All too often as a bass angler you will find yourself longing for new waters and as not everyone lives in areas where public dams are within reach more often than not you will probably be fishing on a farm dam of which you either have to know someone or know someone that knows someone…This story is about a trip I have done along with my brother and father in the greater Vryheid area where we covered some ground to fish a variety of dams all in just one day out and boy oh boy…was the competition fierce…
The trip
Sitting at home all relaxed after a long day at work my brother starts talking to me on Whatsapp about possibly looking at buying a boat together and so the conversation took a turn like it usually does and the words of “when are we going fishing?” came up. Now I’m not sure if my brother is aware of just how far I’d go in life to be able to catch a bass so generally I just said yes to the first indication of a date (which would be the upcoming Saturday at the time) not even thinking of my shift pattern but, it seems the gods of fishing was on my side for a change as it was my weekend off at least. I then get the bright spark to phone my father and see what they would be busy with for the weekend as to get him to go along as well and then my mother and brothers wife would be able to spend the day together while the boys are out fishing.
After a quick phone call it is established…the parentals would be on their way to Vryheid as well, as I am travelling from Ladysmith I had a bit more ground to cover in the morning which meant I would have to get up a bit earlier than the rest but I still had plans on the Friday night which in turn meant I was not able to load my kayaks until the next morning. So, the Friday night at around 11.30pm I managed to start loading the Ford with all my kit to be ready to rumble the next morning once I tied on the kayaks.
The next morning I woke up with a shock, as soon as I opened my eyes I just knew I was going to be a bit late so I ran up and down the house trying to make sure that everything is packed and ready and I loaded the kayaks and as I left the house I realised that I would still have to go put some diesel in the bakkie as well so that would most definitely make me late for our 7am rendezvous at my brothers house in Vryheid
Finally at 06.10am I managed to hit the road out of Ladysmith with my trusty Jack Russel called Rover next to me, the next stop would be Vryheid via Dundee, I then decided im not going to let anyone know that I am late as maybe, just maybe the road is quiet and I would still be able to make it being maybe 5-10mins late. Cruising along to some great oldies on the radio I start mentally preparing myself for the action that this day would hold and lil’ Rover sleeping like a dead dog next to me. As I pass Dundee, I realise that I might still make this meeting on time by the looks of things as the Ranger just needed a pair of wings then I could have been flying.
Reaching the outskirts of Vryheid, I was confident that I would be there by 7am now and as I turned off on the dirt road towards where my brother lives, I see my parents turning off right behind me, so time was perfect. We then stopped and greeted just loading my dads equipment into the bakkie and off we went, a day of adventure is bound to happen I could just feel it.
On the hunt
We left Vryheid on route to our 1st dam for the day – now this one I know and have been to in the past along with my brother so I had a good idea of what to expect and what baits to be using to deliver some fish, but this time round I had the kayak and that means I will have to possibly change the game a bit. We reach the dam and it was really full after all the recent rains and the water also a bit murky and grass structure EVERYWHERE! We only had access to a couple of decent spots and even so with the kayaks the dam had more grass than fishable water so we decided to call it after about one hour of hard fishing where even the “go to” lures didn’t produce anything, loaded the kayaks and off we went again towards the next dam. As we approached the next piece of water I was in awe of the sheer beauty of the dam, it made a nice gully up towards the one side, it offered some thick vegetation to fish as well as a reed bank and the deep water of the dam wall side, with the water seeming black with the sheer clarity. This was it I thought, here we will get stuck for the day and this is where I will pull out my new PB for sure, it just must be!
As we landed I saw some fish playing in the shallows right where we parked so before I even did anything else I grabbed a rod and flung my lure right into place but alas it came out without so much as even a tickle on the other end. Between my brother and myself we decided its good plan to take down the kayaks and make a mission for the gully as it has to deliver some fish – it looked like one of those absolute perfect scenes, a bit of lily pads, some reeds and some thick grass, making channels and drop offs. My brother and I now work this spot, cast for cast, trying to deliver the first fish while my dad is taking a walk around towards the wall side to see if there would be anything around. I change lures and change lures again and again and it just seemed like nothing was working, fishing deep, slow, top water and even flung out a fly with the fly rod but still no fish coming out. My brother picked up a few strikes of small ones as well as my dad but not landing anything.
Eventually we packed up yet again and off we went to the next dam, now my brother pre-fished this next one only a week before so had all the inside info but was not very keen to share until he landed the 1st fish for the day and what a nice one, pulled out right in a thick reed patch at the inlet of the dam. I quickly followed his tactics and had my Keitech Noisy Flapper flying towards roughly the same spot and as it was not long after! Fish ON!! Now we were one of one then he carried on pounding the fish getting a total of 8 and I’m still on one and my dad still nothing. After ending up walking around the dam I managed to settle the score to 8-5 by now but I’m still behind and the old man still on nothing so I decided to give the old man some tips as well as one of my noisy flappers that he could try get a fish as I switch over to a spinner bait with a white Grub as a trailer. I end up casting into a lily patch and on the drop, I got picked up! Landing 4 fish in 4 casts, by now my brother caught another so we were running 9-9-0 then I got another 3 fish in no time, all around this one vegetation patch not far from the bank. I then got my dad set up with a spinner bait as well and explained to him how it functions then shortly after the ballie landed his 1st bass on a spinner bait!
Up to today my brother will still say he caught the most for the day and I would like to think that it was myself but that’s brotherly love I suppose, especially when it comes to bass fishing.
We ended up going to another two dams, none of which produced any fish then back home again where the ladies were eagerly waiting to hear the stories of the day.
