The 2014 offshore fishing season continues to be good and crowded. This trip is one where the gear failure was in the people, but we ended with some good yellowfin Tuna.
Summary
It all started with a night that didn’t give me much sleep. The plan was to leave the house at 4:30, but at 4 I was bored and ready to go. Lee got there are 4:30 and we headed off. The ramp was smooth, I think we just missed the crowds and we were able to drive right up and get bait. Unheard of in the summer.
The day before and the night prior had winds offshore. It was supposed to be lumpy. And there was a bit of lump. I’ve seen much worse, but it just slowed us down a bit. Actually, the 6-9 knots of breeze kept it cool.
We saw a lot of good life and the water was still superb. We slowed down just shy of the 9 to look, but quickly continued on our way. About 5 miles shy of the 224, we put out the trollers. About 15 minutes later we spotted a bunch of birds. They were moving, but we still got into them trolling around 5 knots. Within about 5 minutes, we got a jig strike on the natural cedar plug.
There were fish boiling and jumping all around us, so I started a chunk bait line and we got a couple more on live bait.
We repeated this a few more times, and by 9am we have 7 12-24 pound yellowfin in the boat. I was shot. We half heatedly kept looking around, but we didn’t feel compelled to really look hard. At this point the kill bag was full and I had to stick a couple in the in-deck fish hold that in my opinion is storage only since it isn’t insulated.
The ride back wasn’t too bad, but it was still a bit lumpy. We stopped at the bait barge to give the boys there a yellowfin.
Nothing wrong with finding yellowfin not too far off the coast.
Catch
We ended up with 7 yellowfin tun from 12-22 pounds. My body feels like there were a lot more and they were a lot bigger.
The natural cedar plug and purple rapala did the trick on the troll. Mini-macs and sardines were the live bait of choice.
Conditions
Water
The offshore wind picked up late Friday, blew Saturday and turned the ocean into a nasty wind chop situation. The swells were small and long, but there was a 2-3′ wind shop at 6 seconds. The wind backed off Saturday evening, but there was still 5-8 knots in the morning and a lot of left over chop. We got beat up a bit, but it was better than we expected.
Tide
It was a half moon and the morning tides were not too big. I think they may have had something to do with the bit slowing by 9am. Mainly we were physically tired; gear failure was in the anglers.
Weather
Warm. Even with a bit of wind, it was a warm day on the water. Strong sun and probably 75+ degrees.
Notes
Engine performed well. I think the oil issue was from the thermostat and trolling too hard.
Fuel: Burned 21.8 Gallons
Distance: 64.2 nauticle miles for an average of 2.94 MPG.
Engine Hours: 8.6 for total of 752.9