This is why you should not wait to do a fishing report. Hmmmmm, what did happen? Well, we made a boys’ trip down to Costa Rica to see Capt. Mike, Chowie and Arturo. Capt. Allen decided to come fishing for a vacation, Super Dave and Fletch (Bermuda’s favorite bartender) and I had a great time.
The sails were not super thick but how can you complain about double digits every day? The weather was beautiful and we had a great time. The most notable catch was Super Dave’s Blue Marlin. This fish obviously did not know about the “Pacific fish stay on top and jump around”. Poor Dave had to reel in 71/72 nds of a spool of line to get that fish in, but he did it. Great job Dave!
The next best show was put on by yours truly, emptying (virtually single handedly) the drink box on De Mako. This is why it is not a good idea to start the day with a rum. Ah well, live and learn. (I would like to point out that while walking was hard, I did go 2 for 2 on sails.)
I promise to do better on the report when I return at the end of March.
Things are off to a great start this season in Costa Rica. De Mako and Captain Mike have been out a fair amount over the past few weeks and Black and Blue members have had great luck.
While Marling numbers aren’t huge, Capt. Mike is finding them here and there.
Yellowfin Tuna in the 40 to 60 pound range are being caught pretty frequently and on the light tackle used, they put up a great fight.
Sailfish are all over the place. A couple of days we have seen bites in the thirties and releases in the twenties. Now that is fishing!
As we head into the holidays, we are out pretty much every day so we should have plenty of stories and pictures to share.
Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Best wishes for a spectacular 2010.
We were out a fair amount this week. We lost Thursday to weather but that was it. Wednesday we were out with George Dragonetti and friends and was it ever rough. About as much as you would want to deal with, that is for sure. They were troopers and we managed to catch a reasonable number of Wahoo. Well done guys, way to hang in there. By Friday the wind had quit and all we were left with was the swell. Much more comfortable, but still bumpy. We had Argo out and we were able to catch enough Wahoo and Yellowfin Tuna to keep the day interesting. The Wahoo we are catching trolling dead bait are in the 20 – 40 pound class. We have not been catching many Wahoo bigger than that over the past couple of weeks.
Note how trim the shirtless one looks!
The tuna catchers. Good job, Miss Makenna!
With the tide running to the West, the action in on the Eastern side of Challenger. Argus has produced a number of good days for other boats, but we focused on Challenger this week as the bait moved from the Southeast corner to the Eastern turn and even to the Northeast corner. By Sunday the bulk of the bait had moved north from the Southeast corner and we were doing better with the Wahoo and Tuna up that way.
Way to go Mr. Rhyn!
Want to feel like your boat is bigger? Put these two in the cockpit.
What we did find on the Southeast corner were Robins, and lots of them. We had Rhyn and Makenna Bearden out and they put a hurting on the Robin population, filling up the livewell and then the chumming box. Later in the day we were able to cash those live Robins in for some much nicer Wahoos. i think we ended up with two fish in the 60 pound range and one in the 50s. Fishing with live bait is great fun as long as you don’t focus on how many fish you lose, but instead enjoy the larger size of the ones you do catch.
We are going to be out of commission for a little while pretty soon as we bring MAKO back to Carolina for some odds and ends to be done. We will be back to Bermuda in time for January which, last year at least, produced really great fishing for Yellowfin Tuna and Wahoo.
We will be able to sneak in another week of fishing before we depart. If your freezer is empty, call and book a trip. The Wahoo fishing remains consistent.
As the weather moves towards Bermuda’s fall pattern, so are the fish.
In late September and early October a typical year would see a migration of “Ticker Mackerel” (that is what we call them in Bermuda, they are actually small Little Tunny or, thanks to the Florida Museum of Natural History, Euthynnus alletteratus) moving from the Harbour out to the Edge and the Banks. Don’t ask me why they move from inshore, where they are the top of the food-chain to offshore, where they are everybody’s favorite snack, but they do. These baits are small enough that they are bite sized for Yellowfin Tuna and especially Wahoo. 2009 seems like it will shape up to a year with a poor live bait season. Those Ticker Mackerel are not to be found offshore – at least yet. The only spot we have found them reliably is one small section of Bermuda’s Edge.
The lack of Ticker Mackerel, together with a strong West tide, is making live bait fishing an unproductive use of time. There is a bonus to all of this, however. The lack of bait has made the Wahoo ready to bite and bite well on the troll. Similarly, the Yellowfin Tuna that are around are ready to eat. This has added up to a number of pretty respectable catches this week. It seems like the Eastern Turn to the SE Corner of Challenger is holding the most fish lately.
Friday – Monday we had the Radke boys fishing with us and we produced a pile of Wahoo and a pretty good haul of Yellowfin Tuna. I love fishing in October as the Wahoo strikes often come in doubles or triples (we had two quadruples this weekend). Calling Wahoo fishing exciting for the guys in the cockpit is an understatement. There is plenty of work for the Mate, the customers and the Captain.
We will try to get out a fair amount this week – weather permitting. I hope to have more of the same to report next week.
The Wahoo continue to please. Early in the week we were having good luck on Challenger Bank trolling with dead bait for Wahoo as well as chumming on the NW side of the Bank. In the chum, there were a fair number of little Yellowfin Tuna, huge numbers of Skipjack Tuna as well as the odd Rainbow Runner and Tiger Sharks. All in all, made for a few interesting days.
We fish for Wahoo in the chum using spinning gear with a short trace of wire just above the hook. The particular fellow I am holding above hit my bait (yes, I was convinved to try a drift or two with the rod in my hand) like something very small. As I was reeling the fish in easily, someone hooked a Yellowfin just above my fish. Well, that sure woke up the Wahoo and he went around the bow in a flash. After 10 or 15 minutes fighting him from the bow deck, I figured that I must have a Wahoo that was converted in to a Tiger Shark. I put the max drag on and start to work the fish to the boat thinking I will either catch it or break it off and finish this one way or the other. Well, he was a nice surprise when he came to the gaff.
Later in the week the bite on Argus was good. I think we ended up with 15 Wahoo on Saturday. Ricky Lines and his guests did their usual great job and we had two great days out.
September-October fishing in Bermuda….nice weather, lots of action, lots of fish to eat!
I am going to be in Costa Rica this week checking on Capt. Mike and Chowie, the other half of Black & Blue Fishing. As a result, the next fishing report will be from the Pacific.
Whoa! Too much for one report so we are going to do two this week. Had a pretty good week this week. The Blue Marlin bite is hanging in there and you tend to get a shot or two a day. Friday Colin Barnes got four shots and caught two.
Depending on your personal preference, what might be more exciting is to talk about those big Yellowfin Tunas that I mentioned last week. They are here. While the numbers of fish in the schools are not as big as one might hope, with a little luck and a lot of concentration and patience you can get one or two. The way fishing for these bigger tunas works is you drag baits – beg enough ones to entice Blue Marlin close to the boat and smaller ones further back on the riggers. Way back. Spectra helps a bunch when your baits are so far back there.
You put the boat in 100 – 500 fathoms off the Bank and wait for the school to come up and crash baits. Sunday they were eating these little things we call “redfish”, Saturday they were eating flying squid. Whatever the bait of the day is, when the Tuna drive it to the surface and they are feeding you have to have your baits in the school quickly because they tend not to stay on the surface for long. These Tuna are big for Bermuda – all over 100 pounds. When you get a bite (we got a triple on Thursday) it is a case of hang on and hope for the best! These fish pull hard and fight for a long time. A really rewarding catch for the angler. Gets me all fired up just talking about it.
Our AON trip were the big winners this week catching two of the three big Tuna hooked (one was lost right at the boat – hard luck!). The fish were 120 pounds and 180 pounds. That is a lot of cassarole or sushi or tuna steaks.
Earlier in the week we caught a frisky Blue with Bruce Dilke. What he lacked in size, he compensated for by the jumps. Danny Forchic came fishing for a couple of days with two friends and they both got a Blue Marlin.Congratulations guys!Just as an aside, Danny might have missed his calling.He loves to fish and ski but check out his form with that tag stick…I think the javelin might have been his real calling.
Check out the footage below.
So, for the week a few Blue Marlin, two big Tunas a smattering of Wahoo and Skipjack Tunas. It is August…the seas are flat and full of life. Makes it fun to go out every day wondering what we are going to see today. As I dated this fishing report, I realized that September fast approaches. September is a very interesting month in Bermuda. It is a little cooler, the seas tend to stay flat but the water temperature changes just enough to make it the only month where you can catch every species Bermuda has to offer. Sittting here thinking about what is available in September I come up with the following list:
Blue Marlin
Wahoo on dead bait
the occasional Dolphin
Yellowfin Tuna
HUGE Tiger Sharks
Wahoo on live bait
Barracuda
Amberjack
Little Tunny
Skipjack Tuna
Blackfin Tuna…you get the idea.
I hate being ashore during September with all that stuff out there to catch. Call and book a trip!
The weed has gone back to wherever it came from, letting the fleet have a reasonable chance at trolling for Marlin again. The bite is pretty good and seems to be improving slowly. MAKO was able to convince seven of those Blues to eat this week. We released three of them.
Woody's Marlin
We had Guy Harvey and his son and daughter (and a film crew) on board for a couple of days this week. Guy wanted to catch a Tiger Shark and Blue Marlin. I have to say I was getting a little nervous on the Marlin front, but we were able to pull it out at the end and Master Harvey caught a 200 pound Blue. This release was a little unusual as it involved Guy and his daughter jumping in to film the fish! I am sure we will all get to see that footage when Guy’s project is completed.
If you think that is interesting, young Master Harvey also hooked, fought and landed an 800 pound Tiger Shark. Again, at the release, the Harveys were overboard filming. I know he is the expert, but the Marlin filming didn’t make me as nervous and the Tiger Shark filming did.
In other news, AON ran a trip on Thursday and we caught a couple of Wahoo. We went 1 for 3 yesterday and 1 for 2 on Friday.
The tuna are much harder to find this week. They took the Robins (speedos) with them wherever they went. It is a more typical August now…Marlin and Tiger Shark fishing are the main activities, at least until the guys find the next hot spot for chumming the Tuna. I thought things were going to get real interesting when there were a couple of sightings of bigger Tuna, part of the near-annual run of larger Yellowfin Tuna (over 100 pounds) that Bermuda enjoys. They are also hiding now. I sure hope they show up this year.
I was checking the footage on the hand held video camera and we got a great clip of Karen Sealock catching her Blue Marlin back in the Blast tournament. I also found the slow motion feature on the video processing software so you are all going to have to put up with my overuse of the feature until the novelty wears off.
I spoke about the weed situation last week. It is no better. It is making trolling very difficult. We have been spending most of our time on the Tuna instead. We have had some really great days. The medium size Tuna are being very cooperative this year. One day last week, in an attempt to combat the weed we put marlin lures on the downriggers to try and keep them below the worst of the weed. We got a little dolphin, but it didn’t work on Mr. Marlin that day.
The weather sure seems to have settled into normal August weather – hot and calm. These calm days are great for kids. We had a trip last week where a couple of kids kept themselves busy all day with the Ocean Robins (Speedos), tuna, barracuda and Mackerel (Little Tunny). It is a nice change to see someone get so excited about catching half a Speedo because she couldn’t reel faster than the barracuda could swim.
We will be out quite a bit this week with no holidays to interrupt us. Let’s hope I have lots of fish stories for Sunday.
It never fails. The tournaments over, Colin Barnes went out on the Indigo Blue and it took him 20 minutes to get a bite from a fish he figured would have made the minimum 500 pound weight had it been a day earlier. MAKO took Sunday off but we were out on Monday and had similar action. We went 1 for 4 for the day. That included a doubleheader of blues each over 500. They both came loose, but it sure was fun for a while.
I gave Mate Peter Lewis kudos a few weeks back for pitching a Blue on a big lure so it is only fair that I relate a story from this week that went the other way. We had a fish come up in the spread that was hot. It went after my bridge teaser very aggressively and I felt confident we would get a bite out of her. Peter had the pitch bait rod ready and dropped back to just before the second wave so that when the teaser disappeared and the fish turned, she would see the pitch. All went well except the fish did not seem at all sure about that pitch lure. In fact, after following the pitch for what seemed like a minute, she cut over and ate the short right lure – which was covered, covered, covered in weed. So much for that pitch attempt. At least we got a bite!
The weed is really, really bad on both banks. So bad that trolling is awfully difficult. Normally, the weed starts coming in in September and gets really bad by December. Who knows why this year is so much earlier – but we all wish it would go away. If you are trolling 5 or 6 lines, it feels like half of them are covered in weed at any one time. Later this week the Sea Toy and Challenger went down North of the island and found some relief from the weed. As I recall, they both got a fish up there; Challenger might have caught two.
While the weed is the bad news, the Yellowfin Tuna remain the good news. On the outside edge of Argus you can see them on the surface in pretty good numbers. A good class of fish too, 50 to 100 pounders. Live Robins fished deep seems to be the best way to get a bite. It sure is fun fishing and those Tuna can PULL!
Most of our firends on the visiting boats have made their trip home or will do so this week, we wish them all safe trips. It was great to have you here. It’s going to feel empty out there for a while.
I got an email from my friend and Black and Blue member Mike Sandusky that said the bite is on off Hatteras. They had great weather this week so I look forward to hearing all the stories out of the Outer Banks.
The pictures were kind of sparse this week. We will do better next week. Talk to you next Sunday.
So ends the tournament season in Bermuda. MAKO managed a 9th place finish. Not great, but not terrible. Congratulations to Bree, the big winner!
Our Sea Horse tournament was a challenge. The first day we went 0 for 4 on whites. The second day, “everyone’s favorite redneck”, Todd Holleman put on a one man show catching a White and then a Blue. We managed to catch a lot of the activity on the boat cameras. Look up by the time and date to see that Blue put on a show on top. The third day was quiet again, I think we missed two bites, on a white and one a suspected Blue. We had a big fish come up on the shotgun – at first, I thought the shadow was a Manta Ray – that is how big it was. As is so often the case, this big fish PILED on the shotgun with water splashing everywhere and a huge hole in the water and…..missed the darn lure completely. Ah well, next time.
Just before the tournament the tide (current) switched and is now running into the East. As the bait and fish adjust to this new tide it will take a little scouting to find out where they are living now. It will be interesting to see if the Tuna, which have been great this year, set up again in such good numbers. They tend to get scarce around mid-July, but every year is different.
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