Well I got roped into another five days of work so I only got home two days ago. Yesterday looked pretty good so we headed out at 04:00 to give it a try
The chop was minimal and the swell was manageable on a 10 second interval so we made good time. Put the spread in the water and trolled north, 6 miles up the banks without a sniff.
We marked a ton of bait and Spaniard sized fish but couldn’t entice a bite so we kept steaming north toward the hards. Out in about 100m of water we had a strike on the shotgun. I gave him strike drag and he dropped it. I played cat and mouse with him and he picked it up two more times but somehow the hook never set.
A few miles further we had another strike on the shotgun and a ~8-10kg mahi started jumping. I passed it off to Nolan and it got off a few minutes later.
Another pass of the area and another mahi of a similar size hooked up. Again Nolan jumped on the rod and it threw the hook within seconds even though he was peeling drag at the same time.
We kept steaming and eventually found a current line. We tucked into it and within a few minutes a little black started jumping on the shotgun. I set the hook while yelling at Nolan to wake up. Eventually he woke up, took the rod and we cleared the deck then started the chase. We got back within 300m of it and it ran at the boat, line went slack and he was gone.
We redeployed and a few minutes later the shotgun went off again. I manned the rod, we cleared the gear and I got him into the boat. Rosie planted the tag and grabbed him. Being as Rosie had the gloves on I took the pics instead of grabbing it. Bill rash sucks and I’ve got enough pictures of myself holding little fish.
Then Rosie tells me he’s been having good luck with two specific lures so he pulls them out. I noticed the actual hooks weren’t keel weighted and last year we had horrible conversions on lures with hooks that weren’t keel weighted but I figured it was worth a try. We got the spread back out and had another 8-10 marlin strikes. A couple were between the shotgun and skipping gar and at least four were on the pair of lures he suggested. It was now pushing noon and we had to leave the current line and head south again. A couple hours trolling south yielded nothing until we were getting close to cutting back in toward the banks when we had another strike on the brad J mini sprocket Rosie had brought. It didn’t hook up but usually they also smack the shotgun when it rolls past. The shotgun fired but again it pinched the bait but somehow managed to miss the hook set. We circled back through and had the skipping gar smashed without a hookup.
Seems we had days like this last year. Enough action the day would be a roaring success if we could convert the strikes to fish but???? Almost like we forgot to put hooks in the baits.
We trolled until 15:00 then pulled the gear and ran back in.
The wind isn’t looking good for the rest of my break but it might change. I’ve also got at least two months of working 3/1 thanks to a few staffing issues so my bill fishing season isn’t looking very good for the rest of the year. By April they’ll all be gone again so time will tell how this plays out.
Regardless it was a joy to have a nice day on the water without brutal seas. The action was steady enough to keep us busy and there are a few fish out there.