Battle of the Triggerfish

I had a gut feeling that the fishing would not be good, but we wanted to go out anyway. 

The weather was very calm and the sea followed suit. The air was thick with humidity and no breeze to speak of. 

We set out, Rosie, Brendan, Paul and myself, in hopes of catching something.

Things started out really slow. Not even the bait fish were biting, but persistence paid off and a few small fish were landed. They were to be used as bait (poor buggers). 

We continued fishing with little success and much sweatiness. 

As the day progressed our catch did not.

At one point I was jigging a soft plastic when I felt what appeared to be a bite, I set the hook and prepared for a fight. Alas I was hooked to the fishes house, snagged, caught the bottom. During my zealousness to free my lure there was an unmistakable cracking sound. Yep I broke my favorite jigging rod. For those of you who have never broken a graphite rod, the crack is memorable not to mention gut wrenching. 

As the top half of my rod slipped away down the line and into the blue abyss, my heart sank with it. 

After many expletive's, I realized my line was loose. Go figure, after all that it could have had the decency to stay snagged. 

As  I reeled it up I noticed that it was a bit heavy, too heavy for my jig. Low and behold there was a fish on the end and it was...........a Leather Jacket, aka Clown Triggerfish.

Well, you have to laugh at times like this, of course that is after you cry. Nothing I can do about it now and there was still some fishing to do.

We fished on for another couple of hours to no real avail. 

I new it was not going to be a great day of fishing, but still better than work.

The start of the day.

Intense rigging going on here.

Before the brake.

The Brake

The Clown.

Little bastard.

Consolation prize, Bluefin Trevally.

Beautiful but hot.

Paul getting it done.

Until next time.

Tight Lines

First jigging session of 2013

Sorry for the delay in posting. I was on vacation for November then there was December, which is always a bit crazy, cyclones and xmas and all that stuff. So now we are into January and I am back at it.

Our first fishing trip of the year was slated as a jigging trip. We all had been eating too much beef and pork and were craving some fish. 

So a hunting we shall go.

The weather looked a bit ominous in the morning, but the rarely deters us.

Our crew for today is Rosie, of course, Brendan, Wayne, John and yours truly.

Our objective is food fish by means of jigging.

With out further ado, let the fishing begin.

Rosie up first with a nice steamable grouper.

Brendan with a grouper on soft plastic.

Wayne with a grouper on a home made jig.

Lyre tail grouper.

I think he needs to go into the first aid box to cool off.

Action shot of Wayne connected to a monster.

This fight lasted a good 10 minutes.

We have color.

It turns out to be a nice little Dogtooth Tuna caught on light tackle

A nice Grouper.

Of course I must get in on the action.

Me fighting the bottom.

Another Lyre tail.

That damn home made jig again.

Rosie had to take her own picture.

We caught a lot of different kinds of groupers.

John having a rest from all this reeling up and dropping down.

Too hot today.

There is a story with this fish. Rosie catches a little fish about the size of your hand. Then she decides to live bait it. So back down it goes. She then catches a larger fish with the small on, but it is not quite big enough. Back down it goes. With in a couple of minutes she is hooked up to this big fella and ends our session on a high note.

Keep you hand out of it's mouth.

We had a great day out and the weather cleared up. Best of all I had fish for dinner, YUMMMMM!

Tight Lines

Cyclone Evan

We dodged a bullet where I live. This one was a Cat 4, but hit the other side of the Island. What you see is what we got for 36 hours. 

All is well now. The sun is out and the sky is blue

Tight Lines

Pop and Drop

This time we decided to do a bit of popping for GT's and then a bit of jigging after.

Just Rosie, Wayne and myself on the boat today. 

The morning started out a bit gloomy, but the fish don't care, so why should we.

My shoulder has been hurting me so I was sticking with a stick bait instead of a popper. As the photo below says it all, it was working. A nice Grouper.

Wayne gets on the board with the first GT on popper. A nice clean fellow and easy release.

He follows it up with a little one that is feisty as all get out.

Not to be out done, I cast my stick bait to a fishy looking spot and proceed to hook up a nice Spanish Mackerel.

Wayne with a little Barracuda that Rosie has claimed for bait.

Wayne started jigging in 100 meters of water and proceeded to hook up more than 10 Dog Tooth Tuna. Unfortunately the head he is holding represents the only proof of his sweat. The sharks were thick and relentless to the point of us moving on to another spot.

Rosie on the other hand was having a very successful bait fishing trip. She filled the ice box single handedly.

This is a Long Nose Emperor. Caught at over 100 meters and fought all the way to the surface. A very tough customer, but not as tough as Rosie.

We had another great day out, with plenty of fish caught and lost by a variety of methods.
Until next time.
Tight Lines

One very rough Sunday

The weather Gods have not been kind to us this year. There has been two kinds of weather, rain with wind or sun with more wind. This day was sun with more wind. 

OK enough whining, we still went fishing.

As I said it was windy so jigging was on tap for the day.

Now typically when the weather acts up the fish like to bite, after all, the surging water just brings more food to them. Today was that way, the fishing was good, but a lot of work for the skipper, me.

When bottom fishing it is important that you have a good fish finder and transducer. Reading the bottom is everything with this type of fishing.

I use a Garmin 4010 GPSMAPS with a 2kw transducer, I'll post a photo later. 

We fished as long as we could until the wind and wave became unbearable. At one point we were taking waves over the transom and engine while trying to hold a position long enough to drop to the bottom.

We caught lots of fish and lots of species of fish so no complaining. No one is listening anyway. 

OK enough chatter on with the photos.

Brendan with a nice Lyre tail Grouper.

Wayne with a Sand Grouper. This is a first for us.

Billy and Renee braving the weather, not for long.

Brendan with a High fin Grouper

Wayne and a Green Job fish

Nice weather.

Tight Lines