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

Another Monday at Sea

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.

Tight Lines

In search of Doggies Take 4

Well here we go again. In search of the now infamous Dogtooth Tuna. We are going to try a different area this time.

First on the list is get some bait for those that do not want to jig.

There's the birds.

From Doggies take 4

Now to catch some bait.

From Doggies take 4

With bait in hand it is time to fish.

First up is Rosie with a nice Green Jobfish.

From Doggies take 4

I soon find a point that looks promising for Doggies and before long Wayne is right into one.

From Doggies take 4

Here is the video.

From Doggies take 4

So that makes 2 Dogtooth Tuna in four attempts. I think we are getting it.

Not to be out done Rosie manages to land a Black Tip reef shark without steel leader. Notice the circle hook from someone else. We removed it also before letting it go.

From Doggies take 4

We proceed to catch a menagerie of reef fish for the remainder of the afternoon.

Brendan with a small grouper.

From Doggies take 4

Wayne flexing his biceps for the camera with his big GIANT grouper.

From Doggies take 4

Rosie with a snapper

From Doggies take 4

and some strange devil snapper.

From Doggies take 4

Brendan with a Rusty Jobfish.

From Doggies take 4

Here is an artistic shot of the doggies eye for you all.

From Doggies take 4

Tight Lines

In search of Doggies Take 3

Ding! Round three in the search for Dogtooth Tuna.

We have been very lucky with our weather during our weekend hunts. This one was no exception.

The tides were right and the weather was stellar.

Where there's birds there's fish.

From Doggies Take 3

The plan was basically the same. Get to the general area and then use the sounder to find the depth range and hopefully the Dogs.

As with all fishing down deep, you never know what you will come up with. Especially when you are fishing in the 70-100 meter depth range. It looked fishy and Rosie proved it was fishy with this lovely Brown Spotted Grouper.

From Doggies Take 3

Mean while Wayne and I are speed jigging like maniacs and not really catching anything but sore arms.

Soon after this beauty was caught Rosie decided she wanted to live bait with steel wire. Well the outcome of that can only go one way. A leviathan of the deep. A monster that no one wants to touch. A beast of nightmares.

OK enough here is the video. Warning this video does contain some language that might be offensive to some.

Now if you do not want to watch the video I shall paraphrase it for you.

The fight lasted more than an hour and pretty much whipped Rosie. Lucky for here she had new TufLine XP 50 lb indicator braid and a brand new Black Hole, Cape Cod jigging rod. I only got one shot of the shark, but there is underwater video footage in the above video.

From Doggies Take 3

We put this Silvertip shark at about 8ft and a hell of a lot of teeth.

Now that we are done with this shark it is time to get back to jigging for Doggies. Oh and by the way, during the fight Rosie swore off using steel leader and live baiting ever again. Until the next time of course.

Back to the jigging we proceeded to pull all kinds of fish. including the Lyre Tail Grouper.

From Doggies Take 3

A small Blue Trevally that was hooked in the back.

From Doggies Take 3

Now that Rosie was not using steel wire she was catching fish of a much more reasonable size.

From Doggies Take 3

Unfortunately the elusive Dogtooth was just that, elusive. Wayne lost every jig he had including one of mine. Of course we do not know what it was that was taking them, but that did not deter us.

Here is a shot of Wayne waiting for his jig to hit the bottom.

From Doggies Take 3

The day was winding down and Wayne wanted one more drop. I told Rosie to get the video rolling as I had a feeling of the out come. It would be the same as all of the other ones.

After all that excitement it was time to head home. We had a bout a 20 mile run and I hate driving at night.

One exhausted angler.

From Doggies Take 3

And a gorgeous sunset to finish off a good day.

From Doggies Take 3

Tight Lines