This was my first time fishing for albacore. It was a slow morning and I got a small bonito size albie. There were a few fish on board. We were heading for home and doing the jackpot stuff while still trolling. All of a sudden, boom, there was a triple hook up on the trolling gear. There were albacore all around the boat. There were people hooked up with big fish on all sides of the boat. I managed to get a 30 lb'er on 20 lb. test. At the end of the day we estimated there were over 50 fish on board for 19 anglers. The jackpot was a 40+ lb. blue fin.

I just wanted to say that the crew of the Seahawk was most helpful and informative. Ricky the deckhand was instructive and helpful. Merit, the skipper, kept us out 2 hours longer than we were supposed to when we found the fish and we didn't get home until midnight on Sunday.

We left when the fish were still biting as we had to get home. Still left the trolling gear up though. The highlight of the day was when a 10 year old boy hooked up a big 25-30 lb'er on trolling gear - Merit said we were 61 miles out at this point and had fish all around the boat. Unfortunately though, we had to get back.

What a day!

tree

Great report dude,
Glad to hear you got a couple albies. Midnight on Sunday return, whoo that must have been a boat ride!

Merit comes through once again. Ya know, that's two seahawk reports in a row where merit stayed out longer than he was supposed to... Good deal. Glad you got em. All my gear is cleaned inside and out, re-spooled, and ready to go on the 13th. I've even casted 1/2 oz. and 1/4 oz. weights on most of my setups to "practice". Even tied the 30# to a lawn chair and practiced pullin!!!! Man, I can't wait.
-Brian

Good luck on the 13th Brian. I had some good advice in advance and that was to have a 20 lb. set up (in addition to heavier) in case the fish are shy biters. There were a lot of guys catching big fish on 20 lb. including a 40 lb. blue fin.

I will be on a private Santa Rosa charter on the Stardust on the 15th so unfortunately won't make it out for albie for a little while. But man I am hooked now, need to go by a trolling set up !!!

Stoked to hear you had a good time and caught fish. Gotta love that 20lb.

Amish Ed

LAST EDITED ON Oct-03-00 AT 12:19 PM (PST)

I have fished tuna the past few years on both the sea hawk and other party boats. One KEY factor in getting bit that I have seen time in and time out, being able to get your bait AWAY from the boat. I have a friend who strictly fishes long rods, 8.5 feet and up. He gets beat up pretty badly on the fish, but generally has 2 or more to everybodys elses fish. Get the livestly, greenest bait, I like to collar or anal hook them to get them to swim away from the boat.

Also, LISTEN!! If you hear that they are crashing on the bow, drop your bait, grab your jig stick, or grab a lively sardine so you can cast it further, and hustle up to the bow. The key to my getting 5 fish on my last tuna trip - even though I was filming my buddies catching them, and also filming Chris from the landing fight a bluefin for over an hour and 15 minutes, was that I hustled.

"Fish Crashing on the BOW!!" Run up there and get one fish here, one fish there when the bite is spotty. Remember you may only get one stop that will open wide open, so be ready to trade up in line class, all the way up to 60 lbs. You may only get 20 or so minutes to put the fish on as they rush the boat. This is the time to put your two or three fish on board! Inversly, if you the bite is seeming to fade you may want to get that last fish so be ready to drop down.

Make sure, that if you can, you bring a 20, 25, 30, 40, lb set ups, I also like to bring 50, 60 adn 80lb setups if the bigger stuff shows up, and 16 and 12 lb setups ( freshwater bass rods with abu garcias 5500's) This has saved me on more than one occasion. Remember, you are paying top dollar for a top fishing experience. What if the big bluefin 100 lb + show up, will you be ready, or the one who got spooled. This will only happen a 'finite' number of times. Be ready. As for the 12 lb setup, I was on a Ronnie Kovach Fising School ( don't ask, I won the trip in a raffle) had about 35-40 anglers and staff on board. I show up with my full quiver of rods ( not shiney gold and silver reels and new shiney black rods but setups I put together while deckhanding, a rod here, a reel there) Well the staff and a few other anglers began to give me a hard time about my 'fresh water gear' Little did they know that the grade of fish we were looking at were all 10-12 lb bluefin. I had fished them four days before. Long story short, out of 35-40 people fishing, I had 5 bluefin out of a total count of 65 fish. The fish were super line shy. The only reason I didnt have more was that it took me time to get the fish in. Every bait I dropped, I got bit on. I also used circle hooks to corner hook the fish. I didnt lose any fish that trip.....

Another thing, spend the extra 20 minutes to let your line drag behind the boat on the way out. This does two things, it takes out any spin in the line, straightening it, and it also wet-packs your line on your reel, both inhibiting backlashes and "line-crunch" These are no 3 lb calicos. The fish are getting to be bigger, and any little mistake that you may get away with a smaller fish, DRASTICLY reduces the chance of landing fish. Line that is old, or not well packed, will be 'bit' down by the pressure of the running fish and you can cut your self off at the reel or give yourself a mini backlash, again causing a weak link that may fail.

Good luck - Tight lines and burnt drags.

MAKE SURE THAT YOU KNOW HOW TO SHORT PUMP YOUR FISH - it has made the difference for me from a 50 minute 50 lb bulefin - to a 3 MINUTE 56 LB Bluefin on 30 pound test! Post if you want me to elaborate on short pumping.

Thanks for the informative post. Most of the things you mentioned are things that I figured out in hindsight because I made all the beginners mistakes.

I was dying reeling up the 30 lb. fish until someone showed me how to short pump!

This was my first time at albie fishing and right now I tell you I can't wait to go again!

did you eat the heart?????????????????

be glad that your first tuna wasnt a 70 lb tuna!!!

moondoggie

did you eat the heart?????????????????

be glad that your first tuna wasnt a 70 lb tuna!!!

moondoggie

Moondoggie,

I'm curious as to what you mean by short pumping. I may already know it just not by that name. And I'm sure I'm not the only one who would benefit from the post. Thanks!

*************************************

You can't catch tomorrow what you kill today - please practice catch and release.

Actually, I really did want to eat the heart but the deck hands were so busy with other stuff at the time I didn't want to bother them. I'll get it next time for sure - with a Corona to wash it down.

As for short pumping, you pull up a small amount on the rod and quickly reel ONLY 1 to 2 quick turns on the way and keep repeating the process. The purpose is to constantly keep the fishes head coming up. Initially I made the mistake of doing long pulls and then a number of reels on the way down. What this did was allow the fish to get his head pointed down and pull off all the line that I just reeled. That's the best I can explain it. Maybe some one more experienced can elaborate.