Bluefin pics

[bhsquid]

Well, I just got back from 24 hours of Bluefin tuna fishing out of Greymouth on board the Oracle with Captain Mike Boswell and his crew, and thought I would post some pictures.





We started out of the Greymouth harbor at around 10am on Wednesday morning with 2.5 to 3 meter seas to look forward to. But no wind on the tuna grounds according to the weather reports. So after a quick stop to pick up bait, and an easy passage over the river bar at high tide, the boat began making it's way out to the Hokitika Trench - an area about 45 miles offshore where trawlers can be found dragging nets for Hoki.




The primary way of fishing the Bluefin is to throw a whole hoki along side one of the trawlers and let it drift by the trawl net when the boats are hauling their nets. While the birds, seals and tuna try to get whatever spills out of the nets



It took about 4 hours to get to the trawlers and it turned out there were about 7 trawlers in the area on this day, so Mike started making the rounds to see which ship was holding the most fish below. We made circles around 5 of them before finally deciding which one we should hang out by and wait for them to begin hauling in their nets.

Around 6:30pm the first nets started to pull up and we finally dropped a line into the water. We made 3 drifts past the trawler and got picked up twice but didn't hook up on anything there. After the nets were up Captain Mike decided to chum over some metered fish.

Right around 8:30 we got picked up again, which resulted in the first solid hook-up of the night. The fish took several hundred yards of line on it's first run with me putting as much pressure as I could on it. We got most of the line back on the reel and then settled in to a slow give and take of the line with the fish staying about 50 yards below the boat.


After about an hour and a half, we had the fish up next to the boat for the first time with the leader in hand but we were unable to control it. It got it’s head back down and took off again. Another hour trying to lift the fish the last 30 feet and 3 times getting the double line up out of the water, but ended up parting the leader with the fish about 20 feet short of the boat.



After breaking off that fish I was wiped out and limped off the deck and down to a bunk for a nap. My wife woke me up at 1am and we were hooked up again. The guys were putting the wood to this one and after about a half hour it came up to the boat tail wrapped. We had about 10 minutes of drama trying to get a couple of gaffs in it and then hauled it in.



High fives and picture time










This pig taped out at 637 pounds. It was 100 inches long with a 72 inch girth.

After all the high-fives and picture taking was done, we tried fishing for another couple of hours with two bites, but failed to hook-up on either one. Captain Mike wrapped things up around 6am, and we started for home on calmer waters and a following sea.

Thanks again to Mike and the crew of the Oracle for a great trip.

[coldies]

Fucking gnarly. Good job. 3rd to last pic is awesome, bleeding out of his eye.

[alwaysfishin]

That is a toad nice fish

[Tues]

Fuck me! Outfuckingstanding job there gentlemen!

Front page material there!

[KIWI808]

That thing is a beast. Makes our Ahis in Hawaii look like Bait. Hope to make it there one day to catch a monster like that..

[cycader]

That last photo is a over shot for sure.

[the junky]

Thats great i want to come and get one.

[Bigfish69]

Kinda threw up a little in my mouth.

That thing is beyond words like nice fish. OMFG,,,,Wow.

Thank you very much for sharing.

69R

[bendo714]

That's one sick fish. 2 grown men are having a problem lifting just the tail end. Damn!!! Good job. Too bad you were sleeping during all the action on the 2nd one.

[salty dong]

wow! what a toad!!!

[mr.K]

freaken awsome.

[HTA]

Jesus....you could of tossed back that little thing.