The scattered fleet fishing the Tauranga Sport Fishing Club's one base competition is expected to begin moving closer to Tauranga as the weather closes in toward the close of the contest.

The settled weather since the 97 boats and on board teams began fishing on Wednesday this week has seen them disperse from The Mercury Islands to Waihou Bay, says club manager Roly Bagshaw.

Window shopping for fishermen: Two White Pointers from Gisborne.

'We've had a bit of a weather turn which is going to make the conditions more challenging for the guys,” says Roly.

'It tends to drive the smaller boats in. The larger ones might guts it out for a while. So we are hoping it might ease and we will get another day in today.

'But there's certainly been some great fish across the scales and a huge amount of tag and release this year which is great.”

He says about three times more billfish are tagged and released than brought in to the scales now.

Game fishers are becoming more selective about the fish they are bringing in, tending to keep only those with enough weight to place in the tournament.

'It's great. It just shows the anglers are changing and becoming more conservation minded. They all want it to be there tomorrow,” says Roly.

If the cheaper fuel prices continue they may review the rule that allows four days of continuous fishing, instead of requiring entrants to motor In and out of the harbour, Roly adds.

The radio daily calls are now being routed through Whitianga radio and through Waihou Bay to keep in contact with the widely scattered fleet.

The biggest fish caught so far is a 182 kg broad billed sword fish caught by Team Fujimo, over the Mayor Island knolls.

'The weather will drive a lot of them home and what we will see in day four is a lot more concentration on species like kingfish and snapper which are more harbour and inshore type species,” says Roly.

'A lot of the focus has been on the pelagics; the bill fish and tunas.”

Caught so far are blue marlin, striped marlin, and three yellow fin tuna which haven't yet been weighed.

A visitor to the one base contest this year is Gisborne boat builder Rex Briant who's brought a couple of his boats with him.

There's a White Pointer 730 and 840 parked on trailers. The White Pointer boats are basically alloy, blue water trailer boats. Hand built on jigs but using CAD cut panels, the designs come with as much or as little owner input into fit out and detailing as desired.