Mack tuna Monday

Author: dunebuggy

Category: Trip Reports

Created on Tuesday, 22 February 2011 15:14

Written by Stuart Whitehouse

Arose at 4am to crystal clear skies to meet Jeff (aka; timeout) at Moffats Beach for his first offshore fishing trip. Jeff has had plenty of offshore yakking experience in the past but this was his first with fish hunting equipment. Since I am awaiting an appointment with a surgeon to discuss my hernia, I didn't wan't to make this a long trip and Jeff had not been offshore for a while I think so, he didn't want to be out for a long trip either. 

It was forecast to be fairly hot on Monday so we planned to be back on the beach by about 10ish for that reason, also because Jeff had somewhere to be at a set time. We launched in easy conditions and head out toward the shark nets and Jeff set up his gear once we were out a safe distance. Due to the calm conditions I had launched fully rigged and was ready to go so I took a few happy snaps while Jeff rigged up. 

We head out clear of the headland and set course toward the blinker, although we had no intention of going that far, it is often the case that schools of bait are found along this line but not much this day. Once we were more or less level with Brays rock we turned south and made our way toward it. It was a very pleasant morning with light winds from the north west but, Jeff and I both discussed the fact that neither of us had done well fishing with any northerly wind blowing. 

Showings on my sounder tended to be small clusters of baitfish or the like and the only thing I hook was the bottom. Damn it! Re rig! Jeff trolled around for a while as I Bottom fished but neither of us did any good on the troll. Eventually, Jeff spotted some birds out wide of Brays and we went to investigate. We say some surface action and I hoped for longtail tuna but it turned out to be mactuna. 

Today was a day I was glad to be with someone who had a shark shield. As we approached the school it was clear that the mactuna were not the only things having breakfast. Some serious thrashing took place on the surface. Schools of mactuna were popping up here and there and eventually we were close enough to get a cast in. My slug had barely hit the water and BANG! I was on. 

It didn't feel like anything big but as I put the pressure on it started to peel off line and did some great runs. I realised I had a lot more drag to play with and cranked it up a bit and leaned into the fish and it was as if it had just realised it was hooked and went off. Mactuna are a great fish that punch above their weight and are great fun to catch. As I drew close to landing this fish, a toothy critter of about 6 to 7 feet in length swam across about 2 metres beneath me. 

Jeff! Shark heading straight for you! It was the biggest I had seen from the yak so far but I am guessing that it headed for the depths or off in another direction when it felt the tickle of Jeff's sharkshield. I bought my fish alongside and decided against the gaff, not wanting to add more blood to the water right next to me, and as I went to grab the leader I decided to tail him instead but as I went for the tail, I had unknowingly let the line go slack and the hook fell out. It nose dived out of sight with a trail of blood behind it.

I doubt that it got to the bottom without being eaten. It wasn't long before I was on again, having been too slow and dropped two. I wasn't on the ball it seems. Anyway, I landed and bagged the smaller model and caught up with Jeff who was onto his own fish not long after we regrouped.