TigerfishFrenzy Travel

28/06/2017

I have just returned from another week of fly fishing on the Upper Zambezi and even though conditions were pretty tough with heavy winds bringing on an almost unfishable river, some very good fish were boated and released.

16/06/2017

Tigerfishing May 2017

02/09/2016

Good morning world, come on tigers!

31/08/2016

Loving my first night of my last fishing trip for the winter season

24/05/2016

May '16 Shackletons Lodge Trip Report:
Firstly let me say what an awesome Lodge Shackletons Tiger Lodge is. Thank you to Dave, Tammy and the rest of the team for looking after us so well. The rooms were comfy, the food so tasty and the service was outstanding!

In short the fishing was really good, but like all early May trips you really do have to work hard to find the tigers and get them to bite. Very long hours were spent on the river (from sun up to sun down) searching for baitfish and patterns. By the end of the trip we had a couple really good spots in our arsenal and were able to maximise on the fishing.

Conditions were just about perfect, the water level was high and dropping approximately 3cm per day at the lodge. the days were warm, although we were bothered by a bit of wind in the mornings the water stayed a constant 23 degrees for the duration of our visit. The water was extremely clean and we fished onto a full moon.

The main pattern that worked for us was identifying of banks where the water had just receded enough to leave a small bit of solid ground showing. We would drift these banks casting as close as possible into the eddies and areas of structure, and any possible spot that a tiger might use to ambush moving baitfish.

Flies that worked the best were the smaller baitfish patterns with natural colours like Black on grey, black on purple, grey on olive and brown attached to short 10cm piano wire retwistable traces although in areas of slower ultra clean water we did opt to replace the wire with a heavy Flouro leader. Casting had to be pinpoint accurate and have significant distance up to 30m.

The Results: 1 angler; 8 days, 103 tigers
Average size was 6 pounds biggest weighing in just over 12 pounds. In total roughly 700 pounds of fish boated and released in good health!

All in all an excellent trip with great results, but be warned flyfishing in May is not easy, be prepared to work very hard for every fish you catch!

Tight Lines
Haydn

19/05/2016

Our last day of the first trip of the winter season. The angling has been very technical but once we got the patterns sussed we had some great fishing on fly.
Trip report to follow

10/05/2016

Loving my first night on the River

21/04/2016

First TFF Hydrograph for the winter season. 2016 Flood in Red. Interesting to note that this years flood was way late with the initial rise starting 5 weeks later than the 2013 & 2012 floods, but on a big plus its way up on last year's level. Come on Winter!!

14/04/2016

Upper Zambezi Flooding extent on the Caprivi courtesy of Hydrological Services of Namibia

14/04/2016

2016 water level update: this week has seen the water level at Katima Mulilo stop rising. This is a normal occurrence for April as the usual first wave of flood passes us by. Normally this is followed by a second wave rise about 2 weeks later. Let's see what happens this year?

06/04/2016

After an extended stay in SA I'm finally back home and in the office. The first thing that hit me on my arrival was the amount of water that now spans the floodplain in front of our lodge. Its Fantastic news really and herewith the latest hydro-graph of water levels at Katima Mulilo courtesy of :Hydrological Services of Namibia. The flood was very late this year but most welcome.

20/01/2016

The man makes sense

Hey guys,With all this talk of some of the newer rods getting bad raps for breaking, I looked around and found a very interesting article by G. Loomis on the subject. Enjoy:Ever since the introduction...

18/01/2016

That's it! My summer is now wrapped up and finished. It was a story of high's and lows this season. Mostly high temperatures and low water levels and very little rain here on the Upper Zambezi but thankfully some late season thunder showers cooled us down and turned the fishing on!

06/10/2015

It's October - Our winter tigerfishing season on the Upper Zambezi has finally drawn to an end and what stories we have to tell. Time to put away the Flies and Effzetts and sit down behind a computer again and start planning next years adventures. Pics and stories to be posted soon, watch this space....

07/09/2015

Just Brilliant!!

27/08/2015

Do you agree Bronwen Willans? :-)

Are you married to or dating a fisherman? Then you'll be able to relate to this list!

19/08/2015

Awesome Truth!

03/06/2015

I have just returned from 3 weeks guiding at the wonderful Shackletons Tiger lodge on the Upper Zambezi near Mwandi in Zambia. Thank you Howard Shackleton and James Murray. You guys have an amazing team that can boast great service, awesome accommodation and excellent food! The fishing however was pretty tough due to the low flood this year and a water level that wasn't keen on dropping much during our stay. Although numbers of fish landed was way down the ratio of large fish to small was way up. Driftbaiting is still the method of choice for conventional anglers, finding bait was a little difficult but once we had bulldogs in hand the bites were plentiful. It was a little more challenging for fly anglers to find the opportunistic feeding fish but a full day on the water covering river gave enough bites and opportunities to keep one interested. Once again Shackletons lodge has kept their name flying high with an awesome location and product that keeps guests booking for the following year.

09/03/2015

06/03/2015

Jan 2015 - start of the new drift bait season with the Emslie group

07/01/2015

Jessica Emslie with her first ever tiger - a lovely 10 pounder, what a way to break the ice!

07/01/2015

07/01/2015

Today was an epic start to the 2015 drift bait season.
The giant tigers are running and monster catfish are here.
Its a great time to fish right now

01/12/2014

Cast from the Past: Catfish fun in November 2010

Al York, Deb Klemencic & Fred Kelly enjoying the spoils of Summer Driftbait fishing on the Upper Zambezi.

For more info about the driftbait method please visit:
www.tigerfishfrenzy.com/8driftbait.htm

01/12/2014

The Zambezi has made a nice rise at Katima this weekend with waterlevels already 11cm higher than last year.

29/11/2014

Driftbait season is Almost Here!
Checkout the latest RiverNews catch reports and waterlevel update on TigerfishFrenzy.com

http://ow.ly/F42KB