S.W.A.T Limits on 100lb Plus Bluefin Tuna with giant YFT in the mix ToadsToadsOnly
I have been fishing private boats all season and a couple Sundays ago I decided it would be nice for someone else to do all the work for once. So I set out the bat signal and hit up all my buddies and opt to fish with one of my favorite captains in the fleet I booked a 1 1/2 day with Greg on the Aztec leaving Sat night fishing Sunday the 16th with the Super Moon on full force. Two others decided to join the fun. If you have not fished with Greg try out his boat, although he is on the water most of his life you could tell he still loves to fish and this is his passion. He brings long range service to a shorter range trip, his newly remodeled Aztec has a state rooms, electrical plugs, lights, and curtains.
What sets this boats apart from others is he pays attention to details while fishing we were at the doc baiting up until 11:30 PM filling up 3 bait tanks and a slammer full of bait. The crew helps everyone that does not know what rig up. They walk up and down the side of the boat and checks every single rods drags, they make sure you check your drag again in the A.M since depending on the temperature and weather the drag pressure varies.
We get to the zone at about 8 am pretty late due to the very sloppy conditions two Sundays ago. Once we get to the zone Greg gets on the PA and tells everyone get ready guys! This school is massive the fish are down at 140' lets see if they are going to react to the chum. He yells to the crew "START DUMPING BAIT AND DON'T STOP UNTIL THE FISH ARE BLOWING UP!". The crew yells boil at 100 yards! Boil 70 yards! Greg on the PA says "THE FISH REACTING AND UP IN THE WATER COLUMN THEY ARE UP TO 80'....70.... 50'.." "BOIL!" Greg had the crew dump probably half of the middle tank before the fish came up to the surface. Shortly after HOOKUP! The fish are blowing up around the boat Greg gets the balloon rod and lets it off on the bow where I was fishing. He tells me to watch it and make sure the rod does not get pulled in. I hear HOOKUP my buddy Jim was on and we had 2 fish going. Then I see a crash out of the corner of my eye a huge splash and the balloon rod is tight. I grab the rod and yell to Greg "Hookup on the balloon rod!" He say well reel it up, I battle this fish for 20 min and put the first or 2nd fish on the deck.
Shortly after things just went insane six guys hooked up, double balloon rod take downs, the insane part is all of these fish were the 90-120lb range Bluefin Tuna most of these fish were hooked on 40 and every single angler were in for the battle of their lives on relatively light gear. I was goofing off and hooked up on 25 and got spooled within seconds on full strike. I then get my Talica 12 with 60 lb top shot and 50 flour and never seen a full spool of braid disappear so fast and had about 15 wraps left on full strike before the hook pulled.
By this time the crew have been brailing bait for over 2 hours their time spent at the bait dock paid off and we needed the bait capacity to keep the fish up. Some of the fish blowing were Cows, I later hooked up on 40lb and we had 7 other fish going at the same time. Luckly we had a boat full of seasoned anglers and only 16 anglers on a boat which holds 28 so it was a light load. I put my 2nd BFT on the deck in about 45 min.
We were on the same drift all day and on the 10th hour of the drift the YFT rushes the boat and I landed 2 out of the 13 landed.
We ended the day with 26 BFT from 90-120lbs and 13 YFT what and epic trip the deck looked like we just got back from Guadalupe Island.
