Timing of the tides meant a late morning launch on Saturday.
The late start and bright, sunny conditions with little cloud cover or wind had
the makings for a quiet day fishing-wise. On the plus side though the Solunar
calendar was showing “excellent” and spring conditions with water temperature prodding
18 degrees Celsius held the hope for some positive action. We made our way out
to some structure near the Noises that I have fished occasionally in the past.
While there were plenty of boats scattered all over the inner gulf, this particular
spot had no other boats nearby and so we set up on anchor with the tide flowing
out. Berley was deployed in the wobbly pot. My crew member did try a topwater
popper for a while but with no surface action the focus turned to straylining.
It didn’t take long for the bites to start and the really good thing was that
we were not getting plagued with undersized fish. You know the sort of session
when just about everything coming over the side is about 28cm long and
occasionally something 30cm plus appears. This was thankfully not like that -
the first fish in was a respectable pannie around 40cm and several more
followed. Then my crew member had something more solid connect and after a good
tussle landed a snap in the 50cm range. I also had a sabiki down to see if I
could snaffle-up a livebait. No baitfish unfortunately, but I did bring in
first a cod on the sabiki followed shortly after by a decent trevally I
estimate was close to 40cm. Both were released. It was round about this time
that my straylined half bullet tuna head was taken. When I tightened up on the
circle hook, the fish started coming up easily, then when it was still about
10m below the surface decided it was time to play hard and it took off down and
away from the boat. It was round about now that I realised two things – I was
connected to a serious fish, and unfortunately my 6kg line was probably not
going to beat it. This fish swam hard and fast over the reef in classic kingi
mode, then ran back under the boat in the opposite direction. We hauled up the
berley pot to avoid a tangle and the fish made a bee-line for the other end of
the reef. What a fight! And at multiple times I was expecting the skinny nylon
to part. (Just as well I retied the rig after finding a chafed section after an
earlier fish). After the longest fight with a fish I have had in quite a while,
a magnificently conditioned snapper come to the surface. Right up until the
time I got it into the net I half expected the line to part, but the rig held
and in she came. The call was made to keep this one as I simply couldn’t get
the hook out and after the long fight the fish was spent. Here’s the evidence: