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The Fishing Report

The Archive: Rio Azul, Imbabala Safari Lodge, Chile, New Zealand, Lake Tanganyika, Bassas da India, Des Roches Island, Farquar aboard the MV Illusions, Barotse Tiger Camp, Chawalo, Neptune Warrior - Trident Tested, Ngwezi Houseboat - Okavango,

Ngwezi Houseboat - Okavango

Fish aren’t too dissimilar from the people who spend an unreasonable amount of time trying to track them down. In essence the two most compelling factors that cause either to move any sizable distance is to feed or breed…… and which is more

compelling really depends on who you ask? What triggers the spawning urge can only really be measured by the cycles of our season, a biological clock that is powered by the revolutions of our planet.

And every organism from the time they are bred is fair game for one up in the food chain.
Now old whiskers doesn’t exactly have a discriminating palate…… in fact on a gastronomic scale of variety he makes the average swine look like a fussy eater .Rotting vegetation, insects, crustaceans seed, fruit, frogs birds and even small mammals are on the al la carte. But fish still remain its’ main source of protein and this is what motivates the feeding frenzy tearing up the channels of the Okavango panhandle…….and what provokes an onslaught of anglers who get wind of the annual barbell run.

News of obsessive fish is virulent, spreading faster than an outbreak of the pox.
Which had Tommy Larken fleeing the Bells depot to join Natal Fly Fishers Grevin Price and Richard Gorlei along with the intrepid angling zealots Jeremy Rochester and Paul Lishman in hot pursuit of the run.

The Delta had just received it’s largest influx of water recorded in 50 years, saturating the 16835 square kilometers of Kalahari sand, magnifying the swamps and giving the thousands of animals a vast array of channels in which to forage for food.One of the greatest concentrations of wildlife is to be found in and around the Delta and whilst our interlude with the pan was brief on route from Maun to Seronga, you are given a real perspective on what it the largest inland Delta on earth.

Incredibly within a few hours from leaving the smog of the Gauteng you can be cruising down the Okavango river if you have the right vessel. Surrounded by Papyrus and Phragmites, you really do need the Ngwezi Houseboat to give you some perspective of the maze of channels that make up the main stream. Reacting to the bush telegraph, conveying that the run was very active around Sepupa, we cruised upstream, strapping the infallible fire tiger clouser and entertaining each other with stories that we’ve all heard before but with the help of some extra special still seem to crack us up.

Of course sleep is never a real option when you invite Grevin on tour, well before the sun has even considered rising, he’s pacing up and down, in need of his fishing fix.

Now you would assume that in order to catch tigers in the barbell run, you have to find the run……but that’s just not the case. While we waited for the birds to get airborne and show us the way, we anchored at the confluence of two channels and worked the current.

Nothing quite prepares you for the first attempt by the tiger to wrench the rod from your grasp. It gives a new meaning to the word violated. Grevin predictably was the first man to tackle the striped water dog landing a respectable 8 pound tiger.

With his provincial team mate Richard hot on his heels with successive strikes netting a 5lb and 7lb fish respectively. And Tommy didn’t have much time to get his casting arm oiled as a teenage tiger gave him a good rev.

Although it is considered bad sense let alone karma to move away from any spot producing fish…we wanted to track the run, knowing that we had days of fishing on our side. The run contrary to popular perception is not one moving mass, but a number of congregations chasing the bait up the channels. Just a hint of egrets and storks activity and you know that the action is imminent.

Watching the water slowly come on the boil will ignite any anglers adrenaline.
Simply get ahead of the run and throw your fly into the oncoming traffic, it has all the subtlety of clubbing seals. Jeremy’s fire tiger clouser certainly caught the attention of the hunting packs of tiger. As did Paul, hauling his imitation through the water column at high speed. It really is shot for shot, with us losing count of the tigers we were catching.

Not every strike guarantees runs on the board, with the urge to catastrophically lift your rod. Tip down, line strike and don’t give an inch unless your forced to…..against most modus operandi when it comes to normal fresh water fly fishing.

The run is simply impossible to leave, it has to either disappear into the backdrop of reeds or the sun forces you to relinquish your position and retire to take in the real reason you should make the journey to this part of the world.

The runs are purported to move up to 4km every day with the length of each one about averaging 250m. It all starts at the peak of the flood waters in Summer, where the barbs, bulldogs, churchills and stone bashers that form the base of the fish food chain spawn thousands of eggs…… starting a cycle that reaks havoc the following Spring. As the water levels drop through winter, come September, these baitfish move in large numbers into the mainstream attracting the attention of the sharp tooth catfish that rally on mass.

This degree of action would wake the dead let alone the patrolling tigers whose appetite seems insatiable. To hook into the slashing grasp of striped water dog really requires no skill in this environment……..but to land every assault on your fly is another story.

Paul Lishman had been saving his energy for a full fifteen round bout and set about jabbing at a few youngsters to warm up. Then he started wear his opponents down by raining blows on anything within arms length…..he was reveling in a session that he would be hard pressed to emulate again. Until he set the heavy weight title in his sights…looking for that knock out blow…..eventually netting his personal best of 8 pounds.

He wasn’t the only one punching fish left right and center, Grevin and Richard were exchanging swipes at any fish that came into their field of vision.

And Tommy, with a few tigers under the belt, was enjoying multiple strikes on the end of his line.

That’s when Jeremy decided to raise the bar…in retrospect he will of course tell you that he targeted it specifically….hand picked from the bulrushes with a deft presentation he enticed a spectacular Nembwe to his fly, it was evident was that the big bream were in residence! To really up the anti, in typical fashion he followed this up with another species that we had to correctly identify back on the boat as a Humpback Largemouth……it’s not every day that you get a first on fly.

Jeremy definitely had set his sights on the species crown, hauling a massive barbell to the back of the boat………although not what you’re targeting, with a few thousand mouths gulping in the vicinity, you’re definitely going to touch a whisker or two.

It even spurred my line into action……providing a respectable specimen of 7 pounds.
To say that the fishing was on would be like describing the great pyramids of mild architectural interest………the pack mentality of their feeding behavior is never more evident than during this annual fest.

It does sap the reserves and after many pleas, trying to rationalize with the fishermen who were in their own right in a frenzy, we returned to the comforts of the Ngwezi to enjoy our Skipper Bob’s considerable culinary skill.

The barbell run is a phenomenon that as an angler you have to experience and with only a 12 week window of opportunity, make sure you reserve your place on this legendary fishing trip.