A NUTTAFISH WITH CAPTAIN ASPARAGUS

FISHING

Where have all the kahawai gone? by Captain Asparagus (Issue 42)

This is purely anecdotal. This is purely the result of obviously flawed memory. There is no possible basis in fact for this. But there are sod all kahawai left. Now, I know the experts in the Ministry of Fisheries and those involved in the commercial eradication of the kahawai off New Zealand's coast will dispute this, as I am sure they will point to massive catches of these most popular recreational sportfish. Hell, send out a purse seiner from just about any of our ports, put up a spotter plane or two, and sure enough, I bet they will come back chokka with a couple of eliminated schools of kahawai, no sweat. But these days, they aren't. Even the commercial sector can no longer find the easy-money schools of kahawai any more. The sneaky little devils must have moved south or north. West? East? Somewhere, because the world knows that there is no way the purse seining of kahawai has made any noticeable impact on kahawai stocks. What a load of tosh! It makes me mad just writing that pure BS. The kahawai are gone. They are gone not by overfishing by the recreational sector. They have been scooped from our waters purely and totally by the corporate greed of the commercial sector. How? Purse seiners. We all know it. It is just that intimidation and skullduggery by the big-money team in corporate fishing prevents the powers that be from hearing this. Hands up anyone who has been fishing for 30 years or more. Me! I have been going out from Whitianga since I was knee high. We never bought bait, as we could always count on picking up a couple of fresh kahawai for bait on our way out to the Mercury Islands, any time, summer or winter. If we got sick of using kahawai, Dad would occasionally splash out and buy a packet of squid. Boy, it was a rare treat to use that! Skippies? I'd never heard of them back then. This is the anecdotal part that MFish boffins and the commercial sector rubbish so readily, but I remember going out past the Twins at Whitianga and cruising through acres of kahawai. You could bet just about anywhere between the Danger Rocks and Flat Rock that there would be big schools of kahawai beating the water to froth. It used to scare me when I was really young. I still remember very well the tearing roar of kahawai beating the surface to a froth as something cruised deep beneath them. These fish are gone. These days, to see a big workup of mature kahawai is a very rare experience indeed. I took photographs of every such workup I came across this last summer and autumn, and what do I have? Two pictures, one off North Cape of a couple of small schools of mixed trevally and kahawai, and one of a small school just off Richards Rock at Whitianga. The folks I had on the boat at Richards Rock, despite having been keen fishoes for the last few years, had never seen such an impressive sight. Me? It just made me sad. This was a tiny school compared with the massive fish schools I remember from two decades ago. So, what has happened to these fish? Has the recreational sector really taken all these fish? Rubbish, total and utter tosh. It is the wholesale slaughter of entire schools of fish for easy money by purse seiners that has robbed us of these mighty schools. Why? We are told it is for the very good reason of providing crayfish bait to Australia, or stock food. What a sheer waste. The government is crowing about how kahawai is now being put into the quota system. Yay, whoopee. This is gonna really help, I bet. Unless MFish sets quotas at drastically reduced levels, don't count on ever seeing these sportfish bonanzas ever again. I think the recreational limit on kahawai should be dropped from the pie-in-the-sky limit of 20 per person (as part of the finfish limit) to a species-specific number of say, five or six per angler. Hell, if anyone ever takes more than six kahawai a day they need their heads read anyhow. However, the commercial quota should be set at such a small amount that the actual targeting of kahawai is no longer viable. Kahawai taken commercially should only be for New Zealand consumption (We all like smoked kahawai, don't we?) and then as a legitimately landed by-catch, not as a targeted by-catch. And certainly, for at least the next decade, not by any purse seiner. Let the Aussies use their own kahawai schools for cray bait. Oh, that's right, they already have done. That's why they now want ours.

First timers experience hapuku heaven (Issue 40)

It is great to have a boat that lets you get out there and do the fishing thing. For weeks I had been hearing nothing but grumbles about the fishing. The snapper were gone from around Whitianga, and there weren't even many big reds in close to the rocks. It seemed like no-one was particularly happy up the Coromandel Peninsula.

No snapper, huh? Well, big deal. True, it is nice to get into a few snapper every so often, but basically I don't have that much patience with the darn things. Snapper fishing inevitably means blood and burley from pillar to post on the boat, countless small fish to be tossed back (my boat's minimum size is 300mm), smelly hands, and that oh-so-pleasant spin-off, pilchard-scented sandwiches and heaps of busted-off gear. Nope, you can keep your snapper fishing.

Seeing as how everyone was agreeing that there were no snapper around anymore, it was a simple decision to head out further and check out my more favoured spots, the deeper reefs behind the Mercs, to see if I could find some early winter hapuku. During this time of year the hapuku are massing over reefs in relatively shallow waters. Any reef in 100m to 150m is likely to be holding some good fish. Around Whitianga I have noticed many are what South Islanders would consider typical schoolie groper, fish of 4.5kg to 9kg. This suits me, as these smaller fish make excellent eating and very easy filleting, and since I am the Fish Cleaner around my place, that suits me just fine, too. So, in the middle of the school holidays, when the weather looked to be promising, I was off hunting the deep places where the REAL fish live.

With me was my young teenage nephew from Auckland, Tom David, a keen as mustard fisho who had never fished so far out to sea, or for hapuku. The trip out was great. I was seriously instructing him on all the important things, like what to do when makos jump in the boat, the size of the teeth on deepwater sharks, the sharks and their teeth, and how shark teeth really make a mess of young blokes. You know, generally just being a bastard uncle! It was just a quick trip, as I had to be home early, and we made a late start, so it was definitely a 'no mucking about' trip. Our plan had been first to haul up over some shallower reef areas, the Cobra reef area, where I often get into speed jigging for kingfish, as long as the barracouta are nowhere to be seen. However, everywhere we went along this reef there was the typical 'couta sign, a light yellow dappling at 20m on my colour sounder.

One drop of a jig, and after a couple of touches, I got the lure back with a shredded trace. We were out of there. Those toothy sods were not going to nick MY flash new jigs. Off we went, way past Red Mercury, until we neared my spot X, rising to around 120m, and to my surprise, with some decent sign over the top of it. Normally it is pretty bare down there, but now it seemed we might have a little luck after all. The dreaded 'couta were signing at around 50m, but with a little tootling around I managed to find a hole in the snakes that would let us drift with the current over the reef... perfect. This time, seeing as Tom was new to this game, I went for a standard two-hook ledger rig on 150lb mono, and a couple of Wasabi Circle hooks. I figured these hooks would be better for Tom, as once they hooked up they do not let the fish go, so if he did pause on the way up, the 'pukas would be unlikely to float off. With one squid per hook, and 450g of lead on the bottom, the rigs were soon on their way into the deeps. Tom, having been told by others that this was boring fishing, was not at all prepared for the instant strikes we got as soon as the line hit the bottom. Indeed, his first hit was before he even reached the bottom. With a fish already thrashing below, I had to hold him back for a second from winding it in, telling him to wait for the second fish.

His skeptical looks evaporated a second later as the rod heeled over in a second definite hit. Then I let him start winding. Hah! Teenagers these days. You'd think they'd never wound in a proper fish before. Tom could not believe the difference these fish were from his normal fare of those titchy snapper. By the time he had wrestled his fish to the top, I had already plopped my fish onto the deck, another pair of nice small 'puka, and was waiting with gaff in hand for his fish to come up. I suppose I should have told him what that lever on the lever-drag reel was for, eh. Mean uncle. Anyhow, in a few minutes Tom had landed his first ever hapuku, as nice a brace of 7kg fish as you could ever wish to see. This, Tommy assured me, was real fishing. Seeing as I was in a bit of a hurry, and really, we didn't need all that many fish, after two more drifts over the rock, with eight nice hapuku on board (Two off our limit. Hell, I've only just realised), we headed back home. It had taken us about an hour all told, a very successful little fishing interlude. The run there and back took longer than the actual fishing phase.

Two days later I had my other nephew on board as well. Tommy had been boasting to his cousin Chris about the action, and so Chris had to check this out, too. It was a sloppy day this time, so our visit to the open waters over the deep reefs was going to be way shorter. My tolerance for being tossed around in small boats is evaporating as I get older. Nevertheless, after just two drifts, with only the two lines over, Tom and Chris had popped six more nice pup groper into the fish bin. Now both Tom and Chris are deepwater converts. No more problems finding a crew now. Armed with this knowledge, I got in touch with a mate in Matamata, and a couple of weeks later I was back at the beach, this time with John Rasmussen, and loading the boat up ready for another trip. My neighbour at the beach, Jim Hill, who had come over to say gidday, was also roped in to what was to be his first-ever hapuku trip. Again we returned to one of my deep reefs, ready to drop as soon as we got there. I had already rigged a couple of rods with my preferred hapuku rigs, the Black Magic Groper Grabbers, great rigs, tied on 400lb mono, and a pair of solid 8/0 suicide (or Kahle) hooks. These rigs are perfect for fishing with braid, as the hooks are a cross between the tuna circle recurve hook and a normal, J-style hook. Basically it means that you can use the hook-setting ability of the braid line to set the hooks, as circle hooks require a little more finesse, I have found. Again we had almost instantaneous hook-ups.

Those Black Magic rigs really are the business. I was letting the guys do the serious fishing with the baits, and Jim's initiation to the world of hapuku hauling was a rude shock. On the first drop, the sinker bounced on the bottom once before the baits were nailed by a pair of very nice 14kg fish. Maybe a minute after they were gaffed and on the ice, he was on the phone to his family to spread the word. Pleased? What do you think? Again, he and John were scoring double and single hook-ups almost instantly, every drift.

To keep myself amused while they were waiting for their baits to drop, I decided to have a shot with a jig, to see if the 'puka would go for a slice of metal. Did they? Whammo! Straight away. This day, because we were fishing very much for the pot, as both John and Jim had plenty of folks to feed, we waited until we had our limit aboard. We caught 14 hapuku and a kingfish between the three of us. Given that most of these were only pups of around 5kg, I don't feel too bad about this. Had they been 20kg fish, no way would I have taken so many.

Next day, same thing, only this time Jim's wife was along as well, as Noelene had also never bagged a hapuku, and was keen to see if it really was as easy as her husband had said. I tell you. First drop, wham, bam, two more fish. Hell, this was getting monotonous. Break out my jig rod, guys, I wanted to have a bit of fun with this. Before long, after just a couple of drifts, with six hapuku on board, Jim was ready to play with a jig as well. A little simple instruction and he was right into it, another first for him. It worked. Not only did he catch his first jigged fish, but also his first kingfish. On subsequent drops both he and Noelene scored more hapuku on the jigs.

We left for home after a long dog-leg to look at Richards Rock, and got among a huge school of kahawai and trevally on the surface, (another first for the Hills) with another dozen good fish aboard. This fishing was ridiculously easy, and were it not for the fact that all those involved had either never done it before or had big families to feed, I probably would not have used the bait rigs as much out there. Using two hooks more often than not lands you two fish, and I have found the jigging to be just as much fun, if not more so. I will discuss the jigs I used in a future item, as I also want to cover the novel idea of the 'assist hook'. I will also describe the different techniques I have found to be effective for either hapuku or kingfish.

Giant trevally not easy to tackle (From NZPS Issue 34)

In the last couple of years I have discovered a whole new secret side to fishing in Australia. It is called The Western One, or West Australia.
My first exposure to this stunning secret was fishing in 2001 around Karratha and Shark Bay with WA tackle manufacturer Peter Montague. Such was my delight to find a largely pristine fishery that plans were set in place for me to come back in 2002. Finding somewhere different was a good idea, so Peter jacked up a trip up north for himself, his brother, Blair, and myself, and we headed for Exmouth.
The size of WA is pretty daunting, especially driving from Perth to Exmouth. Holy crackers, that's well over 1000km! Rather than trying to tow a boat such a distance, we took the lazy man's option, arranging for a hire-boat from a local Exmouth Tackle Shop, Betsy's Seafood and Tackle.
It has been said that in fishing, local knowledge is everything, and I have always found chatting to the local tackle shop to be the best way to get a handle on a new spot. At Betsy's, the owner, Greg Crocker and his 2IC, Troy Wright, were right on the ball with what was happening and where.
The boat Greg Montague had for us was one of two Southwind 6.1m Yamaha longboats he has, with two-year-old Yamaha 70hp two-stroke motors, Humminbird 100sx sounders and GME Electraphone VHFs all fitted. In the back, under a compartment hatch with the batteries and first aid box, was an EPIRB as well, and it was very comforting to know it was there.
Rather than pick up the boat straight away, we decided instead to drive through Exmouth, around the top of the peninsula and down to the Yardie Creek area for a bit of rock fishing and some night poppering, swagging it like true blue dinkum Aussie bushmen for the night in the dunes just above the beach.
The fish at Yardie Creek were less than spectacular for us this night, but that was fine, as we were more interested in sleeping than fishing after driving from Geraldton that day. The plan of waking at around 0100 to catch the change of the tide dissolved in a chorus of snores, I'm afraid.
Refreshed and well rested, we headed the 70km back to Exmouth early next morning to pick up the boat from Betsy's, and headed on to the Bundegi boat ramp near the northern tip of the Exmouth Peninsula to make the run across the glassy-calm gulf to the Muiron Islands.
As we approached these islands from the sou'west we started seeing small pods of baitfish everywhere. These small fish had electric blue backs with yellow fins, and lit up the waters around our boat like a thousand small, neon lights. In such clear water it was a great thing to see, and their presence was at least a healthy indication that some predators would be lurking somewhere nearby
As we worked our way along the islands we soon came to an area of large, barely subsurface bommies, where the minimal swell was still causing some wicked surges and roiling water. Swerving to avoid dinging Greg's propeller, we angled out over a slightly deeper passage between several large coral heads, where a cruising school of some massive trevally appeared in the clear, blue waters below us.
Holy cow! Some of those fish were huge! The bulk of the school was of thumping great giant trevallys, while loitering around the edges of this school of fish was an escort of smaller golden trevally, their golden tailfins a colourful counterpoint to the more sombre hues of the GTs.
As you can imagine, we immediately started working our lures all around these fish, but they just weren't hungry. Poppers, jigs, soft plastics - nothing could lure any sort of interest from these disgustingly tightmouthed fish. Damn I hate it when that happens!
We worked our way along the seaward side of the Muiron Islands, spending a fair bit of time in the shallow, bommie-haunted stretch of water separating North and South Muiron, where the poppers finally found fish ready to party. The trouble was the combination of shallow water, reefy snags, big fish and only 30lb line. I'm afraid every fight ended with this sad little 'Ping' noise.
After this tackle-reduction exercise, we left the shallows, squishing surplus adrenalin from our ears, and headed along North Muiron. Even though a string of big trevally persistently failed to hook up, the scenery of blue swells, foaming white wash, red rocks and bright blue sky was enough to keep us happy just to be there. Fish would have been nice, but hey, you can't have everything!
It was only early afternoon when we finally had to head back to the peninsula, as we wanted to check out the coastline along the tip, particularly the wreck of the old cattle carrier, the SS Mildura, which was wrecked on the reefs there at the end of the 19th century. This rusted-out hulk was well known for providing some awesome fishing for trevally at times, although arriving there at dead low tide was perhaps not the best timing.
It was only mid-afternoon when we had the boat back at Betsy's. While chatting with Greg and Troy we settled on our plans for the next day. The best option was to drive to the Tantabiddi boat ramp, swag it again that night, and head out just after dawn to explore the fishing along the outside of the Ningaloo reef.
The Tantabiddi boat ramp is an excellent public facility. Not only does it have a decent concrete ramp, it also has a shower and toilet block and a good fish-cleaning table, complete with fish disposal bins and water.
Launching there was a breeze, and soon we were heading slowly for the inner face of the reef, not following the channel markers north to the open sea. We wanted to have a bit of a close look at the inside edge of the reef, wondering if this might be an easier way of getting lures into the white water lining the reef.
Nope, the lagoon side of the outer reef was a snare of shallow bommies and swirling currents, with no chance of landing anything hooked there. So we idled slowly southward, weaving our way among the coral heads, until we came across one of the several smaller passes through the reef.
Outside the reef the sea was glassy, seemingly stretching in oily flatness all the way to Madagascar. In the clear Indian Ocean water we could easily see the flat slope of the reef where the swells had scoured the bulk of the corals away, as well as the many zigzagging crevasses that split the rock.
Amazingly with such shallow water, we also found ourselves being escorted by a pair of humpback whales and their calves! The calves were lolling about in the shallows, the mothers seemingly unconcerned with our presence within 50m of them.
We spent a fair while with these whales. We could clearly hear their singing through the hull for a while, an eerie but serene sound. Finally our mission took us away from these leviathans, and we headed for a slightly protruding part of the reef with a particularly long surf break on it.
As we idled along towards this area, with Blair casting poppers for all he was worth in the back, I stood for'ard, scanning the area for signs of fish. Under us we could see patches of baitfish, and here and there bright green fish which Peter called bluebones.
Then, under us, I spied a long, slim fish slash past from the shallow waters heading into the deep. Then there was another, and then a pack of about six more sailfish. In 12m of water! Holy cow, now that is shallow-water gamefishing!
It is not hard to see that these fish would have been viable targets for a popper worked along this reef. Now that would have been a real surprise, watching a sailfish come climbing out of the water at you! Sadly though, these guys were truckin' through, not hanging around the shallows with a boat so close over their heads.
We headed on to the surf break, with Peter doing a wonderful impression of Kaptain Kamakazi by getting us close in to the breaking swells, right on top of the curling waves. Yikes! It makes it kinda tough on concentrating on your casts, balancing on a small boat and having to worry about swells dumping on you as well.
We were certainly well in the zone for good GTs, our lures landing right up in the surging white water, and, on cue, out came some of the biggest trevally you will see anywhere in the world.
Having a hulking great black-backed giant trevally swing in behind your popper that was easily 1.5m long and about 30cm across the back, easily over 45kg and knowing you only have 15kg line on the reel, is pretty intimidating.
So, tackle donation time again. Next trip, I am certainly going to up-armour my reel, loading up with at least 50lb Fireline, maybe even 80lb, just to give me a chance to score one of these monsters.
After several tackle-terminating experiences, we finally managed to get a hook-up we could manoeuvre out of the shallows and work into moderately deeper water, resulting at long last in our one and only boated GT, a nice, if somewhat less than hoped for, 45-pounder.
Imagine that, thinking 45lb (21kg) of trevally is disappointingly small. Man, you should have seen its brothers!
By now the breeze had picked up and the swell was mounting, so we decided to call it a day for the outside of the reef. After heading in to check out some mangroves we had seen on the coastline, we made our way back to Betsy's again to drop off the boat.
This boat had been an excellent choice for us to use, being ideally suited for the three of us to cast lures from. The Yamaha longboats are a very stable platform, and are also a very good sea boat for inshore waters, handling the at times lumpy chop easily and smoothly.
Although of a narrower beam than many would consider suitable for a 6.1m boat, the waterline length gives the boat plenty of stability, and enables her to cut through chop without plunging about uncomfortably - a much smoother ride than many other boats I have been in.
The smooth bottom and lack of any noticeable 'V' does make it pound a little in larger waves, and some clears around the bow rails would save the odd spray of water from messing up your Polaroids. But the shallow draught also allows you to get into some very skinny water easily, far more so than a conventional trailer boat.
The 70hp motor can power this 6.1m rig quite easily. For a perfect combination, I think a pair of 40 or 50hp four-strokes would be ideal. We have twin 40s on the same boats in the Solomon Islands, and they perform excellently. It is also nice to know you have the insurance of two motors.
All up, I was impressed with the fishing potential and the facilities offered by Exmouth, and shall be arranging a visit for the television crew there next year, for sure.
Peter Montague is preparing to bring out a range of jumbo-sized poppers suitable for the GTs we encountered. Even better, they are floating poppers, so we have a chance of getting them back after the GTs chew 'em up and spit 'em out!

FISHING (from NZPS Issue 33)

Tiki-touring on a big OE

It was early January when, late at night, I finally got a long-awaited call from Keith, our revered editor, who was finally putting together a bit of a snapper fishing trip around the Hauraki Gulf for a bunch of guys involved with Ocean Enterprise.
Keith had been running his 12m ex-crayboat as a weather and marker boat for the Louis Vuitton Cup races. There was a bit of a lull in the racing, and in this handy little window, he suggested we all clear off for a couple of days and go for a bit of a fish.
Until this time the fishing off the eastern coast of Coromandel Peninsula from Whitianga to Tauranga had been unbelievably barren and dead. It had been a lousy January fishing-wise, so I gladly grabbed a seat on this trip, if only to see if the fishing was any better over on the other, western side of the Coromandel. Hell, if there were no gamefish around, surely we could find something to catch!
The original plan of exploring the upper end of the peninsula had been revised somewhat by the time I got there, due to work commitments, but we were still on line for a couple of days, first to the bottom of Waiheke, and then off the islands around Coromandel. Perhaps it was not as exciting an adventure as originally planned, but still, it was fishing in some waters I was new to, and I was keen to see how things would go.
They went sloo-oo-wly. Ocean Enterprise, nice, steady old lady that she is, is not a fizz boat, and on my own boat, Superhero, I am used to a degree more alacrity in transit. There is a fair difference between 10 knots and 40 knots.
Still, by late afternoon we were nudging our way towards the 14m pin off Kauri Point at the bottom of Waiheke Island. Fish sign was pretty scattered and things were not looking promising, but hey, there had to be something mooching around in 14m of water. Besides, according to the sounder, there were huge masses of baitfish only a couple of metres down. This HAD to be worth a go.
Over the side splashed our baits, a mix of pilchards and baby squid, with only light ball sinkers, just sufficient to get to the bottom, we thought. Oddly though, the lines would feed out nicely for about 6m, then slowly just stop. Puzzled, we looked over the side of the boat, only to see, to our surprise, a solid mass of jellyfish below us.
I do not mean a few here and a few there, no way man, these critters were solid, and a lightly weighted bait would just sit on top of them. Things did not look promising for the evening. By adding some more weight to the sinkers we were finally able to bounce our baits through this layer of gelatin, but it still meant that the baits were totally slimed up with jellyfish goo. Hmmmm. No fish for dinner that night!
So we anchored up in the calm of Waiiti Bay, along with seemingly half of Auckland, and planned the next day's trip. The general consensus was to head across the gulf to the islands off Coromandel, and see just what we could find once we were there.
Waking to the joyous sound of a thousand marine latrines being flushed around us, we were soon off across the gulf, heading for waters clear. The weather was perfect, glassy calm, ideal for making a long, slow trip across to the Happy Jacks. After a short stop out in deeper water for a couple of short drifts, we decided to head on to the islands. We managed to put a couple of just oversize fish in the icebox out wide, but we were hoping for something a little more stimulating in closer.
That was the plan, and as plans go, it was perfect in all respects, apart from the crucial one of not actually working. Nope. Reduced to not anchoring due to a twitchy capstan, drifting in close to the rocks was not a happy option, and the fish seemed to be avoiding us in droves. Oh well, no worries, we gradually wove our way south through the islands until we were able to tie up in the afternoon to one of the mussel farms inside Motuoruhi Island.
Here at last we were able to get some fish on board. A string of small, pan-sized snapper of around 30cm or so dribbled aboard. Perhaps the prize catch of the day, though, was a large clump of mussels that somehow safely wound around my Black Magic Snapper Snatcher!
We wound up with around a bucket full of mussels, a most unusual capture. Perhaps a clump had fallen off the recently harvested ropes around us. It certainly was a welcome catch, giving us not only some top fresh bait, but also some lightly steamed mussels with vinegar for dinner. We were well pleased!
This time, with enough snapper aboard to keep the guys' families happy for a meal or two, we decided to head over to the sheltered waters on Motuoruhi's southern side to anchor up for the night. We had the place to ourselves, with moreporks softly calling on the island and an incredible starfield above us. It was a magic night.
Next morning dawned, and in order to try our hands at an early morning fish, we dumped the previous night's mussel remains over the side as burley. We were soon into a run of small, but just keepable snapper, straylined off the back of the boat. Where were the better fish. We were seemingly raiding the nursery all trip this time. It was most frustrating.
While we were breakfasting and abluting, we saw one of the mussel barges heading to the nearby farm to do some harvesting, so we quickly upped sticks and headed over to have a chat. The ploy worked perfectly. No fish, but the skipper of the barge, a helluva guy, gave us a whole bucket of mussels to scoff. What a great guy! Taking our booty, it was time to make waves.
We had a ways to go yet, as we wanted to be back in Half Moon Bay that evening. So off we went, racing at the exciting speed of 10 whole knots. Good lord, man was not meant to survive at such speed, it was exciting, I can tell you. Our target was the outside of Waiheke, where Keith had his favourite little scallop dredging spot.
I had never tried this scalloping before, so it was a very interesting experience. Keith slowly motored along his secret 'Spot x' what he will not let me tell you, and, to ensure that the dredge was working properly, he had me hold the rope. If I felt it biting that meant we would be getting scallops, he assured me. I didn't half feel a pillock, standing there feeling for scallop bites on a half-inch rope.
Still, apparently it worked. My magic touch paid off again, as after only a couple of runs, we had amassed to my eye a staggering haul of these juicy treats. Having caught them all, apparently it was now my job to grade them all according to size. After a short while we finally had a much-reduced pile of scallops to gloat over. Oh well, we still had 80 of the beauties, the limit for the four of us aboard, so I guess we could not really complain.
It was now edging on towards early noon, and we still had a ways to go yet. So, with the dredge all safely stored away, we headed off around the northern side of Waiheke. While it was a very pleasant little jaunt, I was conscious of the end of the trip nearing, and to my mind we still had a pretty pathetic haul of fish aboard. This is not the way Superheroes such as myself maintain our reputations, you know, so I wanted at least a few more fish before we got home!
Oh me of little faith. Keith had this in mind all along. By various routes, after a while (God I miss my 40 knot boat!) we were over the Motuihe Rubble, almost directly opposite the Tamaki Estuary.
With half pillies on running sinker rigs, we were soon getting good takes from snapper, and although we naturally landed a prime assortment of undersized fish, we were picking up the odd keeper, mostly around the 1.5kg mark. All that way, only to find the best fishing of the trip some 5km from the marina! I ask you, where is the justice?!
Cleaning the fish on the way back in, flicking the trimmings to the gulls as they swooped about us, it was a nice enough way to while away yet another sunny summer afternoon. Still, all the way in, I was still pining, pining for the 40 knot boat, and longing for a trip somewhere where some gamefish swim. I've done the inner harbour snapper thing. Now I want some MARLIN!

Ranfurly Fishing on the Pacific Invader

One of my summer necessities is to make a trip to the Ranfurly Rise, 20 miles or so off East Cape. It is not because the Ranfurly is particularly scenic, no more so than any other patch of ocean really, but it is certainly more prolific than most bits of the wobbly blue.

Of late I have been booking my trips on Mike Richmonds Gisborne based �Pacific Invader�. If the name sounds familiar, she is the re-named �Ocean Invader�, the boat made famous by Steve Haddock when she was based in Whakatane. I liked her when Steve had her, and I like her now under Mikes guiding hand. To me, she is about the perfect fishing boat, roomy, comfy, and laid out for maximum fishing ease. Love her!

Mike Richmond, Skipper of Pacific Invader

This trip, like most others, started in the evening as we slipped quietly out of the Gisborne marina, heading up the coast. Normally we would be making for Tolaga Bay for the night, but this time Mike wanted us to get around the East Cape early, so we could skip some forecast weather and put in some trolling time in the Waihou Bay area.

Now normally my idea of a Ranfurly Trip is a blood an� guts rape and pillage (well, not quite) type trip, where everyone is after a hapuku or three, and a few kingies, lotsa tarakihi and so on to take home for the families.

Sunset over Tolaga Bay, as we steamed on northwards

Not so on this trip, as we had only two dinkum Kiwi fisherman aboard, myself and Pukekohian Russell Smith, while we had three Aussies specially freighted in from Sydney, Terry, Pat and Brad, and a couple of yanks along as well, Mike and Keith. So, with only two people on board actually able to take fish home, we had no particular drive to kill fish.

That pretty much counted out one of my favourites, hapuku fishing. I love fishing deep water for big fish, you never know what is going to come up, but whatever does is usually dead by the time it pops onto the surface. A couple of deep drops (deep here being around 450ft), the Aussies all bagged bigger fish than they had seen ever off Sydney, just average sized �puka and bass really, and that was enough. Time to go.

Sydney-sider Terry Smith with a nice little Ranfurly Bass

We took the rest of the day off for gamefishing, trolling from the Ranfurly to Waihou Bay. Given that the wind built from a 15kn southerly to a 30kn SE, it was a good choice!

We trolled, all day, with only the one Marlin Strike to interrupt to tedium (I am not an enthusiastic troller). The fish gave the Lumo Fishwest Bullfrog a good whacking, but missed the hooks. That night at anchor in Waihou Bay, I rechecked all the hooks, making doubly sure they were as sharp as I could get them.

Next morning, off we headed again. The plan was to work the Waihou/East Cape area all day for Marlin, as plenty were being found there at the time, and as luck would have it, the plan worked! Hurray!

Just on noon, we saw a fin swing in on the Lumo again, this time we were right beside the reel...as soon as the marlin had whacked and let the lure go, I dropped the lure back, then whipped it back into it�s spot. The marlin made a second run at the lure, this time stripping off a good fifty metres before again dropping the hook. This time I gave it longer for the drop-back, and then wound in back in flat-out, almost to the white water.

Teasing the marlin like this really did the trick, as it so often does. Lit up and on a mission, the marlin charged in behind the lure, bound and detirmined this pesky fish was not going to get away. This time there was no mistake, the hook-up was hard and immediate.

Having done my part (the fun part I reckon!) I then handed the rod to Pat the Aussie, which delighted him as it was his first ever marlin, and pleased me too, as he then had the next 2 and a half hours to crank that sucker back in!

Tagged and released, free to come again!

Tagged and released, a very nice 170-180 kg Blue (maybe a very very large stripey) swam powerfully away, and one very bushed Ocker retired for the rest of the afternoon. The only other hit we had that day was from a 9.1kg Skippy, far and away the biggest I have ever seen.

Pat, delighted with his 1st Marlin, on this FISHWEST Cobra XL

The wind had been honking out East cape-way all day, but by evening, anchored up at Lottin Point, it was easing back. Hopefully this would give us passable conditions for our last day, which we were planning on spending kingfish hunting on the shallows of the Ranfurly.

Calm? I�ll say! Although with still a smooth lift and little flattening chop, there was no wind and the greasy seas gradually faded to a metre or so swell, perfect conditions. With our summer being so blah this year, having glorious sunshine all day was a real bonus.

Mike had us on the Ranfurly and fishing by 7-30 or so, and as we sat soaking our baits (I was using a Black Magic napper Snatcher, hoping to score a heap of the jumbo terakihi or trumpeter out there) tarakihi like this are top table fare

We watched Rick Pollock on Pursuit cruise past some 500m off our bow. Then we saw the big splashes. Then the big Marlin. Then more splashes, all behind his boat... he had hooked into a 200kg Blue right off or bow! Rats! Oh well, good luck to him. My snapper snatcher probably wouldn�t have held it anyhow.

We had a steady stream of assorted fish coming aboard now, but not too many of the Kingies we were after. I had one good fish on for a few minutes before it was cleanly snipped off the trace... hmmm, I guess a shark was lurking in the area somewhere. A few minutes later, a small mako of 8ft or so did a couple of perfect somersaults about 30ft off our stern corner, scaring the bejeezus out of the anglers standing right in front of it, a great sight sure, but not something you expect to see launch itself out of the water so close in front of you!

trumpeter and tarakihi abound�

OK, so there was a mako loitering about.. this was the deciding factor for Mike, he flashed up the motors and had us trundling off to try shallower spots for more Kingies. We stopped only couple of kilometres or so away, in some of the fishiest water you could imagine.

For a start the water was the bluest, clearest water I had seen this summer. All around us there were schools of baitfish working the surface, and, by the frequent surging splashes among them, being worked as well. Looking over the side we could see packs of rat kings, fish of around 10-20lbs, as the cruised about looking for a feed. The easiest way of hooking into these pups was speed jigging, and before long we had bits of metal whizzing up and down all around the boat.

Small kingfish were coming in and going back one after the other, it was a ball, until suddenly they seemed to go all shy on us. Huh? Had we scared them all now? Mike Schmahl, perched on the bowsprit was the first to let us know the real reason for our newly fishless state.

Poor old Mike. Standing on the bowsprit, with pretty much nothing but blue water below you, it must have been a rather nasty shock to have a 4-5metre Great White Shark swim directly below you. Certainly he was standing back in the cockpit in a recond 3.2 nano-seconds.

�eeerrmmm, ahem! Ah, quite a large shark out there guys� he squeaked. It sure as blazes was. What a fish! It is amazing how huge and powerful these fish are, they really radiate an aura of purpose, a sortof �I�ll eat anything I want� type purpose, we were all fascinated with this shark as it cruised around and around the boat in the glassy calm water.

Awesome!

It was so close that Mike was able to lean over and stroke the dorsal as the beast slid past us, magic. Then to our surprise, another showed up! Not so large, only a tiddler at around 4m, or a solid 500kgs I�d reckon, this fish was also soon circling around the boat.

The girth of these fish is awesome. Even on the small shark, there was no way I could ever spread my arms across it�s back, (nor had I any intention of doing so!) the pectorals looked like jumbo jet wings... the big surprise was that following this shark was a small school of kingies... maybe they used the shark as a moving FAD, certainly I doubt anything would come in and mess with them there!

Still, jigging a little deeper was still bagging kings, so we watched the sharks as they prowled around, and kept on catching fish. Then we had the great idea.... let�s feed the sharkeys! hurray! So, next time the Big Bopper cruised in, and we had a kingfish boatside, we held the kingi on the trace, out from the boat for the shark to see.

Red Snapper, or nannygai to Aussies, are plentiful out here

Funnily enough, this was not as easy as you�d think. For some reason, the kings would always try to duck under the boat, with a darn near audible �Eek!�, every time the shark swam by. Each loop the Whitey got more and more interested, but didn�t have the manovrablity to flick about on a dashing kingfish. It took a few sweeps past before the big fish lined the king up properly, then Boompha! In a lethal (and scarey, yikes!) surge, the shark rocketed forward and inhaled the 15lb Kingfish.

Holy cow. If you ever think there is some way you can out swim or out-fight such a predator, man, forget it. The news that the guys on �Cascade�, some 400m away, had seen this �really big Mako� and were preparing to put a diver over to look at it really got our gallows humour going. Talk about your live-baits!

The Skipper was soon on the VHF, advising them that the �Mako� was in fact something noticably nastier, and suggesting the diver may like to sign a Waiver absolving Cascade of any blame before he hopped over to swim unprotected with the Great Whites.

We shifted a couple of times as our drifts moved us across the shallows of the Ranfurly, each time the Whites followed us. Finally our fishing instincts took over, and a Cunning Plan was hatched. Next time the Shark moved in, I had another Kingi held by the boat. This time it was the baby of the pair (Still a bloody big fish!), and as it nailed the traced Kingfish, the skipper leaned over and slapped the tag into it�s broad back.

The shark never even felt the tag, but the kingi had disappeared into the maw of the leviathon, a second later the 200lb nylon trace was snipped clean...so technically folks, i have now Tagged and Released a 500kg Great White! Gawrsh!

Filling in the Tag card, we put down a �fight-time� of 5 seconds. It may have been less. Hey if they can do it to catch Marlin of 2 or 3 kg line, why can�t we do it with a shark? Sounded kosher to us.

Well, we kept on fishing, all the kingies, up to 50lb or so,

Standard ranfurly kingies�.

we put back, apart from one small one Mike Schmahl wanted for sashimi-ing, but the stream of tarakihi, snapper and trumpeter all made their way into the box. Before long, sadly, our predatory accompaniment glided off into the deep for the last time. That was the real bonus of the trip, it was awesome seeing an apex predator so very, very close. Mike Schmahl still has the willies after having that big fish swim directly below him!

All in all, it was a super trip. We never set out to keep much fish, as we simply could not handle it, and things worked out well enough that we indeed did only have enough for the two of us. Admittedly, a hell of a lot enough, but a handle-able amount. We had tagged and released a big Marlin, a first for the angler, so he was particularly stoked, and had the awesome privilege of seeing those sharks.

So, in past trips Mike Richmond has had us an Orca on our lines (that is another story, better yet, go get Bill Hohepa�s video, �Biggies of the Deep�, it is on there), we have landed 60kg plus Bass, and now I have tagged and released a great White... what will the man do for us next trip!

A great way to while away a day!