queensland February 2010

[Smithy]

Joan Mackerel Trip

February 24th, 2010

Joan booked me in to take her grandson Hayden out. We left nice and early and were jigging up livies as the sun came up and the seas were calm but we knew a big SE change was coming. With enough livies in the tank we headed to the mackerel spot. We didn't have to wait too long before we hooked up with only one bait set. This was a nice school size spanish which Hayden wound in.

Once again we only got one bait set and we were on and this time another nice spanish.

We finally got two baits out, one on the surface and one on the downrigger before the surface bait got hit. I popped the downrigger bait off the rubber band and started winding it in to clear it out the way when it got hit right under the boat by something with a lot of weight and power. Hayden landed his third spanish mackerel of the morning and was in heaven while Joan was in for the fight of her life. We were guessing everything from a big amberjack to a cobia to the snapper from hell. We went for the kidney harness and eventually Joan handed over to me to finish off what proved to be a big 1.1m gold spot estuary cod. We tried to release him off the downrigger but he floated straight back up so just under legal size we had no choice but to take him home to eat. By then we had drifted way north in the freshening wind so we headed off to another spot. We did two trolls here before hooking up on our fourth spanish of the morning and we thought that was a good time to head in with the wind freshening.

Solo Marlin

February 23rd, 2010

With a mistake with my booking for the day I decided to cross something off my bucketlist and join the trend of solo marlin fishermen. I was successful going 3-2-1 on marlin on 8kg line to GFAA rules for the day with maybe another couple of marlin bites and I also tagged a wahoo and let a dolphinfish go not having an esky aboard.

Steve, Glen & Ben Full Day Trip

February 22nd, 2010

The boys were not interested in gamefishing so I was unsure how I would go for the day as that is all I had been doing for a month pretty much. We still headed to the marlin grounds to secure some live baits. We jigged up a few full strings of slimey mackerel and headed to a mackerel area to fish for a feed. We took about six strikes for the session with only a good size longtail tuna to Ben and one spanish mackerel to Glen finding their way into the esky. A spotty was lost due to inexperience and the weather didn't make things easy being a sqully 5-10knots worse than forecast. I was not looking forward to the punch home but it was predicted to shift around to the north for us but if stayed rainy and overcast I couldn't see it happening as we needed some sun to create a seabreeze. The boys were restless so we put the high speed lead head skirts out and headed to a wider reef.

On the western edge we hooked and landed a nice spanish. We ran over the bait with some gar out but it wasn't super high on the sounder even though there were lots of dolphins around. When things are tough they are tough and nothing goes your way. We had a knockdown which was probably a marlin stealing a skip gar and as I was re-rigging I saw a wahoo cream the long swim bait but it stole the hook and didn't hookup snipping the mono. As I deployed the new skip gar a marlin came in but couldn't hookup and faded out of sight. 3 bites in a football field area of the ocean so we worked it a bit but the boys were bored again. Winding in the baits at the end of my marks one other bait had been billwacked by a marlin which no-one saw so it could have been a productive little session with four bites in not much time.

We punched down to the marlin grounds where I knew we would be in for some action. Sure enough it was chaos for the two or so hours we were there. We missed some marlin and wahoo bites first up before Steve who was yet to stay connected to something landed a good size wahoo. We then had a series of marlin on and we missed them all. A short while later we had a double hookup of marlin on with Steve on a real line burner that dumped a few hundred metres on him before something came apart or a wahoo bit at the line. When your luck is not in it is not in.

Mick Full Day Trip

February 21st, 2010

Mick finally got to head out with me after about five called off trips over the years due to the weather. This time he was on with his son Tim.

We got off to a good start with one of the first bites of the day being this 19.2kg wahoo Mick weighed at home. Probably the biggest for the boat but I had a few bigger on last year that were too good for us.

Then it was onto the main event and we finally stayed connected to a marlin after a couple of false starts including one that followed a crushed bait all the way to the transom hitting it a few times on the retrieve.

We also got one on the leader for son Tim.

And we kept hooking and losing them and getting chopped off by wahoo the rest of the afternoon but we also tagged a couple more to make it four black marlin for the day.

Thanks to Mick for the photos.

Bob, Mick & Sean Half Day

February 16th, 2010

Ruth had set this trip up as a present with all the boys originally from England but the younger guys had settled here as Ambos. Even though inexperienced we ended up with three black marlin and a good wahoo missing many more wahoo and marlin on the troll for the morning due to bad luck and the weather. The first two marlin were part of a double hookup which was my first successful double hookup on billfish landed for the boat.

One of the fish from the double hookup.

A kept wahoo.

Another black marlin so everyone ended up with one for the morning.

Thanks to Ruth for the photos.

Dave Half Day

February 15th, 2010

Dave was visiting from England and booked the boat for the morning for himself. It was good timing as the bite was red hot. We started and finished on the troll picking up three black marlin for him and losing three wahoo plus plenty more marlin seen for the session.

A couple of shots of the day from Dave.

Nath, Phil, Chris Half Day Trip

February 14th, 2010

This day proved to be my best day of the marlin season so far with 6 fish released and also equalled my best ever total for the boat to go with the 6 one day last March. Phil was visiting his son Nathan and he was up from South Australia. You certainly don't catch marlin in SA but Phil will probably think it is an everyday thing for us in SEQ after the day we had. I'll let Nathan's pictures do the talking and there are some great shots of us chasing down fish by Roger Bayzand as well. Somewhere in there we also released a wahoo boatside before I knew what was happening or the gaff may have come out.

Carly, Dave & Craig Full Day Trip

February 13th, 2010

We started out livebaiting this day but had no luck so went on the troll. Sure enough while trolling into a squall to keep everyone dry we had a marlin hookup after everyone knocked back the offer of a rain coat. Carly was on strike and played it in the pelting rain and we got it on the leader for the first of the day. We were fishing for a feed of wahoo more than anything but marlin kept jumping on. We saw a few wahoo strikes where they belted the lures and stole some skirts of them but it was only late in the day we landed one so they could take one home to try. That was after 4 marlin were released in the process, 2 to Carly! All in all a top day but one of the local club boats release 10 marlin live baiting and another boat release 7.

Pierre, Damien & Rob Full Day Trip

February 12th, 2010

French tourists Damien and Pierre were in town and wanted to do a jigging trip. Damien owned a tackle store in France and they were certainly packing the good jigging gear. I had some trolling outfits aboard in case and we had to stop off and get some live baits first anyway. Rob was along to make up the three. The sight of so many marlin being hooked up all around us changed the thinking of the guys so along with filling the live bait tank for later on we did seriously fish for marlin. They ended up getting one each as well as a couple of wahoo and a dolphinfish. With Rob's marlin released we headed out to jig a big. They were mostly rat kings but one better one did dust the boys and with time running out we headed back in.

Pierre and a wahoo.

Hooked up.

Damien hooked up.

His marlin.

Rob's marlin.

Dan & Gav Full Day

February 11th, 2010

Dan was out to learn all about marlin fishing after landing a few wahoo and Gav was down from Bowen and was an old contact from my fish stocking committee days with the Bjelke-Petersen Dam group. We were the only boat out after a spell of poor weather other than some mackerel pros gathering live bait. We didn't capitalise though losing fish left right and centre to a variety of reasons. Eventually we went on the troll to try and turn our fortunes around and they were also on the job trolling. We ended the day with a marlin each for the boys as well as two wahoo and a dolphinfish. Not too bad but we certainly had our chances.

[billp]

What a season. I can't beleive how many quality fish everyone has been landing this year.

Looks like a neat little operation you have running. Great report.