Different Species of Trevally

[Charles Cintron]

Howzit guys,

When I browse through the trip report sections I have come to notice a type of trevally I have never seen, the Black tip trevally. I saw this fish in the Oman reports, just curious is it native to Oman or found elsewhere? It looks very similar to the Jack crevalle (minus the black tips) found in the US in the Gulf Coast. Are they a rare bunch?

Also I do notice that I have never seen in any of the trip reports someone catching a African Pompano. In Hawaii we call them Kagami, I really don't know the history of why we call them that I usually state fish by their Hawaiian names and Kagami has always sounded Japanese to me. Anyways african pompano has always been sort of a "lucky catch" here in Hawaii as noone specifically targets them and are bycatches of fishing for GT's and Bluefin trevally. There are spots near my home where they are caught by shorecasters from time to time more often than anyplace else but never on lures. I have seen juvenile pompano's in the 1kg and less range caught on lures but never anything large. I believe our state record is in the 25kg range and was caught with bait.

A large pompano on a lure is at the number 2 spot in my GT list, has anyone here caught large ones on lures? Or is it also considered "lucky" catches also from your fishing grounds?

Aloha

A pic from google:

[Mark Harris]

Hey Charles

First Blacktip Trevally (caranx heberi) is quite a widespread fish in the Indian Ocean and western Pacific regions.  In Oman I found them to be particularly common and easy to attract with topwater lures.  In  spots in Indonesia they tend to lie deeper in the water column and are best fished for with small jigs.  Fishbase: http://fishbase.org/summary/Caranx-heberi.html

The Pompano-type trevally group is a nightmare of confusion  of common names, and also mis-identification. The African Pompano (Alectis ciliaris) has a maze of common names, see: http://fishbase.org/comnames/CommonNamesList.php?ID=988&GenusName=Alectis&SpeciesName=ciliaris&StockCode=1004.   The confusion is with the Indian Threadfish (alectis indica).  Both often seem to have the same vernacular name!

I have never caught either with a top water lures but I have when jigging normally at mid-water depths.  They pull like hell!

In my (mostly Asian) popping experience, and from chat and reading other reports, the most likely trevallies to take a lure when you are targeting GTs are:

Bluefin Trevally
Bludger
Orange-spotted Trevally
Yellow-spotted Trevally

And also, Big-eye, Golden, Brassy and Tille.

[Andrew Susani]

Aloha!

That pic looks like the diamond trevally we get here.  I don't know if they get much beyond 6kg in weight though, and can be hard to find.  I have caught 3 in the last couple of years, jigging small metal lures around bait schools on reefs in 20m of water.





The bottom one was hooked in the tail and almost spooled me! 

The baby ones have awesome long wisps off their rear fins - these wear off with age.  They have an amazing sheen, sort of like the inside of an oyster or abalone shell.

[Mark Harris]

Diamond Trevally is one of the myriad common names for alectis indica and I think that is what you are holding there Andrew 

Charles' picture is of alectis ciliaris, again with so many common names it is not funny, but most commonly, African Pompano.

In Australian waters, the two species must overlap in the far north.  In Asia they are often in the same waters, but in Hawaii it is ciliaris only.

Both species can go over 20 kilos.

And I might be wrong as these do get confusing!

[Charles Cintron]

Howzit Mark, ive heard the variations of pompano can be quite confusing and I figured if I was going to catch a large one it would probably be on a jig or I was thinking maybe I might get lucky and get one on a pandora or slow sinking jig some guys in Kona are starting to make besides cut bait.

Nice ones Andrew! Kagami's as we like to call them here are some of my favorite fish to look at, very freakish and frankenstein like. Like you said the smaller ones have the streamers coming off them, here's the one and only ive caught while in kona this year. Caught with squid bottom fishing, good looking fish with the mirror finish. I forgot the fork length but I tagged and released this one.

[Peter Morris]

You can clearly distinguish between the two.

In Australia we have the Diamond Trevally and African Pompano is called a Pennantfish here.

Pennants feature a far more rounded head as can be seen in the pics.

Tak Otsuka caught a beautifull Pennant fish on a topwater lure a couple of years back so it highlights there agression.
I dont know of any Diamonds caught on Topwater though.

Pete

[Mark Harris]

I reckon a smallish fast sinking stickbait might be your best bet for getting one on a popping set up Charles.

[Ed Nicholas]

Check out this beast taken on a small Popper inshore .. Not heard them called a Pennant before and to be honest still not sure how to distinguish between the Diamond Trevally, African Pomp or Mirror fish which are common names thrown around on board. One thing for sure it is a beautiful fish and pulls very hard.

[Mark Harris]

I think that is a. cliliaris Ed, most commonly called African Pompano.  Lovely fish.

[Charles Cintron]

That's a nice one Ed good to hear that some are coming from topwater, i'd love to catch one like that on top from my home fishing grounds. The pompano's have never shown their face around us so far.

[Ed Nicholas]

Thanks Charles, we have had a couple off the top but that fish was the finest of the bunch and fought on very light tackle. Hopefully one will make an appearance fro you soon mate.  I thought the African Pomp was the one with the longer dorsal and anal fins? Still confused about the names!

[Dave Hudson]

Hi Guys,
This shot shows the amazing 'wisps' that are a feature of the smaller diamonds. They are wrapped around my fingers
several times to get them in the shot.
Got this one on a gold bomber in shallow reef, it put up a great fight for its size.
Dave

[Callan Wallace]

I used to catch these on poppers all the time here in Fiji. They do put up a good fight.
Here is a juvenile one with the long fins.

[Ladd Yoshimura]

Charles finally released his death grip he had on his Wild Violence and joined me on the shallow flats to hunt monster hawaiian bonefish.  Unfortunately no bonefish were sighted, but we got lucky and landed a beautiful 8lb golden trevally - Gnathanodon speciosus (called pa'opa'o in Hawaii) on ultra light gear.



Typically caught on on fly rods or cut bait, and grows up to 15 pounds or so.

[Charles Cintron]

nice fish guys,

Has anyone caught a trevally like the one Ladd is holding in your home waters? It was a spectacular catch and the first time i've got to see and hold one besides looking at them in pics. The mouth on it was very similar to that of a bonefish. They do come up from time to time here in hawaii but I think less often than the african pompano's becuase of the habitat they like to frequent but don't qoute me on that lol