Curtis Wells return customer and his buddy came to fish with us again this year. We got the trip off to a good start by catching this nice blue. We caught bait in the morning and headed off shore. I had heard the bite was deep so we shot for the 1200 fathom line where I turned south. Just after our turn the fish came to the long corner. It was a beautiful bite. Bill out of the water and the dorsal up. She climbed and climbed until she got the lure. Once hooked she took off. I turned and chased on her twice and after the second chase we idled up the slow moving line while it still was on the surface. The fish had settled but we got the easy line while we could. as we idle up to the fish I looked back only minutes after hooking up and a big white tip shark filled the boat right at the transom. It was a the all tackle record for sure. It would have beat the current record by at least a 100 pounds. I spun around on the line now straight up and down. Mat jammed to bait the shark and unfortunately it would bite what we had. We saw that we need to put the drag up and really pull on the fish to get it before the sharks got to it. Mat bumped up the drag and Curtis pulled in low gear. 10 minutes later the fish was to the boat and 3 sharks attacked it. It swam up the side with 3 bites out of the tail. Now it wouldn’t survive the release. If it had not been bit should we have let it go into the mouth of the sharks? The decision was made for us. We had to bring it in and eat it. it was a shame but we got to give the fish to friends when we got in.
Archive for the ‘Kona Fishing’ Category
Banner Trip for Curtis Wells
Saturday, February 11th, 2012Right When You Thought You Have Seen It All
Saturday, February 11th, 2012
Right when you thought you have seen it all some thing happens out there at sea that has you in shock. We had trolled all day with no bites and I saw the chance to flip some live baits to some tuna under a floater. After a few passes Mat got bit. We struck the fish and we were onto something good sized. Mat thought it was a shark so we hoped the leader would hold up so our friend Wade Renfro could see his catch.As the fish neared I looked over the side and saw that it was a big tuna! I saw the outline of a tuna and saw the sign of it size, the long yellow fin sticking down in the middle of it body. Mature Ahi have longer yellowfins than the juvenile Ahi. I stopped the boat to circle the fish on the leader. Mat moved forward and circled the tuna up. As it came out from under the boat I couldn’t believe what I saw. The long yellow fin that I saw was a 3 and a half foot long gold gaff sticking out of the side of the tuna. The tuna was probably barely 40 pounds but all I saw was the shaped of the tuna and the long fin making me think we had a big one on. I gaffed the tuna with our gaff and our hook and bait came out of the tuna’s mouth. He almost got away again. Seeing that, Mat grabbed the gold gaff by the handle and we flew the tuna into the boat. The tuna had a small hook in the roof of it’s mouth. The crimp or knot the previous anglers used broke and the tuna escaped with their gaff in it side. In one of these shots you can see that the tuna healed the wound around the gaff. This tuna could have gotten rid of the gaff if it could have swam backwards. The tuna always have to swim forward to breath keeping the gaff in place. The scar tissue forming around it held it in even better. This is a good example that release is a good thing. The fish we let go do live!
In this case it wasn’t the idea but it proves that even with a gaff as a tag the fish can survive!
Mat Bowman Due Back
Tuesday, February 7th, 2012
Mat Bowman on one of last duck hunting days before he heads back to Kona. We are looking forward to Mat coming back to help out this season again. We are fixing to get busy soon so I think his timing is right on track.
Andre get the biggest of 2011
Tuesday, February 7th, 2012
An
Noklby’s almost get one
Friday, December 30th, 2011Tday Chip Van Mols and I took out the Noklby Family for a day fishing on the 40 foot Gamefisherman. We had a long day of trolling until we saw a really nice fish come to the short bait. It came up all over the lure and didn’t bite. It looked well over 500 but it was hard to tell how much over it was. Big bill and big dorsal all over the lure. We waited for a bit and nothing. We turned around on the fish and and I never could raise the fish again. We worked the area outside the grounds for awhile with no action. As our day came close to an end we trolled back south to the harbor where we had a fish about 300 blow up on the long corner. We had about 300 yards of line out at one point and got it all back after 40 jumps. It seemed the fish was ours at that point it simply came with no trouble when the hook pulled. Great afternoon and had one close but it came 3 minutes away from getting a tag in it. I guess we got the best part of that one.
My Apologies
Friday, December 30th, 2011I apologize for my posts being late this season. It has been a great year with a ton of good action. We have been in the field so much working that it has been really hard to get in the office. I have been hoping to have the trips and stay busy fishing and hunting and thanks to all of you we have. The problem with this is it is hard to post. My New Years resolution is to post on time and be better at keeping up. For those of you who follow our website regularly I apologize to you for the spotty posting. The news is all there it is just a little late. If you don’t hear from me for awhile you know that we are busy in the field or at sea. This is a good thing!! With good luck we will have a bunch more catches and hunts to share with you. Aloha Kev
Boat Work Begins- Let It Shine
Thursday, December 22nd, 2011
Boat Work Begins- Ready for Stain
Thursday, December 22nd, 2011Here you see the wood stripped and some of the stain applied. It felt good to get to this stage. Once the stain goes on it is down hill from here. We use a filler stain that stains the mahogany and helps fill the grain. It is nice to get a good uniform color throughout the boat. I like when the wood matches.It looks newer and richer. When there are different colors throughout the boat due to stripping at different stages it is hard to get the uniform look. I like the mahogany and the stain for that reason. Teak is strong and holds up better to the abuse and raw new teak varnished is so beautiful. The challenge for me with teak is keeping everything uniform as the sun bleaches it blond. To keep the teak looking rich many times you have to sand the blond colored wood off the top to get to the rich wood below. This means taking a bunch of meat off of the wood to get there. The patches are harder on teak and you don’t have the stain to help match color when you have an accident and put a ding in the wood. The oils in the teak and the hard body don’t allow for even staining.One of the tricks that has been painful to learn after all these years of varnishing the boat is to sand down to 400 grit before any stain even goes on the stripped bare wood. It is so tempting late in the day after getting it down to 220grit that you just want to get the stain on. From what I have learned it is better to get the wood so smooth it is almost polished smooth before the stain goes on. The reason is that the coats of varnish to follow are fewer and it saves a ton of work later filling in the grain with varnish. With what we do with the staining if you have some stray sanding marks from stripping this sanding helps get rid of the last ones. At the 400 grit stage the grain is way less and mostly filled in by the stain. Many of my mentors and most captains of today feel the varnish is foolish and a movement towards painting the wood out is becoming the norm. At times I agree when a careless guest puts a big ding in it,but after working hard all week and it is shining in the sun it is beautiful and really makes the boat pop. It represents our commitment to our job.When we fish on custom boats with beautiful wood that is taken care of it just feels good. The custom boats of the vintage age all had varnished toenails and cab arounds at the least, so we like to try to carry on the tradition by keeping our wood varnished. As busy as we get there is time to get it done it just takes hard work to keep up with it. Next we put on the varnish and make it shine.
Boat Work Begins-Stripping Varnish
Thursday, December 22nd, 2011
A Halloween Birthday
Wednesday, November 9th, 2011The Bergstedt family fished with us today on Halloween. It was Sharon’s birthday and we had a good day at sea to celebrate. We trolled down to the dolphins and fished the tuna stick most of the day. It was poor timing for the traffic. There were a lot of boats there which made it more difficult to fish. After lunch the tuna came up all over the surface of the water. I was able to get a few shots as they slowly cruised around on the surface eating little fish off of the top. They are such a nice family and did so well on the boat because the fish were there and the boats left we stayed late and got one to bite. Great finish to a long day of watching 
tuna.
