So my buddy called and said he wanted to troll the new Madmacs he got this morning. The weather looked to be really bad, but he figured we go out and run the macs in the morning and get off the water by the time the wind blew. Why not? Make a quick run to where Squatch and I saw the tuna on Sunday was going to be the ticket.
I woke up to wind at 3:00 am... good god. We got down to an empty ramp at Dana? We knew the WON tuna/yellowtail challenge was going on, so we steered clear of Shelter and glad we did. We got a half a scoop of bait and got out to the 9 by 5:30am. It was cold, windy and drizzly, but not unbearable yet.
We tied on the Madmacs and was just ready to put them in when we saw breaking fish here and there. Definitely bigger Bluefin!
Within 5 minutes of trolling, my reel started screaming! I can't believe it was so quick! I kept the drag fairly tight and fought it like if I was using a spreader bar. Halfway through the fight, my buddy said "Let me get a turn on the handle" so I passed the rod off. I was stoked, but have no issues passing it off after catching the last three big ones on his boat.
He definitely fought it more aggressively than I would, but we finally got it to the boat, a 95-110# class fish and 5-6 feet under the boat. This fugger kept trying to run under the motor and wouldn't budge the last few feet, but I was circling the boat to make sure we didn't lose it on the prop. I got the nod to get the gaff and in that instance, that damn treble hook pulled and we lost it right at the top... UGH, so sick to our stomachs!
We reset and started the troll again. This time a few more boats got into the area, but we managed to stay away from the. All of a sudden, my reel starts screaming again! ANOTHER ONE ON!
We used the boat in gear to keep him behind us while he reeled in his Madmacs. I was just basically cranking to get him closer as Shaun was clearing lines. All clear and I let the fish run when he wanted to run making sure to not have the drag too tight. 20 feet behind the boat now and we see it's another ~100# model of BLUEFIN! Just then it bolted at the boat and I was winding as fast as my arm could wind when he literally jumped out of the water behind us with mouth wide open, gills blazing, and head thrashing! We both watched him literally throw the lure out of his face! Once again, it had the back big mega treble in it's mouth, but our only guess is there was not enough bite on that hook to get a deep hard part of the jaw..... God, I could puke at this point losing two triple digit BFT's, but have to say it was awesome seeing the lure work as advertised.
This entire time we were also metering fish from 60-100 feet down. I mean PERFECT meter marks on the sonar like something you see out of Wicked Tuna.
Just then I went up front to grab something and the boat dropped 6 feet throwing me to the deck and f@cking up my arm. The wind was starting to pick up as well as the swell and wind waves. Damn it...
With the trollers out, now Shaun's rod gets slammed! He fights it half-way in and "POOF".... just gone. Not sure what happened but the hook pulled. This was enfuriating as he modified the Madmacs to have big ass expensive trebles on the back.
Not long after and he hooks up again! ...but the same story happens. Half-way in and it just pops off. 4 tuna on all by 7:30 am! Could have been limits before 8:00, but instead nothing.
We trolled and trolled, but everything disappeared. Trolling Madmacs is a costly affair as they have to be trolled fast and at the worst RPM's for fuel economy. We saw some fish breaking at 10:00 about 5-6 miles away and I insisted we cast some baits out. I got picked up, but it dropped it. I reeled in a squished head sardine with no teeth marks. Most likely a yellow, but an open water one. We couldn't find a kelp all morning as it was almost impossible to see. We had a few more opportunities, but they were small fish as they couldn't even eat a sardine.
The water temps was 70.5 when we were getting bit, but dropped to 66 and it didn't look good, The wind was sh!tty and the waves were too much for his boat to be anywhere near comfortable, so we turned in and headed back to the barn ... skunked.
It was still awesome to see the Madmacs work as advertised and even better fighting 2 hundred pound bluefin today. Only issue, was there was no pay-off picture. Consider it a catch and release sort of a day... oye vey.
Anyway, thanks for reading and until next tide!
