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Durban – Three nets of sardines have been pulled in at Isipingo Beach, with another net being pulled in at Amanzimtoti’s main beach, the KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board said on Thursday.
A net with "a small pocket of fish" was also pulled in at Winklespruit.
KwaZulu-Natal Sharks Board head of operations Mike Anderson-Reade told News24 that there seemed to be "bits and pieces" of fish between Isipingo and Umgababa.
"As far as I'm aware, three nets were pulled in at Isipingo, one in Amanzimtoti's main beach, while a net with a small pocket of fish was pulled in at Winklespruit [on Thursday]. Apart from that, the rest of the coast is very quiet," he said.
On Wednesday morning, 110 crates of sardines were netted by fishermen in Scottburgh, on the south coast of KwaZulu-Natal.
Anderson-Read had told News24 on Wednesday that it was just "a little shoal of sardines" that were netted.
He said the 110 crates of sardines did not mean that it was a sardine run.
Anderson-Reade had said the weather had nothing to do with whether the sardines hit the shores of Durban or not on Thursday.
"The weather at the moment doesn't play any huge role, but it's more sea temperature related. It's related to the temperature of the water and various other things in the marine environment, not too much on the winds," he said.
He said the last good sardine run was in 2012.
According to the board's website, sardines are "cold-water fish and are usually associated with areas of cold ocean upwelling, where deeper, cooler, nutrient-rich water currents surge to the surface when they strike shallow coastal areas".
Sardines are commonly found in enormous shoals on the west coasts of California, South America, Japan, Australia and, of course, southern Africa.
