Targeting ocean pelagics, sees me off the gold or sunshine coasts most weekends and pretty much every holiday I have.
This 78kg black, caught in Feb 2008 is probably my most memorable catch so far.
Depending on the season we target anything from big snapper to Spanish and billfish when the season is on. Probably my favourite target is longtail tuna on 20lb gear.
With a few weeks downtime in between contracts, good weather predicted and a brace of 15kg longtails caught the weekend before, I decided to spend last week on the Sunshine Coast chasing tuna. A mate from Melbourne flew up to join me.With still a little swell and wind around on our first outing last Sunday we opted to troll a few hardbodies and squid skirts around in the hope for a few tuna. No such luck but we did land a few mackerel and a mac tuna keeping the spotty for dinner.
The tuna were also scarce the next day and with the wind up over 10k and the swell around 2m we bottom bashed for a bit and called it an early day once we had dinner in the bag.
Tuesday was just one of those days when the sun shines on you and the fish take everything you throw at them. With the ability to rig the Hobie AI in a number of ways, we opted to leave the sail and one outrigger behind and fish Polynesian style.
Though most of my fish came from metals and trolled HBs I did hook and fight for 20 mins, my first longtail on a popper. Unfortunately it spat the hooks on the little Halco Rooster 105. A few more follows on the popper but fish on the HBs out the back kept us from casting poppers much of the time.
Whilst I do pop on the yak occasionally its not something I would do every trip out. I recently bought a whole lot of gear and did a trip to the Sth Pacific but for one reason or another never landed a GT. Determined to find out what all the fuss is about and with a longtail in the bag for dinner we worked a couple of likely spots. Though not the monster that many of you chase on here, my first GT on a popper came about 20 casts in on a 20lb rig with a Halco 105 in King Brown.
We got buzzed by a US nuclear sub and three fighter jets flew 30ft over my head.
Sharks, dolphins, turtles and acres of busting tuna all turned on a show for us. I got my first GT on a popper. With only 3 days until Easter Ill be back out there again trying for my first longtail on a popper. Ive got two spots where we caught GTs last week. Who knows, maybe a big one will come out to play next time.
Can anyone suggest a stick bait in the 100-120mm range that tuna would go for?
Stay tuned for more yak poppin reports.
