File - The Solitary Islands Game Fishing

WEEKLY ROUNDUP 15.1.16
Great weather, you bewdy, let’s get into it!
Finally we had some fishable conditions and our first In Hours day for the New Year was
under way, with Better Than Vegas, She’s A Dream, Duchess, Top Shelf, Wicked Weasel,
Matador, Foreign Exchange and Alcatraz fishing. Seaborn, Magnum and Geeza, who would
normally be on the sked sheet, were playing an away game at the Golden Lure.
Yahoo! Lauren Peake and a nice example of the summertime razor gang.
There was a light sou’ easter present all day and the marlin came out in numbers.
Wicked Weasel and Foreign Exchange went wide looking for blue water and found it and
some striped tuna schools chasing tiny flying fish, but no blues. Almost everyone else who
fished inshore or along the shelf had a bite from a black or a striped though, with Aaron
Bevan on She’s A Dream scoring his first and second marlin — a striped and a black
respectively — on the shelf. Clearly having just two on board is no problem for the ‘Dream
Team’! Apparently the water was pretty ordinary at She’s A Dream Canyons, so they fished
further north for a change.
Vegas lost a striped, then pinned one later in the day that didn’t do anything to start with,
including jump, then it really got into gear for the second part of the fight.
Matt Cole and his striped at the North Canyons.
Duchess jumped off a black, as did Alcatraz, Top Shelf had a double header on live baits that
managed to escape, and Wicked Weasel had a brief hookup on another in 50 fathoms on the
way home. So yes, the blacks are definitely here.
Gordon Ridgwell’s first marlin alongside Hemingway. Pic by Sultan.
With the weather still holding, a few boats headed back out on Sunday. Hemingway got the
small furry creature off its back with a 4-3-1 on black marlin inside The Lump to Gordon
Ridgwell — his first.
Ben Larsen’s black from outside the Wide Bait Ground. It’s a long reach down to the
water when they’re that size!
Better Than Vegas continued to connect and went 2-2-2 on marlin — a juvenile black to Ben
Larsen outside the Wide Bait Ground, and a solid striped to Phil Skeoch in 650 fathoms at the
North Canyons.
Fiona with her mahimahi. James shot it. You couldn’t do that with a gaff…
On Alcatraz, Fiona McGinty scored a nice mahimahi for dinner, while grandson Dexter went
very close to catching his first.
Phil Skeoch and a striped to go with their earlier black. Just needed a blue!
THIS WEEK
Foreign Exchange had a few black marlin bites on Monday on baits for no result, Hemingway
went 1-1-1 with a black to George, then on Tuesday 2-2-0 between The Lump and the Wide
Bait Ground. The latter has become somewhat of a bait desert, as it often does at this time of
they ear (typical — just as the mackerel begin to arrive.)
Johnny English (no, not the Rowan Atkinson one, it’s Pete’s brother), with a wahoo from
outside The Lump.
Better Than Vegas fished for a while on Wednesday for another wahoo of 12 kilos (good to
see them around after an absence of a few years), and Pete reported plenty of big whalers at
the light, but no kings. It was rough as hell first up, but calmed off again later.
George Blackwell with a Monday short black on Hemingway.
ANAL FIN NOMINEES
It’s good to see mates shopping mates in the race for this most prestigious award! Simon
McGinty gets a belated mention for letting a teaser run off the handcaster without tying it off
to the cleat first (that’s two teasers for Alcatraz this season alone!). Meanwhile Duchess
Darren wore a hook in the hand when dealing with a mahimahi last Saturday, and Foreign
Exchange collected some additional tackle from another boat at the Wide Bait Ground!
Keep ’em coming gang — the trophy’s all finished and ready to be revealed next Saturday at
the barbecue.
THE PORT REPORT
With Magnum, Seaborn and Geeza flying the flag for the Solitary Islands club, the first day
was very slow right across the board, but the boys got into gear after that. Mike Sasson on
Geeza (he’s ‘Geeza’ for those who don’t know him by his real name), tagged a blue, while
Seaborn ran hot and cold with two hammers to Dylan Steel (good to see Seaborn can still
raise ’em!), a black to Bill Livingston and a lost sailfish boatside, also to Bill.
The tournament has flexible scheduling, so the last two fishing days were brought forward to
make the most of the good weather on Wednesday before everything went to custard. There
was something like 50 marlin tagged for the day, and the chew was on both inshore and off,
which is what tournament organisers like to see. Geeza snared a nice wahoo, while Andrew
Barter on Seaborn went one from two bites on black marlin and a 10 kilo king. Most of the
inshore action was from Point Plomer to Crescent Head.
Lambchop’s striped at the Golden Lure, one of three marlin Magnum tagged on
Wednesday.
Magnum fished wide though and had an action-packed day, with Craig Want scoring two 90
odd kilo blacks and Nic ‘Lambchop’ Edwards a 90 kilo striped.
There were some big blacks mixing with the little guys inshore too, with one boat fighting an
estimated 180 kilo fish on 10 kilo for six hours and ending up out over the shelf when the line
finally gave way. Jason Carroll’s boat Bear even had a big white shark eat one of their
marlin, so it was all happening as Bill Lawry would say.
Fishing was on again on Thursday, but conditions were ordinary to say the least thanks to a
howling northerly. Seaborn retired early for a long lunch, Geeza jumped a marlin off in close,
and Magnum returned to the scene of yesterday’s crime and tagged three mahimahi before a
couple of Deadliest Catch type waves suggested it was time to be anywhere but the shelf.
Then, just before reaching the dirty water pushing out of the Hastings, they saw two free
jumpers! Could’ve saved a bit of fuel, eh Chop! Again, there was a stack of blacks at Plomer,
with one boat tagging seven.
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