Subject: You should have been there!
Date: Thursday, 27 March 2008 12:18 PM
Eat your hearts out, yakkers.
Jaro and I decided to go again this morning -- the weather being so good. We launched at 0700-ish on a glassy sea, with gentle swell, with patches of wheeling and diving terns just offshore hinting at the possibility of pelagic predators. Well, hold onto your seats.
We were heading out to JS, about 500m from launch when I decided that the bird action, and accompanying splashing, 200-300m away, was worth investigating. Jaro agreed to go along too and we altered course to intercept the action. I'd anticipated that there might be some action of this sort and was already rigged up with a small "slug", tied directly onto the line. At about 50m range, I could see that there was some serious carnage going on, with swirls, chomphs, splashes and tiny baitfish showering out of the surface like silver beads being sprinkled on the surface.
First cast, I hook up. A quick screaming run, then slack line. Lure gone -- perhaps a weak spot in the line? I hurriedly re-rig with a similar lure and cast again. Meanwhile, Jaro is frantically re-rigging his casting outfit to suit the new situation. My second cast -- immediate hookup and again the line goes slack and the lure is gone. At last the penny drops -- these fish feeding voraciously right next to the yak are mackerel and just then this is confirmed when I eyeball 3-4 fish which shot past the yak close enough so that I could identify the species -- spotties. By now Jaro is ready. He has rigged with a large slug and he has also added a heavy monofilament leader. He casts and his immediate hookup is announced in typical fashion -- a very loud "yahoo". I wait while he plays out the fish and boats his first spottie -- a very nice specimen. He's got a smile as wide as Laguna Bay as I paddle over in the glassy conditions to take a photo:
I'm down to one slug and have no wire or leader but decide to go with what I've got, knowing that there's a fighting chance that I'll hook up a spottie in the outer part of the jaw, where those scissor-like teeth can't get at the 12 pound monofilament. So I cast again, and again hookup, and this time the lure holds while the spottie makes several screaming runs against the light drag I've set to minimise the possibility of a cut line. Meanwhile, Jaro is hooked up again...
I play my fish out, deal with it, leash its tail to prevent unwanted loss over the side, and then Jaro paddles over and I prevail upon him to take my photo with my camera. He obliges:
About now, I remind Jaro of the bag limit on spotties: 5. Remember, he's never caught a spottie mac before. Anyway the aquatic mayhem continues. Occasional small sharks can be seen feeding on the sprats, and once or twice I spot a tuna leap clear of the water. The spotties tend not to do that, being content to stay below the waterline. Jaro's score is up to three, and I've lost my third slug. I chuck a soft plastic into a feeding frenzy and don't even get a chance to start retrieving it before it's eaten and the line severed.
Below: a couple of scenes typical of this morning's activities:
Jaro has four, then releases his fifth ("a little small" he says). I borrow a slug from Jaro and while I'm tying it on, Jaro hooks up and is towed past me by what is obviously a more powerful fish. I suspect a tuna and follow on out of curiosity. Sure enough, after a tough fight of five minutes or so, Jaro has a good sized mack tuna (his first -- another first) under control next to the yak. He consults me on its eating qualities and I advise that it should be released as it's nowhere near as good on the plate as spotty mackerel. Here's the tuna:
It swims away a bit languidly, but turns the right way up and with a beat of that wonderful tail, heads off, hopefully for a long life.
Shortly afterward, Jaro bags out on spotties, I have three, and we agree that we have enough. So we leave them biting. We paddle the 500 or so metres back to the beach and that's it. Take a few pics, answer the beach-goers questions (no, they aren't whiting or bream, they're spotty mackerel), clean the gore off the yaks and head home for brekky. What a morning -- two hours of unceasing action, surface strikes, screaming drags and glassy seas, all 500m from the launch site. Wow -- you've gotta love this kayak fishing!
As I said, you should have been there...
Kev
Red & Yellow Espri liberally sprinkled with spotty mac scales, black paddle,
VHF channel 09, Call Sign: sunshiner
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