Stormin Norman triumphs. 09Dec12

TR by sunshiner

Wind: NE about 6-8 knots
Swell: 1.5m easterly
Current: N/A
Launch point: Middle Groyne
Participants: richmond, baptism, stormin, sunshiner, jaro, tarzan and brother Aden, corie, panno, gemini, salty, redwood, weeksie, lazybugger (AKFF)

One of those fantastic Noosa Yakkers days, today. A day that money couldn't buy!

It started early, seriously early. Even though I was down at the carpark by 4:00am, I wasn't first there. Richmond and baptism were prepping in the dark.

From the top of the beach Richmond and I could just discern that the exit would be easy but the lights of stinkies heading out from the bar reminded us that care would be needed once we left the beach.

By the time we got back to the cars to grab our yaks stormin had arrived. Stormin, ever faithful, ever reliable, sand monster victim, with no fish as yet in the Record list, a totally enthusiastic Noosa Yakker, was about to have his big day. And he deserved it. Thoroughly.

Launch time, no problems. Still a bit dark, however. So I hung around out the back waiting for a bit more light before moving off. Out of the corner of one eye I noticed another yak coming out and took no notice until a radio call came from our coordinator, jaro. He was the yakker I just saw, and was a welcome and surprise addition to our line up today after an absence of several weeks in India. As I'd carried out his NY duties during his absence I was doubly glad to see him back.

As the ambient light slowly improved I moved off, a few minutes behind others, with jaro not far behind. Of the hoped for flocks of terns there was no sign. This contrasted greatly with the situation described by dugout and tarzan yesterday, when there were terns "everywhere".

Most of us headed NE because that's where the spotties were yesterday, when dugout and tarzan found them in marginal sea conditions, at last. Progress was ploddingly slow as a NE chop placed continual two foot watery barriers in our path. There were no birds visible out there, where the sky was bright with the rising sun. So I headed more north toward Jew Shoal, a frequent attractor of predators. On this journey I was trolling a small black and silver Rapala, rigged with a short single strand wire trace.

Not far north of the three shark drum lines anchored off the headland and still 1.3 km from the Pinnacles at Jew Shoal this lure was seized and the scream, that delightful scream, of my Charter Special ratchet announced it. Yahoo! I knew this had to be a spotty mac despite the lack of visual signs of predator activity on the water. The 10kg mono line and short stiff rod made short work of this spotty. A quick gaff and he was tail first into the fishbox and then, very quickly back into the ocean as a quick flexing of that powerful body bounced him skywards again. Never mind, he was well hooked and the next time I delivered him into the fishbox he stayed there.

My first spotty mac of the summer

With great pleasure I announced this success on the VHF, not so much to brag but to tell my colleagues that the fish were here today.

Damage to the Rapala caused me to rerig so I chose the HLP in Qantas colours and resumed trolling, sticking with the plan to head for Jew Shoal.

By now, with better ambient light, everyone was starting to notice that terns were, in fact, clustering in small groups scattered over a wide area, including Jew Shoal. So that's where I headed for.

Then someone announced by radio that stormin was hooked up. I took a quick look around and saw him, with bent rod, only about two hundred metres south of me. Knowing that capture of a spotty mac would be an occasion for stormin I turned around to get a pic of him for his (future) grandchildren.

He had the fish, a pretty good spotty, on the gaff, which was embedded nicely in the head, best place for it. A huge smile lit up his face. I could see that he was savouring the moment and was happy to be there to record the event.

Stormin and his first spotty mac and his biggest ever fish at that moment (not for very long, however).

Bird activity at Jew Shoal was scattered and only once did I see clear evidence of mack attacks, when a bait ball formed briefly accompanied by several large splashes as the littlies were scattered by the biggies.

The sequence of events is now unclear, but announcements of other successes, or frustrations, now arrived via the VHF radio. Jaro got a spotty, and so did lazybugger. The action was scattered over a wide area from down near Hells Gates to up here at Jew Shoal. We had eyes on the water all over the place, freely passing useful information around.

Then jaro, who happened to be near stormin at the time, came up on the radio with the news that stormin was hooked up and was being towed north from the Jew Shoal centre. As towing a kayak is not commonly an ability of spotty macs, this piqued my interest. When, a couple of minutes later jaro opined that this was truly a big fish that stormin was hooked up to I decided to head over to this action to try to get some useful and memorable pics. As usual, I trolled over to the general area of stormin's with the intention of stowing the fishing gear while using the camera.

There was stormin, about 150 metres away from me with a very bent rod and a wake forming behind his revo, which he was not pedalling. I was catching him slowly when my Charter Special screamed again with a very fast run. OK, change the plan, common in fishing, especially kayak fishing.

This fish was another spotty and a tougher fighter than my earlier fish, mainly because it was bigger.

Spotty mac #2.

This fish stowed, I returned to the original plan. Jaro had been relaying info by radio about stormin's battle and hanging around near stormin dispensing advice about how to fight this fish. Soon I was in position to take a few pics, and this about 30 minutes after stormin had hooked up.

Plainly the fish was tiring, but so was stormin. He was fighting the fish on a fairly long rod and a threadline reel, a combo which doesn't lend itself to putting hurt on a big fish, especially when the fish was holding at about 15-20m depth and refusing to give in. Typical of tuna, and the rod tip showed the steady pulses as the fish's tail pushed it through the water.

None of us had yet seen the fish but jaro and I were calling it for a longtail, a fish which is among the toughest of fighters and relatively common up here.

Eventually stormin started to make progress, grunting all the while and resting his right arm when possible as the fight had been a long one, the longest he'd ever endured. I was close by when stormin first saw the fish and identified it, correctly as it turned out. I was sceptical of the ID but he had it in view and I didn't. Then, quite suddenly he had the last few metres on the spool and the fish broke through the surface to reveal a large strap-like pectoral fin. Bugger me, his call was right, it is a yellowfin, I thought. The colours were magnificent, with flashing golden flanks and a glowing blue stripe from head to tail. I held my tongue and my breath as stormin readied the gaff for this, the most important gaff shot of his life.

Capture of a fish of this size from a kayak is no simple feat. You're alone and it's all down to you. Stormin rose to the occasion professionally. The gaff was carefully aimed and found its mark first time and the fish barely moved as its capturer lifted its head and part of its massive torso from the water. We were busy now. I passed him my tail rope, one of which I reckon stormin will always carry in future, and he looped it around that massive tail, securing the other end to something on the Revo's deck. Then he slid the fish onto his lap.

Kayak fish of a lifetime (as I reminded stormin later)

Sometime later, after the fish had stopped vibrating, stormin hauled it aboard and I took this pic from over stormin's right shoulder.

Video (2 minutes) edited by me, added 12Dec12. Video edited from 35 minutes of footage collected by stormin's GoPro mounted as a chestcam, plus a few stills from my camera.



We were four kilometres from the beach and bobbing around in the swell and chop so clearly the fish couldn't stay in the position in the above pic. Jaro and I rafted up with stormin's Revo; jaro's Viking Profish on the port side, my Stealth Supalite X on the starboard side and between the three of us we removed the lure, opened the forward hatch of the Revo, slid the fish in (tight fit), removed the tail rope and secured the hatch cover. Done. Now the Revo had a decidedly bow down attitude. Plan B was to stow the fish in my Supalite fishbox if the Revo hatch proved too small.

Stormin was keen to have another crack at the spotties and jaro and I were still relatively fresh so we now headed the 1.5 km or so over to where most of the other NYs had congregated. But action was noticeably slowing except that lazybugger scored a late spotty (his second ever and his second for today) near me so gets his pic in this TR.

Lazybugger and his spotty #2.

A general movement back to Middle Groyne started about now, as the air was starting to become uncomfortably warm and the cooling breeze was waning. We had just on 3.5 km to go and moved back at our own speed.

Beach pics

My larger spotty, 87cm, held by beach volunteer.

My two spotties on my Supalite deck.

Crowd control necessary (Noosa crowd)

Fetching lady with stormin's yellowfin

Stormin, triumphant, but knackered

The yellowfin, 109cm. New Noosa Yakkers Record!

What a great day, guys. Brilliant!

Kev
sunshiner


GPS Track provided by Gemini

Distance 14.0 km
Max Speed 7.8 km/hour
Avg Speed 3.4 km/hour