If any of the Board members indulge in tuna fishing, I came across some big schools today. I marked fish going across the northwest corner this morning. This afternoon they were jumping in many areas around the H buoy off Marshfield. They were all over a large school of blues.

Did you get close enough to see type/size? Would you say bluefin? small to medium?

Fireguy,
Could you tell how big they were? Footballs? Giants?

FG,
What they said,,, we need to know !!!!:)

um... any tuna fisherperson with an open seat in their boat - I would love to catch a tuna - football or giant.

PM me if anyone ever needs a partner or two

They were as close as 10 yards when they were crashing bluefish and just under the boat as we were sh#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&g scallops. They were bluefins and perhaps ranged 250 - 300lbs in size.

Where is this hole? How far out were you? Sounds like a total blast just to see them. Unfortunately they would have shredded the 20 and 30 lb striper gear I have on my boat I think. Need 50 lb class gear to battle one of those successfully, unless very lucky.

You don't have to be lucky to take down a 200-300lb bluefin on 20lb gear...

Just patient.

Great news, I can hardy wait to stick a fly in one or three :D

You ain't gonna be stickin many toona with flies unless I get time to tie some bubba :p

Oh wait, is that a seal? :D




Originally posted by Bigcat
Great news, I can hardy wait to stick a fly in one or three :D

Well quit playing on the internet,and get tying:D

any day now....:humpty:
250's?...if so, that is so sweet! I am fully geared up and ready.


Make sure you have your permits!!! (even for recs)

A fly? ugottabekiddinme! A harpoon maybe but a fly? You will need more then a fly rod to land a 250# + bluefin...he will spool you in a matter of 10 seconds....IF he even looks at your fly. I prefer penn international II's 50 W with fresh 50 or 80 # line and a matching international stand up rod with stout belt dragging tuna lures at 10 knots.
I have never seen a big tuna landed on a fly rod...bonito sure...but a 250 bluefin? it probably has been done but I think it is a waste of time. I want the fish I don't want to chase his ass all over the ocean all day with a 20# or less tippet. What kind of flys would you use...they gotta be huge. How do you cast a fly that big in the wind offshore? You're only going to have one cast at the school if you're lucky and then they are long gone...these things really cruise. I think I will stick to my big gear for tuna. I landed a 65# fish on a stout bass boat rod once off montauk and it was a real chore. A 250 on a fly IMO will be a very short experience.

Actually, now that I think about it if you chummed them up to the boat you would have repeated shots at them .

good luck

50 International TSW with 60-80# line should whip any 200# class bluefin, just need the right guy on the helm to work that boat.

hmmm me thinks you need to fish with US this year :D

Me has a killer fly for them, and there's a few things you need to fish for them besides a permit.....LOTSA backing, and a 14-18wt :D

Both of which we have :D




Originally posted by Mr. Sandman
any day now....:humpty:
250's?...if so, that is so sweet! I am fully geared up and ready.


Make sure you have your permits!!! (even for recs)

A fly? ugottabekiddinme! A harpoon maybe but a fly? You will need more then a fly rod to land a 250# + bluefin...he will spool you in a matter of 10 seconds....IF he even looks at your fly. I prefer penn international II's 50 W with fresh 50 or 80 # line and a matching international stand up rod with stout belt dragging tuna lures at 10 knots.
I have never seen a big tuna landed on a fly rod...bonito sure...but a 250 bluefin? it probably has been done but I think it is a waste of time. I want the fish I don't want to chase his ass all over the ocean all day with a 20# or less tippet. What kind of flys would you use...they gotta be huge. How do you cast a fly that big in the wind offshore? You're only going to have one cast at the school if you're lucky and then they are long gone...these things really cruise. I think I will stick to my big gear for tuna. I landed a 65# fish on a stout bass boat rod once off montauk and it was a real chore. A 250 on a fly IMO will be a very short experience.

Actually, now that I think about it if you chummed them up to the boat you would have repeated shots at them .

good luck

I am no expert on tuna fishing,but can hold my own with a flyrod. A 250# might, be tuff but 100+ fish are done all the time.
The equipment we use is as high or higher Qualty then any 50 stand up outfit.
We just take it to the extreme. One on one man against fish.
Different strokes for different folks

Sandman: go look up the IGFA records... those don't lie... and alot of them weren't luck... just skill

50lb on a decent boat rod will take you a long way....

man would I like to tie into one of those with a fly.

can you cast for them - what type of plug would I need?

How do they fight when you hook them?

Man I've been lurking for some time but these tuna threads have really got me going!

I hear what tuna4ever is saying! How do you catch these things? saw them last year off plymouth and assumed they were those Bonitas they catch down on MV. I could never hook up.

#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&, What kind of pattern is it? How big a fish have you handled with it? you say 14-18wt How big is that? My dad has a 9 size rod for bass that I use sometimes - I assume I'm out-gunned? Could it be done?

Any bait tips? Where do you guy's get your bait? Greenharbor? I have access to some tuna trolling size gear (Penn 114's and 113's) so I think I have the rod's and reels down.

Any help!!

hmmmm lets make an analogy here.....your 9 wt is to tuna's what a 2x4 is to a humpback whale :D

Big Tackle, Strong hooks. Don't run'em over.

Stop it ya killin' me :D

Only thing you need to know about tuna fishin' with a 9 wt . . .


ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ, pop ! Holy Sh** what was that ?

:shocked: :shocked:

That's cool - I need to upgrade! Dad owes me a birthday gift anyway. What rods/reels do you recomend?

#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&, you say "don't run 'em over". Does that mean you approach from behind and cast from the bow? or do you come along side them? What patterns do you use? lead lines, floating, what lines do you guy's recomend?

On the tech stuff, how do you set the hook? Hard soft?

mmmmm a 14 wt is a REALLY nice b'day present :D

I said don't run'em over cuz that's what most guys do and putem right down.

600 grain line, I tie my own flies on heavy hooks, and NO don't ask to see one....they're SECRET :D

Gloucester2 and #^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&, what's the cost of some of that gear? I don't want to spend real big bucks if im only going to catch just a few fish a season. I'm sure I could borrow from some of Dads friends.
How many tuna fish should I expect to catch on the fly? What do you guy's average? I know I'm asking a lot of questions but I really want one of them!

14 wt Abel is around $500 plus reel, bout the same.

how many can you catch? Probably none unless you really know what you're doing.

And I'm not saying this to turn you off, but fishing for tuna is alot different than fishing for stripers and blues.

Heavy rods, reels, backing, lines, big hooks, the right flies, etc.

Why don't you get yourself a 30-50 lb standup rod with a BIg spinning reel and throw some plugs at them for now then see if you wanna spend the bucks on the bigger equipment. You could probably outfit yourself with a decent spinning setup for around 3-400$, but fly stuff you're easily going to spend double that......

I'm a pretty good boater and have a 21' whaler which is unsinkable.

can I get near tuna with it? Marshfields not far from Green harbor; right? I always thought they were hundreds of miles offshore and you needed a really big boat and a captain to find them.

I've been 5 miles out many times and am confortable going even 10 miles.

You sound like you've done this a lot.

Am I safe going after them in a 21 foot whaler? I'd take your advice and throw plugs at them. I'll bet you'd need a big one for tuna.

I can't imagine what it would be like to hook into a hundred pound tuna. How long does it take to land one?

I know these are a lot of quesions, but my blood is boiling.

how long to land? how strong are ya?

Tuna Fishing...mmmm... if anyone has an extra spot available, I am willing to help defray the cost of gas, tackle, etc. PM me if anyone is interested :D

I never post here but felt a little bit of input might be necessary.

For tuna I have 3 set ups for the fly rod, each just about touches 1K or over.

For smaller schooly bluefin(30-50#'s): 12 weight Redington Nano Quartz with PL-11 Valentine. Backup 12 weight Loomis with Steelfin Vario 10 lever drag.

For larger: 14 weight custom Sage RPLXi with 3 different fighting butts, including swivel gimbal, with Hayden Broadbill lever drag, shich can apply 30#'s reel drag. Same as 80 Penn standup, by Penn's own numbers.

For larger still: 18 weight custom Graphite USA or 17-19 weight Cape Fear(just about to begin construction), with Hayden Pursuit 6 larger by 30% over the Broadbill and on it's way from Australia as of today.


These fish require serious gear or be prepared to be astonished by what they can do to marginal gear.

Tuna4,
You can experience the fight very easily. Just wait till a top light turns red and put your hook behind the bumper of decent sized truck! :D
Guys,
One, very important, thing to keep in mind. These fish are strong, powerful and fast, but the quality of their meat is inversley proportional to the time of the fight. If you're going to play them for an hour on light tackle, you may as well just cut the line when and if you finally get them to the boat. Bluefins aren't the best eating tuna (cooked) to start with and if you stree them out for very long you ain't gonna like the way it tastes.

You have to be out of your mind to eat a freshly culled tuna...COOKED!

Quivering and bloody straight to the palate is the way to go.

:D

Mako's right...

For eating you want that fish out of the water and on deck and bleeding as fast as possible.

While ch#^&#^&#^&#^&#^&g flies at em is fun for the fight, you want to keep them footballs? Break out the heavy spinning gear/boat rods.

Just be sure you got a GOOD boat handler who can run em down right, which a good portion of the time can cut a fight in half.

These aren't exactly big blues or bass that you can muscle in, laying into 100+lb tuna is indeed a battle.

I got a Penn Senator around here that's had its sideplates flexed out under load from a football on steroids, hense the big gear kicking around. :)

man, i'd love to try my hand at tuna fishing, but alas, i dont have the gear for it...

i agree with mako and likwid about getting the fish bled and cooled down asap for better quality. stressing a fish out for so long is not great for the table fare of the fish.

as for you guys that want the experience of that big fish on flies here is what we used to do.

we used to take people marlin fishing and everyone once in a while we would get a charter that wanted to catch a marlin on fly. we didn't care because we were still getting paid and we wouldn't kill and sell the marlin anyway so it was something different to do. We would drag all kinds of teaser spreads behind the boat and off the outriggers and when we would get a one raised i would have the guy slowly send back the fly as i would pull in the teaser and that is majority of how we would get hooked up. yellowfin we would chum them up and have the guy have his fly chum line . i would imagine you would get school bluefun the same way.

someone said on this thread that luck isn't needed to land a 200 or 300# bluefin on a 20# striper spinning setup. i will take all the luck i can get on that one.


just my .02

good luck

Kav: howabout a combo of good gear/great boat handler?

Your luck definitely goes way up then...

(fwiw: Tuna WILL burn out drag plates FAST... make sure you clean and lube all your gear before you hit em up or you might see just how fast they can destroy perfectly good gear)

*heads back to re-rigging baby bird/chugger setups*
btw... those work on blues too ;)

likwid:

Having good gear and a great boat handler is definately a bonus but i certainly want some luck as well. anything can happen with big fish and light gear. i am assuming by a 20 # test line on a spinner rigged for boat striper fishing it would be something like a penn 7500 ss with a 7ft or 7.5ft rod . If I were to have to target a big size BFT I would want the 9500 SS so i could hold alot more 20# test line ( an extra couple hundred yards of line would be very useful in this situation ). i was just pointing out that an everday striper spinning outfit is probably not considered "good " gear for a 300# bft.

i have a few small spinning outfits on my boat that have 20# test on them and i would much rather use something different for that fish.

There's no doubt 200+ you don't wanna be playing with the striper gear...

But if you're gonna hunt the footballs.. that's perfect gear for it with a good long 50-80lb shock leader.
And alot of fun to boot....

As far as hardcore tuna gear, I'm not a huge fan of Penn reels, their drag plates tend to be on the small(er) side compared to alot of other gear.

I'm a huge fan of the Fin-Nor Ahab #20 spinning reel.