St Brandon Blog: 7 – 17 May 2024

The 6th week of the season kicked off with guests arriving from the United States and Australia. This week we move away from new moon springs and go back into neap tides, these tides generally bring more fish onto the flats while also allowing us more time on the flats due to the less water movement around the Atoll. The wind for the week started off very strong, blowing out of the south east resulting in cool water flushing onto the flats, although it did make casting and presenting a fly a little bit difficult.

The bone fishing was off to a cracking start with many big fish seen tailing in skinny water and feeding happily on whatever was presented to them. Vince had a great start to his trip and with his first cast he landed the week’s first 10lb Bonefish! As the week went on, the bone fishing continued to be outstanding with many fish spotted and caught by our group of anglers. On the third day of the week, anglers Jeff and Terry both managed to land true monsters, with their fish pushing the scale over the 13lb mark ! On the 5th day of the week, Steve also got in on the big bonefish action, landing a beautiful double digit bone which was also just over the 13lb mark. The bone fishing this week was truly a sight to behold with the anglers getting into good numbers every day and the average fish weighing in between 6lb and 9lb.

The guests also enjoyed some phenomenal Permit fishing this week as we saw good numbers of fish around the flats during the pushing tides as well as the high tides around the islands and ridges. On the third day of the week, Alec landed a beautiful 14lb Indo-Pacific Permit during a slow pushing tide in the morning. The fish was sitting stationary on a turtle grass edge, Alec put in the perfect cast and with one strip his line went tight. He wasn’t quite done however as on the fourth day he landed another two Permit of 7lb and 12lb respectively, and yet another on the 5th day of just over the 7lb mark. As we moved into the neap tides there were multiple Permit spotted on turtle grass flats and cruising the edges of sand flats along depressions and cuts. On the last day of the week, Terry managed to open his Permit account landing a solid 8lb fish.

The Trevally fishing this week was once again a little bit slower which is normal for this time of year. A couple of big GT’s were seen around the Atoll with fewer Bluefin hunting around the higher lying areas compared to previous weeks. On the third day of the week however, Jeff had some amazing GT action hooking 4 fish in quick succession but unfortunately not getting a good hook set resulting in the fish having the final say.

The fishing this week was nothing short of spectacular with our guests experiencing what St Brandon’s truly has to offer. The conditions are prime with cool water and the prevailing wind constantly pushing cold, oxygenated water across the atoll. This has the guide team extremely excited to see what the next few weeks will bring us. We await our new clients arriving as the neap tides end and we move back into springs again.

Our catch tally for the week: