What up guys I have not posted in a while due to an extremely busy schedule but I can squeeze a report out for late last week! Several weeks ago Joel Gamester (owner of the tomahawk) contacted me inquiring about me running a few relief trips for his full-time operator Dave Ibrahim. I of course said yes knowing the extensive work Dave and Joel have put into the boat last offseason and this season.
We departed Wednesday morning clearing the point at 11:00 hours with a healthy load of sardines and our sights set for the Northern bluefin grounds 82 NM away, with the blinders on and beautiful weather we expected to be in the zone a little before 21:00. Immediately upon arriving into the zone we stopped the boat hooking 20+ fish and only landing six due to a massive full boat tangle. The grade of fish we were expecting was of the 30-60 pound class with larger wolf packs of 100 pound + fish also swimming through. We quickly discovered the grade of fish in our zone was a bit bigger than what we expected, 60 to 200+ pound fish was what we were working with. We re-established ourselves after the casualties suffered and tackle busted from our previous stop and got back on the move. Not soon after, we stopped the boat on another massive school that wanted to bite. We quickly had 4-8 fish hooked at all times for the next hour and after suffering many more casualties we ended that drift with 15 fish, 8 over 100 and 3 over 200. Things slowed down for the remainder of the night and we scratched away with minimal participation to end our night with 31 fish.
With an entire day to fish and the weather/boat traffic at a minimum, we had high hopes for our daytime tuna fishing. As bluefin do the incredible sign of fish we had seen the night before was hesitant to show itself, on the surface and the electronics. With the entire fleet in search mode, we managed to piece together a day, stopping on various small spots of 30-200 pound fish and getting the occasional bite on a sinker rig, fly-lined bait, or 170-300 gram knife jig/flat fall. We ended our daytime efforts with 16 bluefins from 30-140 pounds, feeling extremely fortunate on the window of opportunity we had the night before we finished our trip with 47 bluefin tuna for our 22 anglers with an incredible opportunity on catching a larger bluefin on conventional tackle. Fly-lined 80-pound, 100-pound sinker rigs, vertical jigs, it all worked.
Even though the season is winding down this is personally my favorite time of the year to fish! Great weather, great sign of fish and minimal boat traffic, it doesn't get much better than that. Get out there and enjoy the end of this epic season!
We departed Wednesday morning clearing the point at 11:00 hours with a healthy load of sardines and our sights set for the Northern bluefin grounds 82 NM away, with the blinders on and beautiful weather we expected to be in the zone a little before 21:00. Immediately upon arriving into the zone we stopped the boat hooking 20+ fish and only landing six due to a massive full boat tangle. The grade of fish we were expecting was of the 30-60 pound class with larger wolf packs of 100 pound + fish also swimming through. We quickly discovered the grade of fish in our zone was a bit bigger than what we expected, 60 to 200+ pound fish was what we were working with. We re-established ourselves after the casualties suffered and tackle busted from our previous stop and got back on the move. Not soon after, we stopped the boat on another massive school that wanted to bite. We quickly had 4-8 fish hooked at all times for the next hour and after suffering many more casualties we ended that drift with 15 fish, 8 over 100 and 3 over 200. Things slowed down for the remainder of the night and we scratched away with minimal participation to end our night with 31 fish.
With an entire day to fish and the weather/boat traffic at a minimum, we had high hopes for our daytime tuna fishing. As bluefin do the incredible sign of fish we had seen the night before was hesitant to show itself, on the surface and the electronics. With the entire fleet in search mode, we managed to piece together a day, stopping on various small spots of 30-200 pound fish and getting the occasional bite on a sinker rig, fly-lined bait, or 170-300 gram knife jig/flat fall. We ended our daytime efforts with 16 bluefins from 30-140 pounds, feeling extremely fortunate on the window of opportunity we had the night before we finished our trip with 47 bluefin tuna for our 22 anglers with an incredible opportunity on catching a larger bluefin on conventional tackle. Fly-lined 80-pound, 100-pound sinker rigs, vertical jigs, it all worked.
Even though the season is winding down this is personally my favorite time of the year to fish! Great weather, great sign of fish and minimal boat traffic, it doesn't get much better than that. Get out there and enjoy the end of this epic season!
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