Well the weather has not really been allowing us to go as wide as we wanted to in the last 2 weeks with 35knt winds both weekends. Our usual spots over by the pigeons and squiggles where there has been lots of snapper have been a long way to go with the big seas we have had! The good news is that the bigger fish are now moving in closer and we are finding good gannet and dolphin workups with loads of better size snapper and kingfish under them! We have been looking for the birds working in the 45-50mtrs marks over a wide area in the middle grounds. These areas are now holding good amounts of the larger snapper and long drifts through them (not necessarily exactly where the workups are) is producing a steady stream of good fish. As you would know we specialise in lures and especially slow jigs. The colours that are working seem to differ every day and sometimes during the same day as well. Orange and yellow colours mixed together have been great as have the pinks and reds. We tend to try as many colours as we can until we find the right mixture then get everyone fishing these. Having 8 anglers helps us to find the right combination. There are also fast-moving workups around the elbow east of Tiri (out side the cable), but they don’t seem to be holding many bigger snapper at the moment. These workups can also be found halfway down the Tiri to Kauwau line on the inside of the cable (western side of cable zone). They are also in the cable zone but please don’t fish in here!!! I imagine the snapper fishing will become more consistent in closer now as the water starts cooling again. We really enjoy this time of year at the end of summer and the great fishing it provides through late February and March. So I look forward to seeing you out there. Or come out with me and enjoy my playground and learn a few tricks I have gained over the years! Nik Key is a tutor, guide, lure tester, author and charter skipper for Snap Fishing Ventures. Capt Nik (Snap)

The fishing has just continued to fire right in the harbour and out wide. The middle grounds seem to be a bit more quiet - snapper wise that is as the kingfish are prolific in all areas! We have been fishing a big area around the squiggles in 45-50mtrs with great success. While the fish are not huge there are numerous pannies here in the 40-50cm range. We are finding mountains of snapper piled on top of each other in typical spawning mode. They are not always hungry but when they decide to feed it is all on! After only 6 snapper being caught all morning on sign like this below at the change of the tide (low) it was all on and we manage another 50 in 1 hour. As you can imagine my decky and myself were very busy netting and dispatching snapper with 8-way hook-ups! We are also getting quite a few legal kingfish out of these epic snapper sessions and they are always a welcome bycatch on the light snapper gear. The lures that are performing the best in these areas and conditions are the 200g Kabura style. I am always changing the head/skirts colours to see which ones work the best and am finding that each day is different. The best colours have been in this order – orange head with orange/yellow skirts, pink head with pink and red skirts, green head with green and red skirts and yellow head with yellow and brown skirts. I am making my own skirts up and mixing colours to see which ones work best. The fish seem to move a 1-2nm each day and I have been tracking their progress on my Navionics app. I have found one really good area that I call the “supermarket” due to its consistency! Looking at my diary top of Coromandel usually starts to go off at this time of the year so we will be venturing over their in the next month in search of the bigger moochers (60-80cm) grazing on the crustaceans on the contour lines. In closer the inner harbour should only get better. I find outgoing tide to be best as the spawning fish come out after spawning and are very hungry. We use the same lures in here as we do out wide but change down in weight as required. So I look forward to seeing you out there. Or come out with me and enjoy my playground and learn a few tricks I have gained over the years! Nik Key is a tutor, guide, lure tester, author and charter skipper Capt Nik