FEBRUARY 2009 was very tough for the Gauteng anglers! Most of the teams that competed on the Vaal River, had a puzzled look on their faces that matched the dirty colour of the water. Their common question was, “Where have all the bass gone to?” However 22 teams unravelled the puzle in the following manner. They all seemed to fish dark plastic lures very tight to structure.

 Some fish got caught on spinnerbaits and crankbaits, but that was in the minority. Here’s how the top five teams put fish on the scales. In spite of only drawing number 36 on the day, we noticed that most of the boats headed towards the weir. Based on that we decided to head up towards the bridg­es at Stone Haven. We targeted the bridge columns with Jiggs, Yamamoto Creature Baits, and Alan used a deep diving Crank Bait.

We fished for a while without any luck and suddenly I felt pressure on my line and managed to land a 1 Kilo fish on a dark Creature Bait.We moved off towards the weir and stopped at vari­ous areas on the way but without success. Alan then decided to stop just past the Suikerbos mouth and the camera crew arrived and asked if we had had any luck. We informed them that we had one fish and at that moment, Alan shouted “I’m in” and our second fish was caught – this was once again caught on a Creature Bait. So then decided to target the lay-downs on the left side towards the weir. Alan had a small bite on plastic once again but failed to pick it up. He followed up with a deep diving Crank Bait which was immediately picked up and Alan managed to land a 1.8 Kilo fish. We continued with this pattern but had no more luck. Just before the Weigh-in we stopped across from Eligwa with only 10 minutes of fishing left. Once Alan had a bump on plastic and then decided to fol­low through with the deep diving Crank, which brought about immediate results and landed a 1.65 Kilo fish. This was definitely the cherry on the top and we headed off to the Weigh-in in high spirits. 

2nd Place - Team Gheco – Carlos Silva & John Short, started off early morning fishing at The Cliffs and caught their first fish ( 1.2kg ) with Mojo Junebug Fluke, then moved near Bird Island where we caught two nice fish close to isolated brush on Texas Junebug Brushhog,approx. 10.00am, then moved up river near Emerald Casino where we caught our 4th fish on Junebug Fluke.

3rd Place - Team Greenfish - Theo Prasinos & Louis Barbosa caught their first fish on dead wood in between reeds, on Blk/Blue jig, after which they changed their approach and pitched “wild thang” in and amongst simi­lar structure. They managed 60% hook-up success and weighed 3 fish with a total weight of 2,91kg. 

4th Place - Team Keepers - Ben and Adriana Albour­ough started off near the barrage. Spinnerbaits and crankbaits didn’t work. Switched to texas rigged black and chartreuse ringworms, fishing willow trees and lay downs they caught two fish holding very tight to struc­ture in 4 foot of water. The trick was repeated pres­entation to the same piece of structure. No bites after midday. 

5th Place - Team Rapala - Colin Wilmer decided to start close to the weigh station, about 1km up river, where he found the water to be very stained . A decision was made to go past the Sugarbush and try find cleaner water, pitching creature baits to back of the trees. A total of five bites for the day and three fish weighing 2.52kg. 

Big Fish (2.05kg) Muhammed Patel – We fished the banks of the emerald casino. At 8:45 I pitched a 5 inch junebug senko, weighted with a 1/8 ounce tungsten weight, 14lb gamma line on a 7ft g-loomis senko rod, into a laydown and on the drop the fish took it and ran.I had to be very gentle because it had taken me between the sticks and I did not want to risk getting broken up.I managed to free her, and got “big mama” in the boat.