Thursday, February 28, 2013

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