The African Angler: Fishing at Toteng river bridge

Its been a while since I posted on the blog. The water level in the Okavango Delta and around Maun is dropping rapidly and the temperature is around 28 deg c. As the water level drops all the fish are forced out of the flood plains and into the main river channel. On the afternoon of the 20th October I took a drive down to the Toteng river bridge.

I had heard the the bream were not taking spinners but rather Rapalas. I tied one on and caught a few small fish. Then I decided to try a lure that's been lying in my box for over a year now, one of those that catch the fisherman way before the fish. First cast and bang, I was on to a good Nembwe, and every cast after that I landed a fish. It must rate as one of my best fishing days ever. The bream just cant leave this lure alone and there are none in the local tackle shop. My wife kindly went to the tackle shop in Durban where I found them and bought the balance of the stock on the shelf. They just have to get here.

All in all we got 25 bream for the afternoon.

The two biggest fish weighing in at around 1.5kg each.

The following weekend I got a boat ride up the Boro River right up into the Delta. Unfortunately I didn't have my camera with me but the fishing was amazing. The African Pike are a nuisance when you are targeting bream. We caught fish on almost every cast. I also had the opportunity to snorkel in one of the lagoons. The amount of fish around is just mind boggling. Thank you Daniel and Ben.

This morning Chris and I left the house at 04H30 for the Toteng River Bridge. We arrived at 05H30 I tied on my tattered no name lure and I was into a fish on my first cast. I dropped the fish and the next two and only then did I notice the tip of my hook was broken off. I put in a jig head and next cast landed a nice Nembwe. A few casts later and I was into another nice fish but this time it was a Humpback Largemouth Bream, my first one.

We fished until 06H30 and then all of a sudden the fish went off the bite as if someone had flipped a switch. From then on till 09h00 we didn't even get another bite. Total keepers for the morning, 8 nice bream.