A big bonito was splashing along from the left outrigger leaving a hefty wake. A small mackerel-like scad trailed from the right outrigger and was swimming beautifully below the surface of the Coral Sea. We were trolling at 5 knots. These are my two favorite baits for the giant black marlin that roam Australia’s Great Barrier Reef during the southern hemisphere’s Spring spawning aggregation of these mighty marine predators. I consider this combination the “marlin equivalent” of the steak and lobster dinner humans call “surf and turf”.
Australia's Great Barrier Reef is the spawning ground for giant black marlin which arrive in the fall each year
When the strike came, it was an attack upon neither of my favorite natural baits, but because of what I had previously derided as such a poorly performing artificial lure, I had refused to use it. Moldcraft’s “Spooler” does not perform well at the high speeds at which I normally troll artificial lures. It is prone to leap out of waves and tumble over, often tangling the hooks and skirts, especially on rough days when the boat would surf and change speed and wake patterns, especially on down sea tacks. I didn’t like the look of the thing out of water and hated the way it ran. It sat, unrigged, in the tackle drawer for over a year.
“You’re missing out Peter B.” John Phillips told me. “You won’t believe how good it works at slow speeds. I call it the ‘scad’. You really ought to try it.” “That’s because you can’t catch scad.” I needled him. “And I’ve told you where to go and on what tide.” “No it’s not. Even when I do I have scad, the “spooler” really works. Try it, I promise you— it works great at low speed. I even use it with live bait sometimes, and just the other day, it got bit instead of the livey!” Phillips replied.
A few days later we were fishing together with a group of friends from the Canary Islands sharing our two boats. It was calm and I had plenty of big baits. Late in the afternoon I wanted to look over a sunken patch of reef in shallow water that held enough toothy critters like wahoo, sharks, barracuda, and large mackerel, to make fishing live bait out of the question. In short, there was no need for the small bait lure I usually pull down the center. I might as well give the spooler another try. Minutes later we were releasing a 200 pound black marlin that passed up the surf and turf combo for a handful of junk food!
Moldcraft’s “spooler” is a soft plastic lure modeled after earlier, homemade, lures that were constructed from discarded wooden spools that had been filled with sewing thread. The “spooler” had a nifty action at the five to six knot speeds that I use for dead bait. But the hydrodynamic instability that worked against it at high speed became an asset. The lure head wiggled and wobbled violently leaving a stream of bubbles (or “smoke” as fanatical fishheads call it) combined with a lively swimming action.
The next day we had three strikes. We caught one marlin on a natural dead bait and caught one and lost one on the lure. “A couple of more days like this and I’ll be a believer!” I told Phillips on the VHF radio. I became a “Spooler” fan! Dead bait anglers, or even live bait anglers, for any species of billfish, should try adding a spooler approximating the size of their natural bait to their spread. You will be pleasantly surprised!
Peter B
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When the staff of the Tropic Star Lodge tells you it is a fairly hard 35 minute walk/climb from the lodge, across the peninsula, to the white sand beach, believe it! And that is each way, NOT over and back! And if it has rained earlier in the day, which turns the clay soil into grease, it is even more difficult!
We all made it but found out we were not as fit as we would have liked! If one of us had slipped and been hurt, getting someone with even a minor injury like a twisted ankle or busted leg up, and then down ( down was even worse in the mud), would have been a real challenge. Our clothes were wringing wet with sweat from 100% humidity, hot weather and exertion, when we got back down to safety a drink of water and then a cold beer!
Tropic Star is a spot I have been recommending for decades after I had visited a few times several years ago. I first met Terri Kitteredge and her dad Conway when they visited Australia in 1982. Terri and her husband Mike run a great operation.
Before this trip, I had fished Piñas Bay on big U.S. boats owned by Jerry Dunaway and Jean Paul Richard, but had seen the lodge’s fleet of 31 Bertrams in action. I was also lucky enough to have stayed in the original owner’s private home, now part of the accommodation for guests, and referred to by one and all as “The Palace”.
There is a little cable car up the hill to the palace which we used for what we called a cocktail cruise as we had for a much needed shower at day’s end. Mostly, I walked it as it is just enough of a climb to make you breathe heavily, but always glad you did it —good cardio exercise and not TOO hard.
The efficiency of the crews, mechanics, and support staff, make this arguably the best run and most successful, charter fishing fleet anywhere. With over a dozen identical boats (31 Bertrams, a long established gold standard) fishing daily, there are always extras available and every essential spare part is on site.
Black Marlin are the main species of marling encountered off Tropic Star Lodge on the famous Zane Grey — Photo by Richard Gibson
The boat I was on caught a blue and a sail and lost another blue in 4 days fishing, reasonable action, but not great. Some of our boats had quite a bit more action and had multiple marlin days. The sun does not shine on the same dog’s back every day.
There were good luck and bad luck tales every night over a choice of tasty Piña Coladas, rum drinks or beer before we retired to our luxurious accommodations to shower and get ready for dinner.
It seemed to me that communications between crew and anglers, in both English and Spanish, were not as good as they could have been due to a reluctance of both the local crews and our team to TRY to speak in an unfamiliar language. The better Spanish speaking students translated when necessary and after a couple of days both sides found out the reluctance to attempt to speak together were not necessary and basic communications improved.
When traveling, do not be embarrassed, go ahead and try to communicate. Often, both sides know some words, enough to communicate. Things like “weight “ for more drag, and is NOT “wait”, and let him eat it, got resolved over time.
We came home and I retrieved the computer I had left in the TSA screening area in Miami. What a relief that was!! I had failed to back up files on my new computer and the idea of losing all those magazine articles made me decide to get a new flash drive ASAP!
When I got home, I helped coach some brand new members of the “Young Guns at Quail Creek”, the local scholastic shooting team. Some of the youngsters who started shooting less than a couple of years ago are already winning, not only in junior class, but even winning state championships as High Over All – beating everyone including all the adults and the instructors who got them started.
My hat is off to the entire crew of kids, instructors, parents, owners and staff of Quail Creek Plantation. GREAT JOB!! I really enjoy teaching young people to both fish and to shoot. It is very gratifying to give back some of what I was given when I was a kid! Also, ethical fishing and hunting are the strongest forces for real conservation of our game fish and game animals.
Good fishing wherever you are.
—Peter B
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There are twenty species of barracuda in tropical waters around the planet, of which, the great barracuda is the largest. The IGFA all tackle world record is 85 pounds, but the largest recorded specimen was 106 pounds. Can you imagine meeting that guy on a dive! Large specimens are rare, and most of those caught in the Caribbean do not reach 40 pounds. The majority of barracudas that we see on dives here in the Cayman Islands are in the 5 to 15 pound size range.
The great barracuda is long, slim-bodied and has a pointed head, with a jutting lower jaw, full of canine teeth that give it a ferocious look. Their second dorsal fin and anal fin are set far back on their body, effectively giving them another tail, enabling them to accelerate very rapidly.
Barracuda have a jutting lower jaw, full of canine teeth that give them a ferocious look — Photo by Bill Boyce
They are tremendous fish to paint. They play the part of the reef bully, but are handsome at the same time, with gorgeous metallic hues, punctuated by irregular black blotches, that are striking from a distance. They can change colour by adopting a mottled or banded colour scheme when waiting motionless near the bottom or beside structure. Their large eye and menacing look tell the story of a successful reef predator.
Young individuals up to about 3 pounds usually live close to shore in the shallow water, and are found in coastal lagoons, harbours and mangroves flats. Growth rates are fast, but little is known about reproduction in this species. Large adults may occur farther offshore along the reef edges and even out in the open ocean. They are aggressive carnivorous fish, and are an underrated game fish. Larger barracudas are usually caught by anglers trolling along reef drop-offs on heavy tackle targeting other species such as wahoo and tuna. However, when specifically sought on the inshore flats by anglers in shallow water, also looking for bonefish and permit, the great barracuda can be a spectacular game fish making swift runs and frequent jumps.
People who eat barracuda and other large reef fish do run the risk of ciguatera poisoning. The symptoms are varied usually include gastrointestinal and neurological disorders, which can last for weeks and sometimes years. There is no effective treatment for ciguatera poisoning.
However, there is a very low incidence of fish poisoning from eating barracuda in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands. Part of the reason is that they are regularly consumed, so big ones, over 15 # are rare (compared to the Bahamas for example).
Ciguatera toxins are produced by dinoflagellates which herbivorous fish consume. These fish are then eaten by large predatory reef fish, such as grouper, amberjack and barracuda, which appear to be unharmed by the toxin. Because the toxins are lipid-soluble, they accumulate through the food chain. The toxin may be more concentrated in the head, viscera and roe.
Ciguatoxin-containing fish may be highly localized and islands may have some reefs where the fish are inedible, and other reefs where the fish are unaffected. No open ocean fish, such as wahoo, tuna and dolphin have been found to carry ciguatoxin.
Ciguatoxins are odourless, colourless, tasteless, and unaffected by cooking or freezing, therefore persons living or traveling to areas where ciguatera toxin is endemic should follow these general precautions:
1) Avoid consuming large predatory reef fish, especially barracuda.
2) Avoid eating the head, viscera or roe of any reef fish.
3) Avoid eating fish from areas with known ciguatera toxins.
In the Caribbean there are many beliefs about how a poisonous barracuda can be identified, by its size, the colour of its teeth, rigidity of its scales, or by putting some of its meat on an ant’s nest, or its flesh turning a silver coin black. My grandfather used to give the head to his cook to make “fish tea”, and if she was around the following day, he would have the barracuda steamed for lunch! Very brave of him!
The dubious food value of the barracuda in no way detracts from its game qualities. The message of this story is that if you are in doubt, then release the barracuda alive. Nowadays, there are dehooking devices available that enable you to release a barracuda or any fish, without taking it out of the water or risking injury to one self.
As an ardent diver, I look forward to the next barracuda encounter. I put their predictable curiosity towards swimmers and divers to good use by capturing head shots and close-ups as they come by to check you out. Frequently, they are accompanied by a group of bar jacks, or as we experience at Tarpon Alley in Grand Cayman, they hang out around the tarpon and schools of horse-eye jacks.
It is our collective responsibility to conserve the marine environment and maintain the biodiversity of the planet.
Fish responsibly, dive safely.
—Guy Harvey
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I recently found an old story I wrote while looking up some information about tagging and its benefits. When “Migratory Movements, Depth Preferences, and Thermal Biology of Atlantic Bluefin Tuna” was published in the 17 August 2001 issue of Science there were some great stories to tell. Stories that had to be kept as secrets until the paper was published in Science.
The data presented, and conclusions drawn from them by a team headed by Dr. Barbara Block from Stanford University (and including scientists, anglers and crew making up a who’s who of tuna angling , research and management) created shocks waves across the Atlantic.
National Public Radio, National Geographic News as well local, regional and national newspapers, had already discussed the ramifications of having tuna tagged off Hatteras, cross the Atlantic Ocean, and even enter the Mediterranean Sea in larger numbers than any previous estimates could imagine. This threw a monkey wrench into all management plans and conservation attempts, based on earlier theories, that eastern and western populations of bluefin tuna were separate and need to be managed separately.
Giant Atlantic Bluefin Tuna, each weighing over a quarter-ton — Photo by Guy Harvey
Two types of tags were used in the study, surgically applied internal “archival” tags and pop-up satellite archival tags (PSAT tags in the article’s jargon). Both showed that fish from the west cross over into the eastern Atlantic. These tags, plus captured fish with conventional spaghetti tags, raised the thorny issue of North American fishermen (commercial and recreational) accepting low catch quotas in order to allow the overfished tuna populations to recover, only to have the fish massacred in huge numbers in the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic. (East of longitude 45 degrees West twenty metric tonnes of bluefin tuna were being caught for every tonne caught in the west!)
The Science paper is fascinating but takes some serious reading! It is not something you can glance at and retain. Some highlights, with some input from me from information gleaned during the tagging process, include:
There were 377 electronic tags in this study. Electronic tags were recovered from a few days to 3.6 years later, AND the TAG program continues to produce amazing results. Internal archival tags totaled 279 with 49 tuna being recaptured. This 18% return rate is extremely high and by itself suggests overfishing.
The 90% data acquisition rate from pop-up tags is a marvel of both technology and tuna survival rates. The return rate is higher since the fish does not have to be recaptured and the data is downloaded through the Argos satellite system. Although, the percentage of recovery is higher less information per tag can be retrieved, because of the high energy needed to send a radio signal, not just burn data onto a chip.
There were 7065 conventional spaghetti tags applied by Carolina tuna fishermen between the years 1994 and 2000. There were 292 recoveries (4.1%). This is a high rate in itself and valuable information was added, but it is obvious that trained scientific teams with top anglers and crews are more successful than the general public in properly applying tags. (One reason for non-return is probably mortality where a dead fish sinks or is eaten by sharks and the tag cannot be recovered.)
Some tags could record depth (through pressure) and location (by measuring the levels of light). Sunrise and sunset were the “most significant light events” and with an accurate electronic clock allow extremely precise east/west location and reasonable north/south estimates. It became apparent that Western tuna breed later in their lives than originally thought- another huge consideration in conservation and management.
Deep dives to over 500 fathoms (1000 meters) sometimes resulted in lowered internal body temperatures that experiments at the tuna lab showed to probably be the result of feeding on cold squid or fish living at those depths (Block fed captive yellowfins cold bait and measured cold internal temperatures.)
My question is “HOW DO THEY KNOW?” You can dive half a mile in most parts of the ocean and NOT find a meal!
In the field, the emotional highs and lows were enormous! The successful signal reception of the first pop-up tag started a major round of toasts and celebrations. Shortly after, on a rough and stormy night when the second pop-up tag failed to report in on its scheduled time, long faces abounded- until the weather eased and in calm water the tag sang like a bird to the overhead satellite. This alone allowed an adjustment, low tech but important, in additional buoyancy for subsequent tags.
Dr. Block was reduced to tears on the flying bridge one rough day when a large sea lifted the boat and one rudder hit and killed a tuna we were trying to tag. “I’m trying to save them- not kill them!” she sobbed.
The cooperation of anglers and crews, and their donations of time and money were an extremely important factor in the amazing success of this study and along with dozens of scientists and technicians all involved are to be highly congratulated! For more information get a copy of Science (17 August 2001). .
Recently, Paxson Offield was initiated into the IGFA Hall of Fame and a high light of his career and work in conservation was an ongoing program of PSAT tags in marlin. Currently, the internationally noted artist Dr. Guy Harvey is also a leader in not only tagging but other conservation initiatives.
We need people like Dr. Block, Dr. Harvey and Mr. Offield to help conserve our precious stocks of “Marine Megafauna”. AND we all need to do our part to help out.
See my next column in Marlin Magazine for a story of a Sportfishing CLUB gone BAD and becoming a detrimental group of swordfish killing amateur professionals.
Peter B Wright
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Stalking a bonefish school takes patience and persistence, but the result can be very gratifying in serene surroundings
Yeehaw! Line was pouring off the small spinning reel, and the rod tip was bucking as the fish took off toward deeper water. I had a bite and was tight to a reasonable sized bonefish. The fish took out a hundred yards of line in the blink of an eye and then turned right, so I waded quickly along in the shallow water near the beach to catch up with the fish, before it emptied the reel. In a matter of minutes, I had the bonefish doing circles around me, and I bent down and grabbed the short leader to hold the fish and remove the hook. I released a fine specimen of a Grand Cayman bonefish about five pounds.
Bonefish are found all around the tropics, even in the remote oceanic islands. Wherever they are found, they are a big draw for recreational anglers. For some islands, such as in the Bahamas, bonefish (and other shallow water game fish such as permit and tarpon) fishing excursions provide a major source of income for locals. It is likely that if diving was not such a developed eco-business here, there would be a lot more emphasis on the bonefish and tarpon fishing that these islands have to offer.
The bonefish has an elongated, torpedo shaped body with a slender head and a small, inferior mouth inserted under a pig-like snout. The single dorsal fin is placed in the middle of the body, and the large tail is deeply forked. The back is dark green, and sides are lined with shiny scales that reflect the color of the surrounding flats. The face looks as if it’s made from beaten stainless steel plates. This is a species I love to paint, but they are a big challenge, not only because of the detail and serial repetition of the scales, but also because the light playing on their back and the added detail in their shallow water habitat.
My good friend Billy Boyce holds up a big bonefish caught on one of the many sand flats surrounding the Bahamas
The bonefish is primarily a shallow water species, and is a very wary fish. They are so wary that many anglers claim that bonefish live in a constant state of alarm. Its habitat, for angling purposes, is the flats or intertidal areas adjacent to sand and coral islands or mainland beaches. Bonefish invade tidal flats on an incoming tide and feed on buried crustaceans, mollusks and small fish. They often travel in large schools and can be spotted from a distance because of the clouds of sand or silt they stir up. If the water is very shallow, their tails will stick out above the surface while they dig in the substrate with their pointed snouts which is called “tailing” and “mudding” in angling parlance. They will accompany stingrays and spotted eagle rays as they dig around the substrate looking for food items. Bar jacks also accompany the rays for the same reason. Bonefish may be accompanied by permit, small tarpon, small cobia and other species of jacks while they cross the sand flats.
Little is known about the life cycle of the bonefish. The egg hatches into a large leptocephalus which is transported by tides and currents into the open ocean. It metamorphoses from this 3-inch transparent eel-like larvae which gradually shrinks in size while it is transported by ocean currents away from the spawning area and hence to populate other locations. When this reverse growth is complete, a tiny bonefish is formed, and from then it wears chrome-plated scales and grows to twenty pounds. The average size varies according to the area in which they grow up, but 4 to 6 pounds is the average size.
A new tagging study on bonefish migration is testing a hypothesis that bonefish from Florida cross the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas, and then return. Tagged bonefish have been known to make coastal migrations and new evidence may soon emerge about deep water transits, which by extrapolation, would then suggest that bonefish could move between the three Cayman Islands.
Got some time on your hands and a good weather day? Then grab the fly rod, or the spinning rod, and some conch, cockles or shrimp for bait and head out to Frank Sound, South Sound or Barkers, and spend some time getting close to nature. Stalking a bonefish school takes patience and persistence but the result can be very gratifying in serene surroundings. Tight lines!
— Guy Harvey
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I seriously question the speeds often given for any fish, especially when Wikipedia and some reputable some encyclopedias claim that sailfish are supposed to be the fastest fish and can hit 60 miles per hour.
I once went to several references and online sites looking for Orca speeds. I found a range of speeds from 25 to 35 miles per hour (from here on shortened to mph) on the publications and web sites. None were anywhere near as fast as some the speeds some fish can supposedly attain.
Since Orcas can run down, catch, and eat, blue fin tuna, I question all the old, unsubstantiated fish speeds. I believe the speed of most fish is highly exaggerated by anglers, especially fishing writers. How excited can a reader get when reading about a bonefish tearing line off a reel at 15 mph, which is slower than many humans can run? In my youth, I could run down a beach in shallow water fast enough to avoid losing line to even a big bone.
Billfish, like this jumping Blue Marlin, are considered to be some of the fastest swimming fish in the sea. Photo by Richard Gibson
As a long time big game fishing guide, part time and ex Biological Oceanographer with decades of personal experience, ( called anecdotal evidence by scientists) I am positive no marine fish can exceed about 25 mph. I often chase large marine fish (tuna and marlin) with a boat and quickly catch them at 20 mph.
In addition, if a fish jumped straight up at 60 mph (88 ft/sec), simple math shows that after one sec the force of gravity (32ft/sec/sec) would have slowed the fish to 38 mph (88ft/sec -32ft/sec = 56ft sec which is 38 mph) The height of the fish at the end of that one second would be 72 ft and it would still going up at 38 mph. Height equals AVERAGE velocity times one second. Average V would be 88 + 56 divided by 2 giving a height of 72 feet.
Last but not least, there is the study AFTCO did decades ago which showed how much frictional drag there was on given lengths of line being pulled through the water. If any fish could go even 30 mph, they would break off before any crew could clear the lines and merely backing up would not make enough difference to avoid breaking the line.
Big fish eat little fish and the biggest predatory fish are the fastest. I doubt very much any fish can go 30 mph — it is too easy for Orcas to catch them for fish to obtain that kind of speed and no one says Orcas can hit 60!
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In what has become a veritable campaign of misinformation, Pew Environment Group issued yet another statement in support of setting annual catch limits on marine fisheries species without the benefit of science-based assessments. Taking the campaign to a new level, Pew is now revising history to make its points:
Holly Binns, director of the Pew Environment Group’s Southeast Fish Conservation Campaign, issued the following statement [Aug. 8] in response to the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s 8 to 5 vote to approve plans to prevent overfishing that protect dozens of species by setting science-based catch limits.
“‘The council has taken a forward-looking approach that allows managers to set scientifically sound fishing limits now before species suffer population declines. This proactive strategy is necessary to avoid what happened with South Atlantic red snapper, which is in such severe trouble that a fishing moratorium was needed in 2010 to save the species.’
“‘This plan will help avert steeper restrictions in the future, setting a course towards restoring a healthy, balanced ocean ecosystem. It is like visiting the doctor for preventive care, rather than waiting until you end up in the emergency room.’”
There are so many misstatements of fact in that statement, it is hard to know where to begin. For starters, there is nothing “scientifically sound” about setting catch limits without the benefit of a stock assessment. Those catch limits are going to be set by SWAG — scientific wild-ass guess – which doesn’t necessarily bother an environmentalist but does strike a nerve with anglers and others who actually use America’s public resources.
Second, the South Atlantic red snapper crisis came about precisely because NOAA Fisheries neglected to do a stock assessment for decades — the exact course of action Pew is advocating now for all marine fisheries. In a sense, the Council managed that fishery by SWAG and got it horribly wrong, so wrong that when they finally did do an assessment, they almost had to close the bottom of the entire South Atlantic to fix it. And ironically, if I recall correctly, Pew was very much in favor of that closure.
Third, as exemplified by South Atlantic red snapper, nothing about setting limits based on SWAGs is going to prevent managers from having to enact steeper restrictions in the future when and if an assessment finally shows them how radically wrong those limits are. And, in the most gaping fault with Pew’s logic, once the catch limits are set without an assessment, there is no motivation for managers to spend the money and resources to actually examine the state of the stock with an assessment. Red snapper became a crisis after the stock assessment. If they had never done an assessment — and NOAA Fisheries has shown a systemic reluctance to expend resources on assessments in recreational fisheries — red snapper would still be heading merrily down the drain, and no one would be the wiser.
Pew likes to say that managing this way is “preventative” medicine, and it’s better than ending up in the emergency room. In reality, they are advocating exactly the opposite. They are advocating that you never visit the doctor, never run any tests, never draw blood or have an x-ray. And by time you realize there is a problem, you go straight to the morgue.
That is no way to manage a fishery.
There are rational ways to manage wildlife resources that are employed all over this country. Anglers are seeking the same for marine species, no more, no less. But we are not going to get there by revising history and distorting reality.
Jeff
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All of us, who have spent any amount of time on the water, have seen or at least heard some awesome fishing stories. One of the features we will now add to this blogsite is to utilize it in sharing some of our stories with you and to provide a forum for you to share your stories with us and the many readers of this blogsite.
My best fishing story is one that I was lucky enough to be a part of. It took place in Panama in 2009 when Guy swam down with my line and connected it to an already hooked up 1200 plus pound black marlin so we could get the fish tagged with a satellite tag. To read about this “Ultimate Fish Story” click here , and to see it on video click here. While this adventure with Guy will likely remain my most memorable fishing story, prior to this amazing event, the best fishing story I had ever heard was told to me by my father.
The story was about longtime family friend, Bobby Tidwell, catching his first marlin in Cabo San Lucas Mexico in 1956. Herb Bell of Packard Bell fame, owned the 100 foot Five Bells, named after the five Bell brothers, including the boat’s captain/ brother, Willard. As one of the very first boats to fish the waters of Cabo, the Five Bells played an important role in discovering this fishing paradise. Herb would invite friends to join him on fishing trips to waters of the East Cape and Cabo San Lucas. He needed talent on the boat to help ensure fishing success for his friends, and invited my dad Milt Shedd to join him in that role. During the trip to Cabo in 1956, Bobby Tidwell joined the group. An accomplished diver and expert angler, Bobby had yet to catch a marlin and was determined to do so. While trolling, Bobby hooked up to a striped marlin and when a second rod went off, dad grabbed the rod thinking they had a double. As both lines quickly came together, dad realized it was not a double hookup, but that one hungry marlin had eaten both baits. With the Five Bells now stopped, the fish ran towards the bow. Both dad and Bobby followed the fish and, when about the middle of the boat, the fish turned and ran directly under the boat and came up jumping on the other side.
Knowing there was no way to get to the bow to clear the line to the other side, dad tightened down the drag to break the fish off. To his amazement, he turned to Bobby just as he was diving overboard shouting “I am going to catch this fish.” Bobby is one of the most determined men I have ever known, but this was crazy. He dove overboard with rod and reel in hand, swam down to clear the considerable draft of the large boat and came up on the other side. Luckily, the marlin did not sound and was jumping toward the horizon. Bobby was being pulled behind the marlin, much like a water skier as the ski boat slowly moves away before accelerating to pop the skier out of the water. The other guys on deck looked down in amazement as Bobby yelled back to launch the skiff, which dad was already in the process of doing. The skiff was launched and Bobby Tidwell caught his first marlin. When asked later why he did it, Bobby simply replied “It was the only thing I could do to make sure I caught that fish.”
Bobby Tidwell passed away last year. While many people in Orange County, CA will remember him as the guy who gave the Children’s Hospital of Orange County (CHOC) $30 million dollars in his will, I will remember him for the amazing fishing story witnessed and told to me by my dad when I was just a young kid.
If you have an unusual fishing story send it to me, Bill Shedd, at laura@guyharveysportswear.com so we can share it here on this blogsite for others to enjoy.
For a complete list of our other featured blog posts and to see the full line of Guy Harvey Sportswear, please visit:www.guyharveysportswear.com
Responding to last week’s announcement from the Government of the Bahamas that it will prohibit all commercial shark fishing in its more than 240,000 square miles of territorial water, Dr. Harvey commented: “I am very impressed and pleased that the Government of the Bahamas has taken the necessary and correct step to further protect its marine resources from over-exploitation by both local and foreign interests. This new legislation compliments the ban on commercial long line fishing enacted 20 years ago. The ban on commercial shark fishing and exportation by shark by-products is a huge step in the conservation of sharks worldwide.”
Through the Bahamas National Trust (BNT), Dr. Harvey met with government officials last March to add his voice and influence as a highly respected conservationist to call for strict regulations to ban the commercial fishing of all sharks in The Bahamas, an archipelago of 700 islands sweeping across 500 miles of open ocean. The Bahamas is the fourth country to ban shark fishing after Honduras, the Maldives and Palau. Estimates are that more than 70 million sharks are killed annually around the world.
One of the premier shark-watching destinations for divers, reeling in $800 million over the past 20 years for the Bahamian national economy, sharks, according to Dr. Harvey, were worth much more alive than dead.
“Many countries have seen their populations of sharks annihilated by commercial over-exploitation,” said Dr. Harvey. “Research has shown that shark populations do not recover. Other countries will take encouragement from the Bahamas’ very bold move. They are realizing, very quickly, the value of the living shark in maintaining the health of reef ecosystems. In addition, the economic value of a living shark to ecotourism is now widely accepted as a sustainable and non-consumptive use of a marine resource with many additional benefits to respective island nations.”
Last year, following news that a Bahamian seafood company was considering exporting sharks to the Far East, the BNT along with the U.S. based Pew Environmental Group and individual conservationists, such as Dr. Guy Harvey, who created a “Protect Bahamian Sharks” campaign logo and poster, initiated a petition drive to force the issue of banning commercial shark-fishing. The government upon receiving a petition signed by 5,000 Bahamian residents acted this week to protect the some 40 sharks species found in Bahamian waters.
With shark populations around the world continuing to spiral downward, marine scientists such as Dr. Guy Harvey, are working around the clock to give these magnificent animals a fighting chance for survival. Dr. Harvey is also seeding cultural change in the structure of shark fishing tournaments to creating Catch and Release divisions.
Last month, he brought his cause into the epicenter of one of the nation’s oldest and largest shark fishing tournaments in Ocean City, Maryland. Thanks in part to his efforts and a willingness to continue to adapt by the tournament founders and organizers, The Ocean City Shark Tournament’s cash and prize package payment in the catch and release division increased to over $15,000.
In May, the Second Annual Guy Harvey Ultimate Shark Challenge, a catch and release only tournament, was held on the West Coast of Florida in Punta Gorda. The tournament, created as a model for catch and release only shark tournament formats, drew some 3,000 competitors and spectators and paid out over $15,000 in cash and prizes.
In related shark conservation activity, Dr. Harvey offered his artistic talent and foundation sponsorship funding in support of the recent Circle Hook Symposium held in Miami. The symposium, hosted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), is an international gathering of scientists, resource managers and constituents convening to discuss the performance and use of circle hooks in commercial, recreational and artisanal fisheries. While it is legal to use a J-hook to fish for sharks, experts such as Dr. Harvey recommend using a circle hook, where the barb points inward and not outward.
The oceans just got a little safer for sharks, and conservationist, artist and scientist —Guy Harvey couldn’t be more pleased.
For a complete list of our other featured blog posts and to see the full line of Guy Harvey Sportswear with a varied selection of shirts with fish, please visit:www.guyharveysportswear.com
In 1986 we were fishing one of the last Giant Tuna tournaments to be held in the Bahamas. Fishing was ok that week but we wound up winning with one fish. Ralph Mongeau caught a 615 pound tuna aboard “Raptor” on a classic day with a stiff southeast breeze. The tuna were pouring but not biting, well and ours was the biggest fish caught that week.
One evening, we watched movies from the International Game Fishing Association’s (IGFA) film library. Hundreds of anglers had donated their old fishing films and many of them had been copied onto video tape. The first film was shot in the early 1950’s and had wonderful action shots including footage taken from a small airplane that showed huge schools of tuna crossing the shallow flats south of Cat Cay. We could see fish peel off from the school and strike the bait trolled behind boats that were the state of the art “fishing cruisers” of that time, according to the announcer.
The film that really got us excited showed one of the greatest fishing guides of all time, Tommy Gifford. I met Gifford several times when I was a teenager and was most impressed with what a crusty old so and so he was, yet, he never paid me too much attention – I wish I had seen the movie before I met him. One way or another, I would have pestered him into letting me hang around, ride along, or something.
Marlin were already being caught in the Pacific by pioneering Australians, New Zealanders and Hawaiians. The Avalon Tuna Club was already a going concern with many striped marlin catches and Zane Grey was making expeditions to the South Pacific islands that have not been matched even with today’s motherships.
Ernest Hemingway advised Gifford of commercial marlin fishing techniques used in Cuba (later immortalized in his novel “The Old Man and the Sea”). Mike Lerner (proprietor and a founder of the Lerner Stores as well as the major financial contributor for the fledgling IGFA) chartered Gifford in 1934 to try for a blue marlin off Bimini. Gifford and Lerner decided to give these big cousins of sailfish a try. The movie footage is superb by any standards, doubly so considering when it was taken. Greyhounding marlin with a recognizable but unspoilt Bimini in the background, drew applause from the watching anglers and crew.
When Gifford put on a life jacket as he prepared to wire a good sized blue marlin, Lerner had, alongside the boat, cries of surprise and comments of sarcasm coming from the salty viewers. Then, Gifford billed the marlin like a sailfish. Cheers of surprise and approval echoed through the warm Bahamian night as Gifford billed a series of marlin ranging up to almost 500 pounds!
There were no gaffs -just a short nuggety young man who never let go once he had hold of a bill! “What a stud! I don’t believe it and I’m seeing it!” were two of the many shouted comments as Gifford was shaken like a rag doll. Never once did he relinquish a grip. It is still one of the most awesome fishing movies I have ever seen.
The IGFA museum in Dania, FL is the ultimate destination for angling enthusiasts and those interested in the complete historical record of the sport. It is open to the public 7 days a week
I had been impressed by the IGFA Hall of Fame and Museum when I attended its opening but hadn’t had a chance to check out the library with its video viewing and reading rooms. “Mike, I used to come and hang out once in a while and look at the old books when the office was in Pompano. Is the library open to the public?” I asked the then IGFA president Mike Leech at a chance meeting. “You mean you haven’t been in yet?” was his astonished reply. Two days later, I drove down and was floored by what I found. Leech introduced me to head librarian Gail Morchower, who showed me through a state of the art facility that has since seen a fair bit of me. (A few years ago I was inducted into the Hall Of Fame and some of my log books are now included.)
First, we entered a rare book room containing first editions (all of Zane Grey for starters) and original albums and logs donated by pioneering anglers. The humidity and temperature controlled room is a fishing history researcher’s nirvana. The books can be viewed and read but not removed from the library.
There are two video viewing rooms with comfortable seating to view the more than 1500 videos, including copies of the early movies mentioned above (and hundreds more!) You would have trouble reading just the current magazines as fast as they come in and there is a huge library of older periodicals as well as over 12,000 books. You can find books, videos and magazines from a computer list of titles, authors, and subjects. (It took Morchower about 30 seconds to tell me the year of the video I had seen in Bimini 15 years earlier.)
The IGFA Hall of Fame and Museum is open 10 to 6 daily and admission is free for IGFA members. The airy and spacious reading rooms offer superb views of four wetland ecological zones. Library, museum and ecological classroom, the only thing you won’t have enough of is time.
For a complete list of our other featured blog posts and to see the full line of Guy Harvey Sportswear, please visit:www.guyharveysportswear.com
I would like to welcome you to the Guy Harvey Sportswear web site. Here we will feature my blog where I will report on expeditions, adventures, and various marine conservation efforts. We will also include various guest bloggers, videos and photos that I believe you will find interesting, whether you are a serious fishing or diving enthusiast, or simply someone who cares about the marine resource, loves living the coastal lifestyle, or just wants to learn more about Guy Harvey sportswear.
I would like to welcome you to the Guy Harvey Sportswear web site. Here we will feature my blog where I will report on expeditions, adventures, and various marine conservation efforts. We will also include various guest bloggers, videos and photos that I believe you will find interesting, whether you are a serious fishing or diving enthusiast, or simply someone who cares about the marine resource, loves living the coastal lifestyle, or just wants to learn more about Guy Harvey sportswear.
