After prepping the boat and before waking the little man I walked over to get the gar we had stashed in the creek. Seemed someone else needed them worse then I did as the bucket was still there with the lid on top but the gar were gone.
Then my fishing buddy arrived ten minutes late and we stopped for fuel and snacks before launching the boat. On the water a little later then we should of at 430 and off to see what the day would bring.
We shot out to the first fad which is 10 nm off shore. We weren’t the only boat on the fad and while we could see mahi mahi they didn’t want to eat what we were offering. We moved on to the next fad and had a strike with no hookup. The next pass gave us two more strikes with one finally hooked up.
We tried the third fad with lures instead of gar and had one strike but no hookup. Then we shot east for another 10 nm to the banks and started trolling for the fourth fad. Again we could see the mahi but they seemed to have lockjaw. The sounder was showing a lot of nice fish in about 35m on the thermocline and there was another boat pulling two lines off downriggers. They landed a nice wahoo and mahi in the fifteen minutes we were there so perhaps the old scotties will need to take a ride out there with me next time.
At that point we turned north and trolled for the areas we caught marlin last summer. We didn’t see anything useful, no bait balls, nothing really interesting at all besides a pod of dolphins.
I noticed a bit of structure on my chart a few miles north so we kept steaming in the 120m’s of water heading for an area where it popped up to about 90m.
Just on the south side of the area of interest in about 104 m of water we started seeing more flying fish then we’ve ever seen. They were coming off the water in front of the boat in schools (flocks?) of 50-100 fish flying away from us.
Then it finally happened. There was a big boil on the water 15m behind the boat where the long corner had been swimming and the 12” marlin magic ruckus was gone. The drag started howling and my buddy grabbed the rod. I started clearing the first line and this marlin came to surface about 70m behind us with his head sticking out of the water thrashing back and forth. It was huge. The largest fish I’ve ever raised and while I don’t know how big (I realise almost nobody’s going to believe me) I’m going to estimate 300+kg. He sat back there for about 20 seconds with his head and occasionally shoulders sticking out of the water thrashing back and forth. They’re was a lot of yelling about what we had hooked and I managed to clear two lines before the line went slack. Let’s just say at that point there was more yelling but it was more colourful.
That’s life though, typically boats are doing well if they can hook up on 50% of strikes. Nothing left but to set the spread and try and raise another fish. So we doubled down and I took the skipping gar off the short rigger and put another 9” coggin tado out there so we had some extra action in the spread. We worked the area in a bit of a loop and on the third pass through the same spot the long rigger went off. Initially we thought marlin again as the drag was screaming but then a mahi mahi started jumping behind the boat.
Porter was still on deck to fight the fish and he brought it boat side for me to gaff.
It was a nice fish but we could see another dozen or so in the water with him so I attempted to hook another before we pulled the first one out. They would chase my offerings but nobody wanted to hit it. Then we noticed how poorly the first one was hooked so we brought him in for the gaff shot.
We were then told by Nolan he wanted to catch the next one. I took the 9” lure back off the long corner, put a 7” tado behind a bird and deemed it a more mahi friendly spread and decided we could handle a few more if they were that size. After another pass or two I watched a green rocket shoot across the prop watch and hit that same lumo sprocket you see sticking out of porters fishes mouth.
This one was a bit smaller but the right size for Nolan. Unfortunately after a jump or two the hook came out and he was gone.
We trolled a little more, working the same area and finally decided we best head for port. We got back to the banks in about 50m of water that same sprocket on the long rigger went off. I hadn’t seen the fish and it didn’t feel very big so we left most of the spread out and Nolan landed arguably the hungriest mac tuna in the ocean. He was so small he had no business hitting a lure that size. I wish we could of caught some like him when out chasing marlin as they would of received a 7/0 circle hook in the face before being trolled behind the boat for that leviathan we had raised.
We ran back for the inshore fads. The first two had people fishing then so we hit the third one. We made a couple passes and finally got one hooked up. Nolan had decided the little tuna didn’t count as his turn so he took this mahi as well. For the record, I didn’t gaff this fish, I always aim for the head like the one above.
We then headed in for the clean up and some much needed sleep.
The water was still fairly cool at 24.5-25 deg and I didn’t mark much bait schooled up out there. Fishing on a weekend always sucks too because there are so many other boats on the fads. Typically during the week we have them to ourselves and do a lot better.