Read this article - Offshore Adventures

offshore adventure
By Grant Dixon
Softly, softly,
catchee sailfish
For the travelling game fisher, one of the most frustrating fish
for a novice to target has to be the sailfish.
C
redited as being the fastest fish in the ocean, these
finicky eaters are famous for feeding habits that at
times have even the most experienced anglers pulling
their hair out.
When towing lures, it can be difficult to get a hook into
them.
For the lure fishers, the first indication of a sailfish’s
presence is a line tripped out of a clip or an unseen bite on
the flat line. Now, with the crew alerted, they can be ready
for the next attack, which will not be long coming. So if the
fish has not felt the prick of the hook after grabbing and
then dropping the lure, the offering can be free-spooled
back to them in the hope of enticing another shot. To further
complicate the scene, sailfish often hunt in packs, so it might
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New Zealand Fishing News October 2013
not be one dainty eater you are dealing with, but several.
A more reliable way of getting a bite involves trolling rigged
dead baits behind a teaser or a dredge. I was introduced
to this method on a recent fishing trip to Mexico with Tony
Orton and his team aboard the 42ft Viking Forby out of
Puerto Vallarta. Joining me was a regular fishing buddy Paul
Davies from Te Awamutu, along with two keen angler readers,
Hayden Sherwood from Morrisville and Neil Douglas from
Auckland.
For us, targeting sailfish was an exciting, sharp learning
curve, but we had a great coaching line-up of skipper Tony
and crewmen Javier Sanchez and Josh Worthington, with
Tony’s partner Bea Bagnall keeping the team well fed and
watered.
The live-baiter’s curse – needlefish. Their teeth are so sharp
they can cut through trace without the angler being aware it has
happened.
I had experienced dredge fishing only once before during
a Marlin Master Class trip aboard Arenui, when it was used
more as a teaser for pitch-baiting.
A ‘dredge’ is a device rather like an umbrella without
its cover. Attached to the frame at regular intervals are a
number of rubber fish baits – although in many sailfish
tournaments crews rig real ballyhoo or mullet dead baits –
and the ‘umbrellas’ can be run in tandem, one behind the
other.
The whole kit and caboodle is towed behind a heavy lead
weight, which can either be run off the transom as a flat
line, or – as was the case aboard Forby – deployed via an
outrigger pulley system driven by a heavy-duty electric reel.
The dredge creates an illusion of a small school of baitfish
moving with a ribbon-like action just beneath the surface. As
a fish puller it is extremely effective, and Tony says at times
it is very hard to get a billfish to switch from the artificial
baits to the real one.
“They get their bills in amongst the dredge and give it a
real thrashing, but can’t work out why they are not getting a
feed,” Tony says.
Running just behind and above the ‘school’ is a rigged
bait – generally a small, dead mullet or ballyhoo (similar to
our piper), or a rigged salted belly flap from fish such as a
skipjack tuna (on this trip Josh used a wahoo’s belly flap,
which proved just as deadly). The bait is secured behind
a Moldcraft chugger head, with the circle hook ahead of
that. When deployed, the bait does what baits do, while the
skirted head helps create a ‘smoke trail’, indicating a fish
moving quickly through the water.
Haden, Paul and Neil with sailfish
captures. After a quick photograph,
the fish were all returned.
New Zealand Fishing News October 2013
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Hayden with a relatively rare catch in these waters, a wahoo.
Now back to the fishing.
Tony runs two dredges with the baits run on flatlines short and long from the corners. Bridge teasers
are run in the middle of the spread followed by either
rigged dead baits or loaded lures on the long and
short ‘riggers.
For good measure there is a live bait in the tank on
a pitch rod ready to go if called for. This was a goggle
eye (think jack mackerel but with ‘Mr Bean’ eyes),
and on a previous trip these had proved irresistible
to a number of species, especially yellowfin.
Our first afternoon out was spent mainly casting
poppers and stick-baits around the shoreline and a
couple of offshore reefs, where the action was slow.
The plan for the second day was to run out to
El Banco, three pins that rise sharply to within 30
metres of the surface from several thousand metres
down. It is one of Mexico’s ‘hot spots’ and I had
enjoyed some great action there before.
The action was not long coming this time either; we
started to raise sailfish, which invariably came in and
checked out the dredge before picking up the rigged
bait in close proximity.
It would happen something like this:
The fish would come in, grab the bait-lure, pulling
the flat-line out of its clip and alerting us to its
presence – if Tony had not already seen it from his
lofty perch in the tower above.
The angler then grabbed the rod and held the tip
up high while free-spooling the bait back. Using only
thumb pressure, the bait would be allowed to skip
enticingly where the fish was last spotted. If the bait
was taken, the angler immediately dropped the rod
tip as low as possible and free-spooled the line,
giving the fish the chance to chew on the bait. The
drag was then slowly increased in the hope of gently
rolling the fine-gauge circle hook into the corner of
the sailfish’s mouth. The hook either missed or it was
‘game on’, the line coming up solid and the fish going
ballistic as it felt the hook and the weight of the drag.
This sounds simple, but in the excitement of the
bite, clearing the gear and everything else going on
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New Zealand Fishing News October 2013
around you, it is not always that easy – as we were to
find out.
The long and the short of it was we managed to get
a hook in just one sailfish from 10 bites that day –
frustrating for the anglers, but doubly frustrating for
the crew, who themselves had the technique down to
a fine art.
Faced with our angling inadequacies, I have to
commend Josh, Javier and Tony for their patience –
the anglers were testing this side of their character to
its limits!
A discussion over our tacos and Coronas that
night helped fine-tune our techniques, and we were
determined to remove the ‘must do better’ on our
report card the next day when we returned to El
Banco, some 38 nautical miles offshore.
Our tutors would have been proud of us. All
three anglers – Paul, Hayden and Neil – found their
rhythm. Hayden had never caught a billfish before, so
losing his virginity was cause for celebration, and he
went on to land two more sails that day.
To add to the excitement, the tuna also popped up
– not the big ‘cows’ we were all dreaming of, far from
it – but catching them on stick-baits was still good
fun. And of course, the fresh tuna steaks for dinner
that night, along with sashimi, was something many
Kiwi anglers had been missing for some time.
After two day trips, it was time to head away for a
three-day stay-away. Tony had the word from a fellow
skipper than an area known as the ‘Sandbank’ had
produced a few fish. This large flat area comes up
out of great depths and, with the right currents and
conditions, can produce plenty of action.
I managed to put the camera down for long enough
to land a sail early on in the proceedings, a promising
start that was unfortunately not to be fulfilled.
However, Neil hooked one of the biggest bull
mahimahi I have seen for some time, but dropped
it, and then Hayden chipped in with a 14kg wahoo. It
was the first wahoo Tony has caught in the two years
he has fished Mexico, and both were hooked on one
of Graham Murphy’s new G-Force lures.
A strip of wahoo belly flap tied in behind a chugger head
brought about the downfall of this sailfish.
A dredge system where a series of artificial baits are
deployed behind a torpedo weight.
The Forby team – (from left) Javier Sanchez, Josh Worthington, Bea Bagnall and Tony Orton.
Later in the day a nice blue marlin, estimated at
around 180kg, nailed the lure and headed off into
the sunset with us in hot pursuit. There was no mad
run the blues are renowned for, just one surface
run after the bite before heading down deep. Tony
suggested all was not as it should be, and he was to
be proven right, the fish ‘disassociating itself’ from
us 10 minutes later. The verdict on inspection of the
G Force lure and trace: it had only been bill-wrapped.
A striped marlin was raised a short time later, but
did not bite, before it was time for the boat to head
towards the Tres Marias – the prison islands – some
130 kilometres away.
The next morning the weather took a turn for the
worse as we frantically hunted for the yellowfin
everyone wanted to get amongst. It was not to be,
Our digs at La Cruz Inn proved a great base for our Puerto
Vallarta, Mexico trip.
although a further five sailfish were added to the tally
from 12 bites, and another blue marlin was raised
and dropped.
On a worsening forecast we headed back to El
Banco for one last shot the next day, but by 11.00am
it was lines out as the rising swell and squalls drove
us back to Puerto Vallarta and the comfort of the
marina. Game over.
Faultless service
W
hile the fishing had not lived up to my high
expectations following my previous trip,
the one thing that could still not be faulted
was the standard set by the vessel and the service
from Tony, Bea, Javier and Josh.
Tony drove the 45 minutes to pick us up from
the airport at Puerto Vallarta, a welcoming cold
drink in hand. Our land-based accommodation
was comfortable, clean and cool – with a dip in the
swimming pool much looked forward to at the end
of each day.
The 42ft Viking Forby is set up specifically for
sportfishing and angler comfort. It doesn’t have
a game chair – all fishing is done stand-up – but
carries every sort of tackle imaginable for pretty
much all scenarios, including light line fishing,
bottom jigging, lure casting and salt fly. It is top
quality tackle too, with all reels being top-end
Shimanos.
Powered by twin Cummins 600hp diesels, Forby
has the ability to run fast to the offshore hotspots
with its 28mph cruise speed and great sea-keeping
abilities, aided by a full suite of Garmin electronics.
Four anglers are ideal for day trips, while three is
the perfect number for overnighting – there’s airconditioning throughout. Fishing and comfort-wise,
there is nothing left to chance!
One of the highlights of the trip was Bea’s
galley creations. Bea would not be out of place
as a Master Chef contender, and was able to turn
the local produce and our catches into gourmet
delights.
Tony and Bea run ‘Offshore Adventure – Tony
Orton Sportfishing’, an operation that offers
opportunities to fish both here in New Zealand
and in Mexico. From November 2014, Tony will be
running New Zealand charters out of Mangawhai in
either a 5.7-metre Extreme centre-console or an 8.5metre Extreme centre cab.
From May to August 2014, they will be based in
Cabo San Lucus, Mexico, where striped marlin will
be the main target, with September and October
spent fishing out of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, for blue
and black marlin, yellowfin tuna, roosterfish and
cubera snapper.
Tony Orton Sport Fishing – Offshore Adventures
Website:www.offshoreadventures.net
Email:[email protected]
Facebook: www.facebook.com/
TonyOrtonSportFishingOffshoreAdventures
Phone:
+1 954 614 7006
Forby is a 13m Viking 42 and comes armed with a large
range of top-end Shimano tackle.
Want to learn more about dredges?
Next month Tony Orton presents the first in his
series on using dredges to tease billfish from
both game launches and trailerboats.
New Zealand Fishing News October 2013
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