April 19 Waianae Trip

[Tightlines667]

My friend Evan invited me to go fishing on his Cabo 20 on Sunday. He recently moved here from CA and brought his 20' Cabo walkaround with twin 80 4-strokes with him. His boat is set up for jigging and fishing live bait, not really trolling but I threw my trolling gear in anyways.

Although on Friday the Hawaii governor declared fishing to be restricted to 2 people per boat or commercial operations, none of us or household members had experieced symproms so we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather and make a trip.

We met at the harbor at 0400hrs, launched and headed out to make bait. After 2 hours working small bait piles, we managed to put 2 Opelu, and 1 Akule in the 40 gal tank. We ran up towards CO. After finding a pid of Striped Dolphins a few miles south of the bouy, we out a 4 bait mixed bait spread with a 9" Blue/silver fish head slant behind a small bird on a long 80w, 7" Ice Blue bullet on short rigger, 7" black salmon slant on long corner, and 5" Ice Blue chugger on short corner. We worked tue dolphins then Co, then an Aku pile a few miles west of CO with no luck. We trolled westward and worked 2 more Aku piles further outside, and then trolled the 500fa out towards the Kauai Pinnacle.

The plan was to hit the Pinnacle at the 1030hr for moon peak. We spotted a small bird pile on the radar 6nm S, but they broke up before we got there. Then spotted a small pile coming together 3 miles ahead and 1nm S of Pinnacle. At around 1015hrs, as we approached the fast moving birds, the long rod popped and screamed. After a 350 yard run the fish settled down and behaved funny like it was foul-hooked, in 10 minutes we had the fish near the boat and a pulsing rod tip suggested a tail wrapped fish, but as soon as color showed we saw a Yellowfin that was hooked in the mouth. He came in easily and was landed quickly...weird. Turns out he had inhaled the 9" double hook rig which had the forward hook in the jaw, and back hook buried in its gills...
sucka no could breathe?

We worked the area for another 2 hours, then ran East to a bird pile and dropped live baits for an hour. Pulled up and ran to CO where we worked live baits for 2 hours, no bites. We wrapped things up and cleaned the fish while we ran back towards the harbor. The boat was pulled at 430pm.

Overall a good day on the water. This was Evan's first real fish in ~5 trips in Hawaii, so he was stoked! I enjoyed hearing about the fishing techniques and approaches he uses to chase Pelagics in CA and Mexico, and am enjoying the fresh Sashimi.

Hopefully we can do it again sometime.

John

[Tightlines667]

*

[Benni3]

Fabulous job man,,,,,,,,,,,

[thorhammer]

Thanks for taking us along Johnny-boy! As always a great write-up; I'd like to know more about your live bait techinique, and what you were targeting with that. Your trolling looks a lot like ours, except we almost always have a ballyhoo or squid under the jig (Islanders, sea witch, Zukers, Green Machines mostly). Do you ever run planer? We pull one, bridle rigged, with a blue / black, purple/black or red/black jig / ballyhoo on wire- this is what most of our hoo and blackfins hit.

[Hardy Boy]

Looks like fun and delicious! On another note: How are you making out with your boat work ?


Cheers:

Todd

[Tightlines667]

Thanks for taking us along Johnny-boy! As always a great write-up; I'd like to know more about your live bait techinique, and what you were targeting with that. Your trolling looks a lot like ours, except we almost always have a ballyhoo or squid under the jig (Islanders, sea witch, Zukers, Green Machines mostly). Do you ever run planer? We pull one, bridle rigged, with a blue / black, purple/black or red/black jig / ballyhoo on wire- this is what most of our hoo and blackfins hit.

As far as live baiting goes, I am still working on gaining confidence using live bait.  I have live baited on and off throughout my life but don't really feel like I have it dialed in yet, and I have not done alot of it out here yet.  Though it is quite popular here.  

Typically guys use sabiki rigs (hand tied work better than store bought) to catch Bigeye Mackrel Scad (Opelu), and Mackrel Scad (Akule) in 60-140' of water.  Bait is easiest to catch in the dark with a light, especially during the dark moon phases, and especially during the winter months, thpugh when a goodvpile is found it can be caught during the day.  Most guys will fish a small circle or live bait hook bridled (with rigging floss, or zip tie) to the top of the head, or hooked through the nose.  Lighter mono leaders are typical when targeting tuna or Mahi.  

Some guys troll lures to locate fish, birds, dolphins, or debris, or to a FAD bouy and switch to live baiting once they mark fish or they troll during early morning and late day, and fish their livies during slow periods of the day.  They can also be used aftrr a Mahi bite on the troll, to the others to come to the boat where you can try to catch them on prerigged dead baits.  Most often 1 bait is dropped back on the rigger and one on the flat with flat clips and a dropback loop, or super light drag and they are trolled at 1-2knots.  Alternatively, you might drop one down to marked fish with a rock wrapped in line or using a lifesaver rig so it will break free at depth, or inline torpedo or 45deg bent wire weight rig.  

Akule are also sometimes rigged on light wire with or without a stinger hook to troll the 40fa ledge for Wahoo.  One downside to trolling the ledge with live baits is there are alot of unwanted shark, amberjack, Green Jobfish (Uku), Giant Trevelle (Ulua), Barracuda (Kaku) and other bycatch species that take your baits, thpugh you might get a Wahoo bite when no one else can get them.

Live baiting the offshore FADs, marine debris, or Spotted Dolphin pods in the winter months for smaller (20-60lb) YFT&BET is popular and can be productive if you can find the fish.  Fishing livies in 'porpose' schools is the go to method for catching tuna off of Kona especially in the winter.  

Some guys also get serious about fishing abanondoned cargo nets.  They load the baitwell with livies, pre-rig dozens of dead pitch baits (like sardines or Sanma), and run offshore (usually to windward) up to 100nm offshore searching for a single cargo net or piece of debris.  If a good net is found, slow trolling live bait rigs in a tight circle around the debris is used to start the bite, and the deadbait rigs are used to catch volume, sometimes on handlines.  Mixed bags of dozens of small to medium tuna, wahoo, and Mahi can be caught in just a few hours on a productive pile of rubbish.  However if you don't have live bait, you may only be able to catch a few fish or none at all.  Aske me how I know!  Chunking or dead baits alone just don't seem to draw the strikes.  The guys that are serious about this cover alot of miles and may actually go out several days before they are able to find a good/productive rubbish patch.  

The big commercial guys use private floating FADs which might be deployed 70-100nm offshore, and tracked electronically.  Having a jigging rod, and surface popers is good here too.  Ika Shibi is another productive method where you fish for squid at night and drop live squid, akule, or jigs down below the main pile to catch BET, and Albacore.  Usually this is done in the winter months on windward sides of the islands (often well offshore).  Though this has waned in popularity in recent years.

Traditionally this was done using handlines and often used in combanation with daytime deep drops of chum bags and rigged dead baits (Palu Ahi).  You attach a 3-7lb flat puck weight along with a cloth bag full of diced palu (sardines/chum) to the top of a long heavy mono swivel and a dead Akule.  The package is wrapped with the line and dropped 300-700' down (on a FAD or rubbish pile or below a bait pile), jerking the line unwraps the package and releases the palu and hooked bait.  If you don't get bit, it is retrieved, often with an electric ot hydro pinch puller or on a bandit reel, and you try again.  This can be done in combination with deep water coin jig attached to a bent wire/weight rig or tradtional heavy jigging rig usually a parachute is used to control the drift.  Chunking can also be used, but it is not as popular because it usually draws sharks to the boat.  

Another trick is to use a dead or live-rigger 'Charlie' or Skipjack Tuna (AKU) or Kawakawa (Little Tunny) and to drag it fast while making tight circles and chumming to bring the tuna up from depth.  Pre-rigged dead baits or live baits in combo with dead are used to catch the fish.  

Commercial guys also employ danglers (similar to fixed jack poles) to load thousands of lbs of tuna once you get them to follow the boat with chum and live baits.  They usually use this method in combination with setting short <1nm long lines, verticle bouy gear, trolling, green stcking, and jigging.  A typical trip will yield 3,000-8,000lbs of fish in the holds and may last 4-10 days.  Our small boat full time commercial fleet consists of less than 150 vessels 30-45' in length.  We have over 1000 part time commercial trollers.

Longline boats are responsable for 80-90% off all commercial landings.  Trips are 14-42 days with 26 day average, 10-16, 25-35nm long sets with 2500-3800 hooks are set and boats return with 12,000-35,000lbs of fish.  The auction buys/sells 45,000-120,000lbs/day 6 days a week and supplies the local market with ~15,000-45,000 lbs daily, the remaining 50-80% of fish are flown out to the mainland (and sometimes other countries such as Japan) where they are responsable for supplying sushi to much of the country at large.  

Our local commercial fisheries are an extrememly valuable contributor to the economy and are one of the most valuable fisheries ($/lb) in the country.  Also the landings are more valuable and more sustainably harvested, and closely monitored than the international fisheries operating just outside the range of our local fleet of ~140 vessels.  They fish in an area 1600nm N/S and 3,000nm E/W (4.8 million sq nm).  To put this in perspective, this is 25% larher than the entire land mass area of the United States (~3.8 million sq small miles).

Fishing small 1-3lb live Aku for Marlin or big tuna is also a popular method (especially on the Big Island during the summer months.  This is pretty much the only time you see most local boats using a single downrigger to drop one bait deep, and they often run a second long on the rigger.  Most of the granders are taken this way.

As far as trolling spreads go, most local small boats, myself included, spend most of their time trolling locally built lures.  With the exception of charter boats, and during big fish tournaments, most guys avoid running large 12"+ marlin lures since they would rather not catch a large marlin.  When caught, marlin are usually killed to eat fresh and turn into smoked or candied marlin or smoked fish dip, but they are generally not targeted because they are alot of work to deal with and don't bring the money that other pelagics do.  

Most local lures are built heavy, up to 2×s heavier per skirt length than typical east coast lures.  Chrome jets, bullets, inverts, 4 hole, and 2 hole jets, scope jets, slant jets fall into this category.  9" and 9"+ are used to target YFT during our peak (late April - mid August) Ahi spawning run.  Almost everyone buys the heads and skirts them in their favorite colors.  Deep 500-3000fa waters on the leward coasts are best, though the bite hapens on windward and north shore too.  The heavy relatively quiet, straight-running lures fished way back work best here, they pull hard, and stay where you put them in the spread.  They run best in rough water or at higher speeds, and but will still catch in a variety of conditions and some guys swear you need to slow your troll when on the fish.  Most are rigged with tandom 10/0-9/0 or 11/0-10/0 hook rigs where the trailing hook is smaller and 180 deg offset from the forward.  Some secure the trailing wire to the forward shank with a light ziptie, or shrink tube.  

Larger lures with more action, like slant/cut/chugger face, are run close, smaller or straighter running lures are ran long.  5-7 bait spreads are the norm year round with 7" being the mist common.  5" lures are used for Mahi and 20lb+ Skipjack (Otaru).  1.5"-5" lures are used to target smaller Aku and sometimes Mahi.  7" lures are rigged with wither tandom, single, or double hook rigs, and smaller lutes are often fished with heavy doubles.

Lighter lures with more action (i.e.pinnaple heads, ninjas) are used on calm days or trolling slower for Mahi, Striped Marlin, and short bill spearfish (Hebi).  Some guys run these short on handlines.  Generally lighter colors on bigger lures are used during summer months, and smaller darker colors in the winter.  Alot of guys like to fish mixed spreads with a little something for everyone.  

I tend to run only Ahi lures when fishing Ahi, only marlin lures when fishing Marlin, only Wahoo rigs for Wahoo, and mixed smaller bait spreads when looking for anything else.  

Daisy chains and spreader bars, planers, dredges, and downriggers are not commonly used here.  Greensticking was extensively and is still used (most commonly on Kauaii, and to a lesser extent on BI) and can be deadly for Shibi on the otter weather bouys or in the pirpose for Ahi.  Though interestingly enough, it has become less popular as the number of fisherman has grown.  

Deadbait trolling is not very popular here, and ballyhoo are not readily available.  Some guys are starting to troll dead ballyhoo and Akule rigged on wire pin rigs behind islanders or naked with Nitta rigs for Wahoo (Ono) on the 40fa.  More traditional tripple-skirted heavy chrome jets rigged with braided wire leader and tandom hook rigs are fast trolled often with 2 short corners off of leaded line on senators attached to bent butts (no rod!).  

With the except of charter boats and some mainland transplants, most locals use 80 or 130 2-speed lever drag reels spooled with 130-180lb mono, heavy (30-45lb) drags and fight the fish from the swiveling rod holder (often handlining the fish in on heavy line/Hawaiian style).  Direct drive electric or hydro reels are favored by commercial guys, and sometimes only 2 power reels are used when trolling for Wahoo.  Chairs are sometimes used by charter boats and tournament fisherman, standup by only a few guys, rail fishing is nonexistent except for a few CA transplants like my friend Evan.

I learned to troll for for Wahoo in Bermuda using pin rigged ballyhoo chin-weighted naked, behind weighted squid skirts, or sea witches and islanders with 2 downriggers and that is how I mostly fish for Ono on my boat.  I also learned to rig ballyhoo behind moldcrafts and local made 5" chugger heads for my rigger baits.

Fishing with my friend Jay these past 2 years, he has taught me dead bait rigging/fishing techniques he learned during a lifetime of mating on the Outter Banks and in Australia.  Our wahoo fishing spread is similar, but he favors lighter longer leaders, smaller heads, smaller hooks, and uses planers instead of downriggers.  His baits get bit more but hook up % might be a little bit less.  He introduced me to rigging and fishing naked dinks and using dredges and daisy chain teasers with a dink as a pitch.  Dec-March when offshore trolling he likes 2-3 naked dinks long, 1-2 moldcraft popper ballyhoo short, 1 planer with an islander in any color as long as it has purple, and 1-2 black bart or moldcraft marlin lures short.  We also run a dredge or daisy chain squid teaser short if serious about Striped Marlin.  His spread has been absolutely deadly on Striped Marlin (the pacific version of the white marlin), and has resulted in more Mahis and Blue Marlin bites than my Hawaiian style spread.  There is a lot more attention to rigging, and you need to be skilled and attentive to all the dinks all day.  We basically are fishing for one good bite on the day, and without a quick dropback on the pickup, hookup percentages are dismal (10-20%).  I get maybe 40-50% hookup on dinks, Jay gets 50-70% hookup rates.  He says its like shooting ducks, you just need practice.  

When he is serous about big marlin, he rigs chin weighted mackerel and runs 3 long, with 2 marlin lures, and a teaser short, with a mac pitch bait at the ready.  The dead baits run terribly in rough water, and can not he trolled fast, but they have been deadly on Blues.  Last year we had 6 total mackerel and all 6 got bit by Blue Marlin, with 5 Blues landed.  We have never pulled a hook, on a single billfish hooked on the dead bait.  However, some of our biggest blues were caight on short lures.  Jay favors a single stiff hook rig placed way back in the bait for marlin lures.  
Jay fishes larger dinks and ballyboo islander combos rigged on 100lb hard moni for Ahi, and he does catch a few, but I and others am/are outfishing him with local bullets trolled fast.

I feel our ballyhoo wahoo spreads are outfishing lures, though we do miss more hookups on deadbaits than lures.

Hawaii has generally deep unproductive waters and offshore fishing is slow.  One or two productive periods can make or break the day.  

Probably more info here than you asked for, but I hope it's helpful.

Good fisherman are always learning, not afraid to try something new, and kniw when to stick with what they know

John

[Tightlines667]

Looks like fun and delicious! On another note: How are you making out with your boat work ?


Cheers:

Todd

I haven't heard anything lately, been tough for my guy to get any help with the corvid thing.

John

[Swami805]

Thanks for the break down of how you fish there, interesting reading. Personally not a fan of trolling but you gotta do what you gotta do. Catches fish, that's the important part.

[Tightlines667]

Thanks for the break down of how you fish there, interesting reading. Personally not a fan of trolling but you gotta do what you gotta do. Catches fish, that's the important part.

It is slow and boring, but you can cover 80-150nm/day which is often needed to find fish that can easily swim over a 2,000-5,000 square mile area in a 24hour period.  Also, aside from fads, the nearshore ledge, and floating rubbish, we have little to attract and hold fish.  Also our currents are weak (typically 0.3-1.1knots with 2.2knots being exceptional) and structure is deep (like 2400-6000feet on top) so oceanographic features are weak and temporary.  A 1 deg temp change over 1-3nm is significant here.
A hot Ono or Mahi bite might peovide 1-5bites per hour over a 2-5hour period, whereas a hot billfish or Ahi bite is like 1-5 bites all day.  You can get into shibis on live bait and catch a dozen fish in a few hours, teolling for Aku can produce the same, though many times they have lockjaw.

Jigging the ledge will sonetimes give you the action, but you are catch Amberjack (not eadible here), goatfish, jacks, and maybe an Uku.. and it is not a sure thing either.  Shallow water bottomfish gives you a mixed bag with Nembetta and ghoatfish being the preferred catch.  Deep drop bottomfishing in 60-160fathoms is tricky, not veey sporting, but can produce super tasty and valuable Deep 7 species.

John

[El Pescador]

John,

You speak of a term I am not knowledgeable on:     DEEP 7 SPECIES

So off to the internet I go.   I don't get out much!

Interesting for sure.

Wayne

Our youngest son's wife is from Waianae, HI - told him to call you IF he wants to fishing. He is not as fixed on fishing as his Dear old Dad.  Imagine that, deciding IF you want to go to fishing...  NOT member status in my mind!!!!!

[mo65]

That's great fishin' John.