Fly Fishing Blog by Alphonse Fishing Co™

ASTOVE ATOLL FLY FISHING REPORT | 24 FEB – 03 MAR 2025

As a new week of fishing dawned on the gorgeous heart shaped atoll known as Astove, we were joined by four anglers, Toby and Alexander Swank who run Fins and Feathers out of Montana, Gary Walters from South Africa and return guest Christopher Ward from the United Kingdom. Toby and Alexander had a splendid days fishing on day one with Astove guide Don Dustan, where Toby caught two giant trevally measuring in at 70 cm and 78 cm while Alexander went on to completing his first slam for the week with an indo-pacific permit, milkfish and bonefish. Christopher Ward went out with head guide Enrico Aerts on his first day and had a good amount of shots at giant trevally, even witnessing an amazing sighting of 12 giant trevally following about 18 rays on the turtle grass around the iconic Paulie’s island just situated off the south western corner flats of Astove, even though Christopher had a tough days angling, he managed to finish his first day out on the flats with a 61cm giant trevally.

On day two Christopher was determined to correct the mistakes made on day one, he headed out with guide Gary de Klerk doing the long trek from Paulie’s all the way to the mouth and up the lagoon system towards south mooring where lunch was only going to get served at about 14:30. Despite the long walk and late lunch Christopher was focused on the goal at hand and managed to complete a slam for the day catching an 82 cm giant trevally, 34 cm permit and respectable sized bonefish to complete his slam. Toby and Alexander spent day two fishing with head guide Enrico Aerts and even though there were fish around, things didn’t seem to be going as well as on day one with a few missed opportunities and getting rinsed by a few bigbone fish in the surf zone around north point. The guys managed to catch a couple of good sized surf zone bonefiish and Alexander eventually managed to pin and land a 36cm moustache triggerfish, one of the species he was most interested in catching during his trip to the Seychelles.

Day three and four were tough days with very little shots being presented on the flats, even though the weather was prime and the visibility was great the dropping tide wasn’t fishing as well as it had been the previous two days and the pushing tides were just as slow and tedious. Some guides opted to fish the lagoon, which was also slow when it came to trevally’s, but did hold a few permit circulating the system. Christopher managed to scratch it out the bag on day three catching one 74 cm giant trevally with guide Don Dustan.

Day five and six the fishing picked up again and there were definitely fish around. Although most of the guys struggled to land fish on day five, Toby and Alexander had an incredible days fishing with Astove head guide Enrico Aerts where Toby landed a 70 cm giant trevally out of a pack of 6 sitting on about 14 rays pushing up a cut on the eastern side of the atoll between the dune and the pole, while Enrico stood with a moustache triggerfish already in the net that Alexander had just caught and landed moments earlier, Toby was tussling the 70 cm giant trevally with another trying to eat the fly out of the fishes mouth, Alexander was instructed to take his 12 wt and make a cast to try catch the second trevally, where things didn’t go as planned. Once the chaos settled and Enrico could finally take his camera out of this backpack, after landing the giant trevally they snapped a couple shots of father and son with the trevally and moustache triggerfish, absolutely epic memory for the father and son duo. Already buzzing from the days events, Alex wasn’t done with his favourite species to target out there, Alex managed to land three moustache triggerfish that day with the biggest being 41 cm, landing two giant trevally’s (biggest being 72 cm), a respectable 61 cm bonefish and later completing the super slam in the lagoon once the water had pushed them out the surf to complete the super slam.

Day six was another great day on the flats of Astove with Toby catching a 65 cm giant trevally, while Alex managed a giant trevally and three more moustache triggerfish with guide Gary de Klerk, declaring him the triggerfish king for the week. After a tough week of searching for trophy sized trevally during the course of the week, Gary Walters managed to complete a slam with head guide Enrico Aerts on the last day of his trip consisting of two giant trevally (biggest being 70 cm), a moustache triggerfish and bonefish. Well done to all the gents for their amazing catches and we hope to see you out here again for another session.

Tight lines, Blue Safari Fly Fishing

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