While being leadered at boatside, a beautiful blue marlin cooperates for a photo before being released

Curiously enough, the middle of summer, when there are plenty of fish around, was proving to be the most difficult time of the year to continue my quest to catch a blue marlin each month of 2008 from my home waters around Grand Cayman Island.  My fishing time in July was so restricted by my busy work schedule that I felt very fortunate to catch my one and only blue marlin on a weekend excursion squeezed into the middle of the month.  I feared that my prospects for success in August, given an already full schedule of commitments, would be no better, if not worse.  That’s why I wasted little time getting out on the water as the new month arrived, and on August 3, I was able to catch-and-release a blue marlin.  As was the case in July, this turned out to be my only fish of the month, but it extended my streak, and it allowed me the peace-of-mind to concentrate on my many other tasks at hand during the remainder of August.

As much as catching a blue marlin was my focus on that August day, I was abruptly reminded of all I love about the sea and her many creatures when I came upon a number of sea turtles on my return trip to the harbor.  I slowed the boat to admire these magnificent creatures as they effortlessly glided just below the water’s surface, and caught myself mesmerized in the moment in much the same way as the old fisherman Santiago was when he encountered feeding turtles in Hemingway’s classic “The Old Man And The Sea.”  As the sea turtles moved on toward the island’s coral reefs, I couldn’t help but ponder if what I had just witnessed was much the same as Christopher Columbus would have seen as the first to discover the Cayman Islands in 1503 on his fourth and final voyage to the New World.  After all, Columbus named the territory “Las Tortugas” because of the abundance of sea turtles he found on and around the island archipelago.

The Caymans consist of three islands — Grand Cayman (by far the largest), Cayman Brac, and Little Cayman — and are located in the western Caribbean about 150 miles south of Cuba and 167 miles northwest of Jamaica.  The islands are limestone outcroppings at the top of a submarine mountain range today known as the Cayman Ridge.  Much of the islands are only a few feet above sea level, and surrounded by coral reefs and crystal clear waters, they have long served as ideal habitat for sea turtles, which in turn served as a primary food source for the first explorers and early settlers.  Long after their discovery by Columbus, the islands came under British control when Oliver Cromwell captured Jamaica from the Spanish in 1655.  The islands officially became a part of the British Empire under the Treaty of Madrid in 1670, and for the next 300 years, were administered as a dependency of Jamaica.

Guy Harvey's "Pirate Shark" is one of his most popular AFTCO Bluewater T-Shirt designs, and representative of a portion of the colorful history of the Cayman Islands

In 1668, an attempt was made to inhabit Little Cayman and Cayman Brac by early settlers, but they were forced to return to Jamaica because they could not be protected from ruthless Spanish pirates.  In those early days, the Cayman Islands played a significant role in the piracy that gripped the Caribbean.  The islands were remote, offered plenty of turtle meat, fresh water, and a safe haven for unscrupulous legendary characters like Henry Morgan and Edward “Blackbeard” Teach.

It wasn’t until the 1730′s that the first permanent settlements were established.  Up to that point and for centuries thereafter, the islands continued to be known to mariners as “Las Tortugas,” and is where they came to harvest live turtles and their eggs as a source of protein for their long voyages.  Couple that with a relentless commercial harvest, and the Cayman turtle population suffered greatly.  It wasn’t until 1968 that the problem was addressed with the development of a turtle farm to replenish natural stocks and supply local demand for turtle products.  By 1978, the farm had achieved its objective of having enough broodstock to be self-sufficient and economically viable.  The Cayman Island government has owned and operated the Cayman Turtle Farm since 1983.  Besides being a major tourist attraction, the farm is a well-respected research facility with a highly effective breeding program that has released tens of thousands of sea turtles into the sea, each tagged for research purposes.

It’s a happy ending for the sea turtles — and for my limited attempts at blue marlin fishing in August.  I did release the one fish to perpetuate my quest of catching a blue marlin during each month of the year, and though the last part of August was unfishable due to powerful Hurricane “Gustav” passing by, I was hopeful that I would find more fishing time during September.

— Guy Harvey

Check this blog next month for my adventures in September, 2008, as I continue my quest to catch a blue marlin every month of the year.

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