 6140

PLACE STAMP HERE