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Topwater Caranx Ignobilis: Giant Trevally (GT) => Reports & Expeditions => Topic started by: Brandon Khoo on August 06, 2009, 08:23:15 PM
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I went for a trip to NC for six days with Damon Olsen from Nomad Sportfishing with le Poisson Banane in July. The objective of the trip (apart from the obvious) was for Damon to meet the boys from LPB and for an exchange of ideas and approaches in targeting GTs. This can ultimately only be good news for those of us who fish with either or both of these outfits. Both David and Rudy will then be fishing with Nomad at a trip of their choosing in 2010.
Unfortunately, the weather gods conspired against us. The first day was a complete write-off and we couldn't even leave the harbour and looking at the conditions, none of us would have wanted to. As far as conditions were concerned, we ended up with two reasonable days, one good day, one poor day and one unbelievably bad day! :D
Still, we enjoyed some terrific fishing at times and with an ounce of luck, we could have had an unbelievable few days. I got to say, Damon has got to be the most unlucky angler I've fished with! He raised something like 8-9 huge fish in the two reasonable and one good day and he didn't get a single hook-up! The fish would either slash and miss or a smaller fish would get in front of the big fish or the fish would veer away at the last moment but he just had no luck. I think Rudy and I would say the same. I had one absolutely monstrous fish strip over 100m in its first run before it threw the hook moments later and Rudy had another monster grab his pencil popper right in the middle of the body and not hook up.
In terms of the fishing, we still caught a bucket load of fish but an ounce of luck would have made for a truly memorable trip. I was amazed by the variety of fish for winter. It's really hard trying to convince Damon, David or Rudy to take photos - I think they see too many fish on a day to day basis. I almost had to make them take photos for it to happen. In terms of meeting the objectives of the trip, it was a huge success, I think. Damon got along like a house on fire with David and Rudy. Damon said he found it very informative in terms of how the boys targeted certain areas and no doubt, David and Rudy will find the same when they fish with Nomad next year.
Highlights for me:
Isle of Pines - we anchored one evening in the lagoon at the Isle of Pines and it would have to be one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. It was worth the trip just to see the place. We fished the lagoon throwing small minnows and plastics and I lost every minnow I had.
Damon striking at the fish - On the first day we were out, Damon hooked a shark which jumped about three feet out of the water. On the last afternoon, he then hooks a cod which jumps out of the water as well. It wasn't until I realised what had happened that I found it so funny. he was striking at the poor fish so hard he was literally pulling it out of the water!
Smallest fish on a plastic - I think I might have outdone myself at least - check out the last photo!
Almaco Jack on a popper - Damon managed to catch an almaco jack on a popper in atrocious conditions!
Blue cod - truly the most impressive fighting fish in New Caledonia. ::) The strike is ferocious and then ............. nothing! The fish just floats in mid-water with its mouth wide open and doesn't do a damn thing.
Bottom fishing - the bottom fishing in NC really is quite spectacular. the only time we did it was at night or when the weather was so bad, we had to anchor up and wait but the fishing on he bottom were unreal. For some reason, the inchiku jigs work better than soft plastics.
In terms of what we used and what worked best, We fished primarily PE10 although I was using PE8 on my stickbait outfit. Damon went heavy the whole way with his lightest rod being a SP78EXH! He was also using a Wild Violence and a Ripple Fisher GT78XH. I was using a TBL711 for my stickbait rod and a SP78UHL and Fisherman GT Game T-RSH with PE10 for poppers. This really was a trip for poppers, and big ones at that. I had most of my success on a Fullscale Big 200 whilst Damon caught most of his on a big Cubera or huge Patriot Masterd Bomb.
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Some nice fish Brandon. The trip description is exactly how you told me when we met! Almost word for word! ;D
I like that last pic - thats the size we catch back home :D
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no, I reckon mine is much more impressive than the moses perch which they caught in the Shimano video which Gu is in!
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Nice pic Brandon that one has to go in the avatar ;D
Great pics as usual and good report, at least you got a few good days :)
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Top stuff Brandon,
That a flutefish..?...Interesting capture
Pete
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Top stuff Brandon,
That a flutefish..?...Interesting capture
Pete
Yeah Pete that's a flutemouth, quite a few of these turn up around Ningaloo reef here on the west coast.
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I love those things - they're so cool. I've wanted to catch one for years and I finally got one at Jewell last year and then got this one in NC on a soft plastic. They're covered in slime though! ;D
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Mate well done and great report from u also,good to see heaps of big fished raised but annoying that they didnt connect with your poppers,ill be there next month to have a crack,hopefully that 50kg will come to me agian!!!! ;)
The night fishing is always fun!!!
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as allway's Brandon a good read and some good fish, it's a shame the hit's from the monstrous fish did not hook up.
the fish which stripped over 100m in it's first run, I am just wondering........any idea what it was?
going and judging by the condition's of the sea in the background of the photo's, with out being rude and certainly no dis-respect, it look's to me like you had some nice good days. One thing i can assure you is that when me and Stan were there in New Cal, the weather and condition's we had (in my honest opinion and most probably in Stans opinion to) were much worse then that (judging by the photos). I think in fact i am sure we were all hoping for the weather and condition's to be like it is and was in what is seen on the photos.
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We had sunshine for about 1.5 days out of six, Sam and on the last two days, the camera hardly came out due to the rain. I hope you didn't have worse than 30 to 40 knots and pouring rain. :D
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Nice! Love those pics! Which lures would you suggest for trout Brandon?
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Great report Brandon. We had similar experience of big fish pulling the hooks in June when me and my son where there. I think when you hook a really big fish and the boys up the speed of the boat to pull you off the shallows you practically tear the hook out with the fish going one way and the boat the other. David opened a SW 18000 with faulty drag and we found the drag washers compleatly disinegrated ..black powder!!. I persume thats cause the guys lock the drag compleatly if they suspect a real big one at the other end. Any thoughts?
Jeen
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Hi Brandon,
Looks like you made the most of it despite the weather conditions. Some great shots in there and a good description of having to make your companions take some photo's at times. The fullscale poppers look the biz...
I experienced similar variety a few weeks before you, no flutefish though!
Cheers Dave
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nice report thank,s for sharing .. ;) :)
tell damon hi for me ya .
when you go back with nomad
hey brandon when is your next trip :-X.
i can,t wait to fish there one day . a
As it ,s on my list ::)
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we weren't even pulling the hooks on them, Jeenraj - we just weren't hooking up. In terms of tearing the hooks out, I have to say that I haven't experienced this before. I think over the years I've been fishing, I've had a couple of occasions where the hooks have pulled when we're towing the fish but I think this is more then fish turning and the hook coming out from a poor hook-
set rather than tearing out. GTs have pretty strong jaws. The approach used by LPB is the same as any other guide when you hook up in the shallows. On most occasions, the GT will allow itself to be towed out but on a few rare occasions, I've had the fish decide it is not coming out.
In terms of the drag desintegrating, I'd suggest that reel had a faulty washer or two than simply fell apart under pressure. Shimano drags are excellent out of the box and the new Daiwa drags which they started using this year are excellent as well. Personally, I believe all pre 2009 Dogfights needed a change of drag washers to carbontex but that appears to be no longer necessary.
It's not the first time I have heard of this happening but thankfully, never to me. The reels are designed to operate under maximum drag and if you wound the drag to absolute maximum with a Stella or Saltiga, I'm not sure you could hold onto it for very long if a big fish decided to make a run for it. My drag setting is only about 12kg as I much prefer to exert additional pressure by winding it up after the fish is hooked or by simply applying more pressure using my palm. Over the years, I've just seen too many snap-offs on strike from excessive drag pressure so now I prefer to start off with a lower drag setting. This of course varies from location to location. If I was fishing somewhere like Shoalwater, the initial setting would still be about fifteen kg.
I actually spoke with David about the drag washers falling apart and he said that it was just a standard drag setting so it can only be a faulty washer or two. The other thing that could cause this to happen would be if the steel washer(s) were not perfectly flat. With the amount of pressure being applied, a warped steel washer would cause havoc and it would concentrate the pressure onto a small part of the carbon washer. This would almost certainly result in the carbon washer desintegrating.
Great report Brandon. We had similar experience of big fish pulling the hooks in June when me and my son where there. I think when you hook a really big fish and the boys up the speed of the boat to pull you off the shallows you practically tear the hook out with the fish going one way and the boat the other. David opened a SW 18000 with faulty drag and we found the drag washers compleatly disinegrated ..black powder!!. I persume thats cause the guys lock the drag compleatly if they suspect a real big one at the other end. Any thoughts?
Jeen
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there is one lure I know which works better than any other on big reefies and it is the Tailwalk Gunz 180 sinking model. Don't ask me why this lure works so well - it just does. I actually whack on a couple of ST-66 3/0s which are probably just a touch too big for the lure but they do make it sink even faster and this combination works great. It was after one session at Marion Reef where I had called it before I even cast the lure in that Nomad decided to start carrying these lures.
We were working a reef edge without much luck when I said to Damon I was going to throw in my coral trout killer. he looked at me and said "yeah right....." so I threw it in and bang - coral trout first cast. Two casts later, another trout comes in the boat and when another came in about five casts later, he said "let me have a look at the bloody thing!"
i would point out the 180 is for big trout. The do come in sizes down to a 120 which is more akin to something you'd cast for jacks and barra.
Nice! Love those pics! Which lures would you suggest for trout Brandon?
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Great report Brandon. I grabbed a Tailwalk Gunz 180 sinking on my last order from Nomad, I'm very keen to see how they go when chucked at blue water work ups over here in NZ.
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I'm sure it will work well there too, Shane.I think the reason they work so well is that as they're sinking, the way they sit in the water is very similar to how baitfish sit when they stop. The only thing is I wouldn't be looking to target big yellowtail kings with them. I had one broken in half by a big GT a few years back
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I was thinking things with a beak...
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mmm, I have no expertise to call on there but it won't be a pretty sight if the beakies start slashing at it
I was thinking things with a beak...
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Hello Brandon,
Your trip report makes my day! Wonderful photos with interesting captures. Can't wait to fish at NC one day!
Cheers,
Paul
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Great insight Brandon . Thanks .
Jeen
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Hi Brandon,
Great story and photos, even though the weather was lousy at least the company was great.
As for the Full Scale, thumbs up.
Cheers
stan
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In terms of tearing the hooks out, I have to say that I haven't experienced this before. I think over the years I've been fishing, I've had a couple of occasions where the hooks have pulled when we're towing the fish but I think this is more then fish turning and the hook coming out from a poor hook-
set rather than tearing out. GTs have pretty strong jaws. The approach used by LPB is the same as any other guide when you hook up in the shallows. On most occasions, the GT will allow itself to be towed out but on a few rare occasions, I've had the fish decide it is not coming out.
This used to happen to us quite regularly when we used to tow fish out rather quickly under very heavy drag settings. We've since started driving out just above idle and we've noticed a significant decrease in the incidence of pulled hooks.
Recently at Bugatti we pulled the hooks on so many fish it wasn't funny, and we were using singles - sheesh :( I can't attribute this to anything besides bad luck.
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Hey brandon
great photos and well done
is the red line on your 18000sw varivas? as I know they did make a red edition line.
thanks
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will have to try what Jay says pull out gently with the boat. Will get to test mid Nov on some big GTs
Jeen
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Hey Brandon,
I'm glad you went to the effort to take photos; they compliment a great trip report. ;D It must have been an awesome experience being amongst the two world renowned GT guiding companies and their key people? :o
When I was in New Cal in April 2009 with LPB, I was unprepared for their preference to use trebles and not necessarily barbless either - Rudy reminded us that he lost his best GT to a GT Recorder (barbless of course) and strongly encouraged my crew (GT newbies) to use barbed hooks and looked bemused when most of my lures were rigged with singles! ???
Given Damon and the Nomad operation has a strict policy on singles as opposed to trebles, I'd be interested in your commentary on how this difference in rigging preferences played out during the trip. ??? I dare say the conversation and sharing of intellectual property about GT techniques amongst the all four of you would have been impressive. ;)
I'm also interested to get your opinion on LPBs preference for a short strand of mono (200 lb) attached to a double with grommets that sits outside the rod tip as opposed to twisted leaders. Again my crew began with twisted leaders much to the amusement of Rudy ;D, but after a couple of bite offs courtesy of the razor gang, we changed to the LPB method and did not get busted off by any GTs throughout the 6 day trip ;). I assume its got to do with the deep water and the use of the LPB method wouldn't be as successful in the Coral Sea or at Shoalwater due to take lack of shock absorption, rougher terrain and shallow water? ::)
Cheers
Craig Lupton
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Hi Craig,
I'll let the original person you posed the question to answer in detail, particularly about singles/trebles but I think you've just answered most of your questions yourself. I would say the terrain (very deep vs. very shallow) and probability of getting busted off (high probability vs. very little) greatly influences the two different styles of rigging here.
I prefer trebles alot more myself. However, you never know - Glenn who was on my trip had a rare popper rigged up with singles and what do you know - he lands a Sailfish that would have been close to impossible with trebles on the lure.
Go figure :P
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Craig, there is no doubt whatsoever you will lose less fish with barbs. I have lost a number of big fish over the years ten or fifteen minutes into the fight when the hook comes out. I am pretty sure at least some of them would have stayed on with barbed hooks.
Nomad insist on the use of single barbless hooks for a few reason, all of which I fully understand. The first is safety - if you get a huge treble whacked into you with barbs on them, you literally need surgery to remove it. Barbless, it comes straight out. The second is for the fish - if you lose a fish and the poor bugger has a lure with barbs on it in its throat, you have killed the fish. Even with barbless, there will be occasions when the fish cannot shake the hooks out but it has a much better chance of shaking the lure off with barbless hooks. Third - Nomad belives the single hook does less damage to the fish and holds better than trebles. I'm not so sure I agree with this myself based on my experience but they are strongly of that view.
There is no doubt that the incidence of lost fish with LPB is much lower than Nomad experiences but not all the areas LPB fish are deep and their customers lose their share of fish as well.
Damon was quite intrigued by the rig the boys use but his immediate reaction was that the short leader just wouldn't be the go for places which Nomad tends to fish. I have to say that I agree. I would have no hesitation fishing with the rig which LPB use in NC but I would not want to be using it in Shoalwater or Jewell Reef! Btw, the boys at LPB don't use 200lb - they use 300-400lb mono leaders. if you didn't experience any bite offs from the razor gang after changing your rig, it simply means you got lucky. Wahoo, mackeral and barrcuda will cut 500lb mono without any effort at all. For comparative puprposes, I didn't have one cut off on my last trip whereas Damon spent the whole cursing and re-rigging from encounters with mackeral - and we both use long mono leaders. It just means I got lucky.
Shock absorption is not as much of an issue for the rig that LPB uses because the boys are using Tufline Guides Choice - it's like rope!
I must admit that it really was a privilege being around the discussions. Watching and listening to the subtleties of how they target various areas was really interesting as well as their experiences over the years. I would love to do that again some time but that is just being greedy! :D
for me, I will continue using the long leader but would have no issue whatsoever with using the short leader in NC. In terms of barbs, I use barbless hooks and will continue to do so.
Hey Brandon,
I'm glad you went to the effort to take photos; they compliment a great trip report. ;D It must have been an awesome experience being amongst the two world renowned GT guiding companies and their key people? :o
When I was in New Cal in April 2009 with LPB, I was unprepared for their preference to use trebles and not necessarily barbless either - Rudy reminded us that he lost his best GT to a GT Recorder (barbless of course) and strongly encouraged my crew (GT newbies) to use barbed hooks and looked bemused when most of my lures were rigged with singles! ???
Given Damon and the Nomad operation has a strict policy on singles as opposed to trebles, I'd be interested in your commentary on how this difference in rigging preferences played out during the trip. ??? I dare say the conversation and sharing of intellectual property about GT techniques amongst the all four of you would have been impressive. ;)
I'm also interested to get your opinion on LPBs preference for a short strand of mono (200 lb) attached to a double with grommets that sits outside the rod tip as opposed to twisted leaders. Again my crew began with twisted leaders much to the amusement of Rudy ;D, but after a couple of bite offs courtesy of the razor gang, we changed to the LPB method and did not get busted off by any GTs throughout the 6 day trip ;). I assume its got to do with the deep water and the use of the LPB method wouldn't be as successful in the Coral Sea or at Shoalwater due to take lack of shock absorption, rougher terrain and shallow water? ::)
Cheers
Craig Lupton
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Nice work Brandon, thought I had read this report before but turns out I hadn't! Great photos too. I agree with you the the Gunz is a good lure for the big reefies, not so much for the big Gt's though! They like them but they just aren't tough enough. I had one split and rip the wire an inch and a half or so out of the lure and it had caught just the one fish (GT of 30kg or so).