Joe’s Marlin
I took Joe and his wife, from Florida, out last Friday on what turned out to be beautiful day at sea. The sea calm and the rain cleared as we headed out. So off we went out looking for Joe’s Marlin.
Joe had experience having caught Sailfish and Mahi Mahi in his home waters in the Carribean. However he hadn’t caught a Marlin and that was his ambition, no pun intended.
So we headed out and after hearing of Mahi Mahi around the FAD’s did a couple of circuits around the Sydney FAD with no result so headed out over the twelve mile to the shelf.
Just past the twelve the current picked up and the temperature started to climb and the water turning that beautiful blue and 22.5 C.
I started to mark bait around the shelf and out to around 140 fathoms but it was very patch and obviously not being harassed. On approaching Browns I saw another boat and it looked like they were fighting a fish which was confirmed when I saw a Marlin jumping. Turns out it was a boat called ‘HotRod’. Later on they told me that they had a 2.5 metre Blue Marlin on board which had sadly died during the fight.
Action
Spirits were now high and expectation great. Further out as I was watching the Mutton birds migrating South I could see that some patches were circling and indeed working an area. I concentrated on them for a while and though it was obvious they were on something I couldn’t make out what it was and nothing was marking on the sounder. Subsequently as I move further North I saw several more patches of birds working the same way. I have in the past seen similar behaviour when the Mutton birds were chase Flying fish in that hey scare the fish into taking flight then pounce on them.
Then Ron screamed out Marlin! and there behind the short corner was a Striped Marlin coming up behind ‘Evil’ mouth open and ready to eat. Ron dropped the lure back but no hook up. The Marlin came back onto the lure, Ron teased it a little then dropped it back and this time hooked up and the fish took off.
It was a very stubborn fish and I actually thought it might be a Blue which stayed deep and made Joe really work for it. However, he did eventually get the fish up and we released a good ninety to a hundred kilo Striped Marlin.
It was getting late by then so I turned for home anticipating my next trip out into the blue.
Tight lines,
Ivan