kept smashing our lures and we just watched in aw as they continued hitting our splash boats and hand lines but would be gone as quick as they were there;
This is interesting. The tuna where hitting your splash boats? Or the lures? Also are you using single hooks? You guys were really into them good. That was a good school you were on. My total for the day with an experienced crew was 17. I had some setbacks during the day with my "research rigs" and mola mola hook ups. I wrote this earlier today for posting. Pics to follow tonight. It was awesome to have other boats out there, it just makes it so much better for everyone out there on so many levels. Thanks everyone. Also got buzzed really well by the coastal patrol aircraft "speed air". I like airplanes.
Tuna Trip Aug 11, 2013
My trip starts of at 4:45 am departure from Tofino. My buddy in his boat has a half hour head start on us. It is hard to travel in the dark so we are only doing 19 kn for the first hour. Once there is a bit of light out we can bump the speed up to 21 kn and slow down for the odd bigger bump. We arrive in the center of the ammo dump circle at 7:40 is and the water is only 13.5 C but it looks clear and we cant wait to start fishing. I have not heard from Sculpin yet so I am a little concerned but he has a buddy boats out of Ukee so I hope he is on 78 and I will hear him soon.
About an hour of trolling and I hear my buddy boat has a sextuple header so I am pumped and he is only a mile away and soon we start getting singles. Today’s color is green.
I wanted to try some different ideas today and one of them was the two clone rig where there are 2 clones on the line 20 inches apart but only the back one has a hook. I didn’t really work but for once and that one time was enough for me to take all those rigs out of the water because it was a foul hooked tuna that escaped after a half hour battle. I have never foul hooked a tuna so I suspect that it took a swipe at the larger clone in front with no hook and took the hook from the back one in the side, three quarters back. This happened on a double header and we though maybe something unique was on the line but it was mentioned halfway through the battle that a foul hooking was a possibility and that was the case.
I had the dream crew with me on this trip. One fella has done these trips 6 times already and brings amazing camera equipment(he’s a whale watching guide) and know how to fish. The other fellow really knows how to fish salmon and halies. BOTH guys own there own boats so they are just all around good to have out there. They both like to get’em to so they will check lines for weeds all day which make a huge difference. But they are smart too and catch on quick. It wasn’t long before they were handing off the rods/reel combo hookups and I had to call BS on them and tell them that I know the hand lines are way more fun but the rods and reels are part of the game so suck it up and reel that darn tuna in. LOL
It was one guys first tuna trip so me and the whale watching guide were showing him all the cool off shore stuff. We stopped on the way out to be with a group of Dalls porpus which was amazing and while we were trolling we would go close to the sun fish when we saw them to show him. The sunfish that are out there now are the largest I have ever seen. Its hard to say but out of the five I saw I bet they were all between 4 to 6 hundred pound. Anyway we turned on one and slowed right down to look at it and in dove a but and we looked at it but it came up and one of our rigs hooked it in the back. We saw it happening and knew that it was a 50 50 chance that it would get the hooks when when the zuker bounced over its back and that’s what happened. I was a bit pissed because I just didn’t want that to happen. It thrashed on the surface for a minute and then it just dove and just before it spooled us the hooks came out. Note to self “keep the gear away from the sun fish”.
Other than that it was a great trip. It was so nice to have other boats out there even though there were fish all over the place. I never even saw the boats out of ukee because they found em and so did we. There was some time where it was slow and I considered running south 14 miles to get in on the action at father Charles canyon but then we would find them again.
The warmest water we found was 14.4 C and the first part of the day we were in dark green emerald water. It was clear but not blue. Later we found bluer water but IMO it was not premium but it was very clear and a bit warmer. Its really hard to tell the color of the water unless the sun comes out but one of the guys pointed out if you lean over the outside edge of the boat and look down along the hull so see under the boat you get a better idea of the color. I prefer the dark blue water.
). I like using Neptune Ice as they are reasonable and accommodating.
