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.
The weather was not looking so good on this particular Sunday, so we decided to stay inside the reefs and do a bit of light tackle fishing.
Out comes the 6lb to 30lb gear. Now anytime you pull out this light of tackle in the ocean, your gear is bound to get smashed and busted. We were not let down. Lots of tackle was lost, but a lot of fish were landed too.
The weather did not disappoint us either. It blew harder and harder as the day progressed. Good thing we stayed inside.
A rather ominous looking morning sky.
Wayne with the first of many on his little 6lb soft plastic grub set-up.
Rosie catching the toothy critters without a steel trace. (Barracuda)
Brendan with a little bluefin trevally.
Another toothy critter. (Gar fish or Long Tom)
This is a little better bluefin.
A baby grouper or coral trout.
Now we're talking dinner. Rosie with a green job fish caught on bait.
Two at a time. A long nose emperor and a grouper
Another good day on the water despite the weather. Come to think of it, as long as we get home safely, it is always a good day on the water.
Another beautiful Monday for fishing as Rosie and I head out. Today will be a little jigging and bait fishing.
Fishing started off really slow. Nothing was biting. I could see fish on the sounder, but they had a case of lockjaw.
Finally, after many drops with the jig, I hook up to a small Barracuda that Rosie immediately claims for her bait.
We try a few more spots and get zeroed.
As we are moving from one spot to another I am taking in the scenery, enjoying the day, when all of a sudden Rosie screams. I look out the front, where I should have been looking all along, and what do I see, a Humpback whale right in front of the boat. A quick turn of the wheel and we avoid a collision with the giant. Of course by the time we get the camera out and ready the big guy disappears.
Truly amazing how 40 tons of mammal can vanish instantly.
As we carry on to our merry way we spot the big guy a ways out and Rosie gets the video rolling.
So we have not been catching much and Rosie says I can do a bit of jigging for Doggies.
That means deeper water than she really likes to fish.
So I'm jigging away and I notice it is taking a long time to hit the bottom. How deep are we? I ask.
Um it says 165 meters.
Yikes, no wonder it was taking so long to get to the bottom. I decide to let it fall and give it a try anyways.
My jig hits bottom and as I get my first crank of the reel I'm on. Not big mind you, but I'm on. It is a long ways up from 165 mts and when I finally get the fish to the surface it is a Pakapaka, deep water A grade snapper.
Rosie says wow should I drop and away she goes.
She proceeded to fish until all of our bait was gone and tat accounted for 17 fish of about 5 species. All of them really good eating.
Leave the rod in the holder and you can switch hands reeling.
A small Pakapaka.
A Long nose Emperor from 165mts, just about killed me.
Two at a time, not bad.
Another beauty of a Monday and we caught fish to boot.
This is our last trip before we left for Japan.
We went searching for Dogtooth Tuna again. But before we could go for Doggies, we had to chase a few GT's.
Now in this post you will notice that the images are not as good as before. Rosie's G10 finally gave up the ghost for the third time and it is time to get a new one. Only problem, they do not sell Canon G series in Fiji, so she will have to wait until we get to Japan.
Meanwhile we shoot with my phone.
We just get into position and Rosie is out on the bow starting to cast and get warmed up when her popper gets destroyed by a giant, fat and definitely healthy GT. What a hell of a fight. After a bit of coaxing it is boat side and it takes two of us to get it out of the water. Rosie, needless to say, has had her ass kicked, but she prevailed.
Here's the proof
Well you can imagine how the rest of us felt, energized and ready to land monsters.
Ahhh, but alas it was not meant to be. In fact not another GT was landed. I heard Wayne say that Rosie set the bar to high for us mere mortals.
The following fish were caught while we looked for Doggies.
First a Rusty Jobfish
Rainbow Runner
Blue Trevally
Leather Jacket
Lyre Tail Grouper
Finally a Doggie, well a doggies head anyways. Damn sharks.
More good tasting aquarium colored fish.
When you start jigging deep you never know what you will catch. Here I am holding a true Black Trevally. Caranx lugubris (also known as the black trevally, black kingfish, coal fish and black ulua). This is the first one we have caught.
This is a Rusty Jobfish.
A finally Wayne hooks and boats a Dogtooth Tuna. I think we are getting this down now. We are catching them where we think they should be. Not big ones yet but we are still catching them.
