Archives for October 2020

Composite Fall fishing report , zero to 350ft!

October 31, 2020 By Scott Leave a Comment

If you were wondering if things improved after the lousy summer season, here’s the Team report from shoreline to boat:

Jeremy, flats whipper and fly fisher: After a really slow summer, I had high hopes for good action in September, as it’s been a prime month year after year. This year was no exception. Papio and o’io bites were good, along with the opening of moi season, accounted for my best month so far this year. But as we neared the ending of October, action has died down quite a bit. With winter approaching, catch numbers will drop, so it wasn’t unexpected that bites have dropped, but it still disappointing when you go home whitewashed sometimes, LOL. How has everyone else fared this fall?

Matthew, shoreline whipper and fly maker: It’s been a very slow September-October for me, months that in previous years have been great for me. The fishing has been very inconsistent (at least on my part), and I wasn’t able to find any pattern (tides or conditions) in the few catches I made except for “right place at the right time”.

Since I am a fly tyer that is eager to test my new colors, I have been strictly whipping with bubble + fly at a few spots. The Papio bite has been odd this year, ending earlier than normal. Being on the south shore of Oahu definitely doesn’t make the bite any better, but perhaps other sides of the island are seeing similar trends, just less drastic. However, a bunch are still out there, and if you’re lucky, you may be able to catch one. I was able to pick off a few Papio at one of my spots, most of them in the early morning. The only thing similar with all of the catches is that they were caught on smaller flies, around ¾” shorter than my normal flies (a significant amount for a fly). Perhaps the Papio are keying in on smaller, easier to catch prey? The colors that worked for me this month the most were Oama and Hinalea patterned flies, to match the most common baitfish at my spot. One of the Papio that I was forced to keep because it swallowed the fly had a hinalea the exact size of my fly and a small manini in the stomach.

I have been seeing less activity in the water, such as baitfish fleeing from a predator, less schools of baitfish along the shoreline, and less follows and boils on my flies. It could mean the bite is turning cold, but it’s no reason to give up.

It may be a good time to focus on other types of fishing, such as fishing for “easier to catch” edible fish, such as Moana, Toau, Taape, or Weke. Kaku fishing on the flats with topwater lures is a fun, year-round event that I enjoy, but not something I’ll turn to yet. Oio fishing on the flats has also been inconsistent, with some of the guys getting great results one day, with nothing the next. While the fishing may be slow, I’ll keep plugging away at my spots until I catch something. For all of you like-minded whippers, keep at it, the time will come soon.

Dino: “Well, another whitewash morning” I say to Thad as we walk back to our cars. This is a saying that was becoming more and more common during the peak summer months. I didn’t know what was going going on? Corona virus perhaps? Cutting my nails at night? Who knows…

Things changed as October arrived. I started picking up some small paps here and there. Noting to write home about, but hey at least I was getting some kind of action. I mainly fish town and north shore for the most part. Action was good at the north shore spots where the Halalu were coming in. Good sized Lai were caught and friends picking some nice sized awa’awa. I’m primarily a whipper these days. Hardly ever using bait anymore. That being said, bubble fly is my main technique. Picked up a nice sized omilu on the town side during a dawn patrol session, weighing 4 pounds. The sun was barey coming up when it hit. The Kanakē fly by my good friend Jourdan Kua’ana of Lawai’a Flies has been really productive for me. It’s what I was using when the 4 pounder hit.

October has been pretty good considering the peak summer months has been really slow for me.

Be safe, have fun!

Jason, fly fisher and on-the-water reporter: It’s certainly been a Fall (and year) like no other. Looking back at my logs, I see that I’ve hooked at least one bone on all 4 of my fall trips, and friends have also been consistently hooking fish.

I will note that I have seen far fewer bonefish in shallow this year – a direct result, I believe, of the pandemic-spurred increase in nearshore ocean activity. I have also heard that other flats around the island have been a bit slow this year, but suspect these reports are coming from hardened sight-fishermen who simply aren’t seeing as many fish.

I personally believe the fish are still around, they’re just staying farther from shore, or are hanging out in the deeper channels of the flat where they feel safe from the swimmers, SUP boarders, spearfishermen, whippers, fly fishermen, throw netters, windsurers, kite boarders, foil boarders…. well you get the picture! It’s a “circus” out there, as my friend Rich likes to say, haha. If you can come away with a fish, you definitely beat the odds. Either that, or fish the weekdays (might as well, you can’t really go anywhere for vacation this year). I personally enjoy blind casting for bonefish with my two-handed rods, so I am pretty well-adapted to catching bonefish that don’t want to be seen.

Another thing I’ve noticed, is there seems to be fewer reef fish in general on the flats, and the oama have never really made an appearance (at least in these parts). I am not sure if this is also related to the general increase in activity, or maybe just an increase in folks harvesting them (legally and illegally). I know there’s got to be more of that going on this year, thanks in part to our current economic conditions.

My suspicion is that things will begin to fall off soon (pun intended), but for now, I’ll keep shooting until I miss!

Kelly, SUP inshore troller: Fishing has been slow, mo betta go surf!

Scott, offshore kayak fisher: Fall is normally a great time to offshore fish because there are more light wind days, the water temp cools a bit, inviting pelagics to come closer to shore again, and opelu become more catchable than they are in the summer. But recently, the kayak hammahs have been reporting slow pelagic fishing despite catching a tank full of opelu. My uku spots have only held bait stealers. Not sure where the bigger fish moved to. Bottom fishing for goats and nabeta is still productive, and the big jacks are still willing to take jigs. Hope the target fish are targetable soon!

Erik, small boat fisher: Nearshore bite has been good for us this season. As the winds died down and the seas calmed, it presented more opportunities to fish. Calm nights have brought a good menpachi/aweoweo bite in late September and akule bite was good earlier October with larger size akule showing up. Bigger schools of opelu have also been seen and caught and the better bite times are at dawn and dusk. Pelagics are seen more regularly closer to shore and ono and mahi are coming in to feed on the bait. We’ve not had to go further than 350′ for the ono and mahi, and live-baiting seems to be the best way to get them. We’ve gotten all the pelagics on lures so far and plungers/slant-faced along with deep-diving lures are what’s been working for us.

Holoholo: After work and school grocery run

October 29, 2020 By Scott 3 Comments

Capt Erik shares how his plan came together, in this heart warming tale of 3 generations fishing together on their “new to them” 17ft Boston Whaler Montauk.

Capt Erik: Sometimes I feel like I’m crossing the line of exposing, experiencing, & sharing time with my oldest son into indoctrinating him into becoming someone who loves fishing. Which is why I choose to limit the amount of time we’re out trolling so that he doesn’t become bored or feel like I forced him. I balance his ocean loves (swimming, snorkeling & most: night torching) with some trolling & whipping. This fishing trip was AWEsome.

I decided that we would do an evening troll after work for a couple hours since I had a longer work week & needed to get out the oldest son out of the house to break away from the distance learning schedule. The bonus was that dad was able to go with us. The plan was to blast straight out to an area that I heard was biting & see if we could get something on the way in. 3 hours max to make it in before sunset, park boat at home and I’d wash it in the morning before I head to work. We headed out from the pier & my son took his favorite place at the bow and hemo’d his shirt before we took the boat off the trailer. I saw some rain squalls 10 minutes out & told him to put his rain jacket on just in case. He must’ve been tired from standing on the bow & bracing himself because he laid on the seat to nap. Since we were slowed for him to don his rain gear and we saw some birds diving & circling already I looked at the fish finder and noticed opelu schools.

“Dad we go put em out already?” I asked. “Yup!” Dad responded. As my son caught some ? not even 5 minutes into the lines hitting water the starboard line starts going ZzzzZzzzZzzZ. Dad takes the wheel, I try waking my son up but he’s in a deep sleep & start bringing in the center longline. Wind squall is starting & the cold air-drizzles begin. Fish is still on while I pull the center line lure in & decide to leave the port side lure out. Cranking in the fish I see an ono thrash on the port side line ? & after another quick jerk of its body it’s free. I get the ono to the boat & realize the one treble hook it’s hooked on the outside of its mouth & the fish still has some life left. No time to waste “Husssss” gaffed right in body.

I tried waking my son gently but let him rest as the rain was now consistent. 1 on the boat within 30 minutes of launching. Dad and I did a big circle to try and let the rain pass knowing we’d be following it if we turned around and went straight back in. My son woke a little while after and was surprised to see the fish. He was still groggy and the rain squall wasn’t moving so we decided to rush em in. We got pelted by rain and it was so thick at one point the gps couldn’t connect to the satellite. The heavy white-out rain only lasted a minute and through it all not one peep from my son. No complaining , not scared and just sitting there watching me and his Papa laugh at the situation. Of course the calm came after the rain and it was a beautiful and little chilly drive into the bay. Had plenty time to wash at pier and head home to let my youngest play with the fish and take pics.

And when we got home my oldest told everyone “WE caught a big fish.” I loved hearing that. He may not have seen the fight but he was onboard and still felt a part of the catch. He was the good luck charm!

Another compact tungsten jig taken by big fish!

October 26, 2020 By Scott 7 Comments

I’ve been kayak fishing the Windward side for kau kau fish (goats, lai, nabeta, small uku etc) but wasn’t finding opelu, bigger uku, or pelagics. When the wind and surf dropped on the South side I went back to check my old spots. Those spots were overrun with small fish who pulled my frozen opelu off without getting hooked.

After going through more than 20 pieces (I ended up cutting the opelu in half), I gave up and put a live moana out. 10 mins later the fish got hit and a scrappy 2lb omilu came up, in 70ft of water. I’ve never caught an uku on a live moana despite its reputation as “uku candy”. I let the omilu go (you’re welcome Matt), and went 1 mile downwind to a spot I’ve hooked ulua on jigs, but lost them. Here’s the report when an ulua busted me off.

Squiggly horizontal lines started showing up about 20ft off the bottom so I dropped the pink 60gm tungsten jig down. I didn’t expect a huge fish since the jig is only 2.5″ but it got slammed by a fish at full speed, and the fish pulled tight drag off my reel smoothly. Right as I was reaching to turn the GoPro on, the line when slack. What came up was the curly cue “pig tail” of my 40lb flouro leader where it was attached to the Tactical Angler Power Clip. I had tied a Uni knot to that clip 2 trips ago on the water and maybe I didn’t cinch it down tight enough?

The SW wind picked up and I was now more than a 2 miles downwind from my launch/landing. There were still 4 out of 6 battery levels left on the Bixpy jet motor and I ran it at less than half speed and paddled along. 2 battery levels remained when I touched sand. Whew.

I have one more of those pink tungsten jigs in that prototype shape. This was the last time that particular jig was photographed, landing a lai on an earlier trip. I was working with an established international tungsten company to design affordable compact jigs to sell in the Store. They sent me a small set to try out and the jigs have gotten bit on every trip, from moana, lai, to ulua and kahala, but the company suddenly went MIA. I’m bummed because these were the best jigs I’ve ever fished. I’m now working with a second company to get their jigs in, and hoping they don’t disappear on me.

Thad, our resident JDM expert and whipping technician, suggests I use 8 wraps with the uni knot instead of the 5 I’ve been tying. I’ll definitely give that a shot!

Holoholo: Shibi on the rocks caught on homemade damashi!

October 23, 2020 By Scott 14 Comments

First time Holoholo writer Krystal with a heart warming story of an incredible catch.

Krystal: Hi, I’m on the Big Island. As a kid, my dad would take me fishing and I loved it. After he suddenly passed when I was 12, I never went fishing again. Having a health scare of my own towards the end of 2016 with a diagnosis of leukemia, life had taken on a new meaning. In January 2019, I made up my mind to do what I love. My own three kiddos were older now and I was managing my health better. Going holoholo has been my therapy. I hope to share a few of my stories with you along the way.

It all started with the invite to The Rock.

I’ve heard the name Suicide Rock thrown around by fishermen over the years but never knew where it was exactly or why it was so “famous,” if that’s even the word to use. As a novice fisherwoman, I knew it was hard to get that spot and didn’t want to skip on this potential once in a lifetime opportunity.

I had just broken the largest eye of my dunk pole a couple days before the invite and asked my brother to borrow his. The day right before our trip my husband came home with a surprise. He had just come back from visiting our landlady who had been going through her late husband’s possessions. My husband opened our car trunk to reveal about a dozen rods and reels! They were all old school, mostly medium-heavy dunk poles, just what I needed! I selected an 11 ft Ugly Stik to take on the trip and gave my brother back his dunk pole.

I had found one of my late father’s old conventional reels in our storage. Nothing special, a very old Eagle Claw brand reel with a line winder. I had never used a conventional reel before but wanted something that could hold more line than my biggest reel (a Penn Passion 5000). The guys I fish with like to use drones to take their jigs 400+ yards out and I could never get that close even with my biggest spinner.

I took apart the conventional, cleaned it, greased it and spooled on as much 50lb braid as I could on there. I wasn’t gonna jig with it, just slow retrieve a damashi with bait. I figured that this reel paired with the Ugly Stik was gonna be just fine for what I wanted, little did I know how it would turn out.

Fast forward to our trip. Suicide Rock was everything I imagined it to be, a rock out from the rest of the land that you need to time with the waves to get to. Water surges between the main land and the rock and also comes over the entire rock itself at times. Not for the faint of heart. I planned to leave the rock for the guys and stick to the safer part of the spot we were fishing.

It was near sunset on our 2nd day and I decided to give my setup a try. My friend had just tied up a few damashi rigs and gave one to me but now, it was nowhere to be found! I decided to take it into my own hands and tie one myself. I grabbed the biggest line I had: 40lb mono. A spool of line I found under the house I’m renting. It belonged to my late landlord. I looked through my tackle and picked up the size 16 BKN hooks thinking they were a decent size.

I began to tie a hook on with a snell knot, or what I think is a snell knot but couldn’t remember which way the line was supposed to wrap around. I ended up doing it backwards. I should have started with the bottom hook not the top one of the damashi line. Oh well. I looked at the bottom hook of the chain of 3 I just tied and didn’t trust the snell would hold. I managed to finagle a sort of clinch knot on top of it to give myself extra assurance and kept the tag a little longer than I normally would just in case the knot slipped a bit (little did I know).

My friend sent my damashi out into the sky and woops! It dropped pretty close to shore. There was a knot in my reel that caused it to stop unexpectedly. Unable to get the knot out, I reluctantly reeled my damashi back in so it wouldn’t snag the bottom. On the 2nd attempted drop, the bait on my bottom hook came off (I was using dead halalu pieces). Another friend decided to add a whole piece of frozen shrimp on the bottom hook as well as a small piece to the middle hook. It looked ridiculous going out on the 3rd attempted drop. My friend said he’d drone out really slowly this time. We found the knot in my reel and managed to get it out! This time the damashi went really far.

We let it sink maybe 20 seconds or so and I slowly began to retrieve. Everyone began to go about their own when I suddenly got stuck. I reeled a bit harder and wait, was this a fish? Everyone began to notice the struggle I had and shouted “Krystal’s on!”

Whatever was on my line was really heavy and every few minutes it would run and undo all the line I just managed to reel in. My left forearm was on fire as I got the fish closer to land but the guys said it was going way to the right — right to Suicide Rock! They said I had to go out there to land it. I slowly walked my way over the lava rocks, with all the guys right by my side guiding me and coaching me the whole way. They had to clear my line of the ulua poles they had out on the rock. The fish went right, then left, then right again. Finally they could see that I wouldn’t be able to land it from where I wanted as it was rubbing the ledge and getting stuck. They took my pole from me and braved Suicide Rock to fight the fish so I could remain safe on the main land.

The waves were washing all over the rock as they tried to land the fish. They had to get it unstuck from the ledge a few times and one of my friends nearly ended up in the water. When he saw the fish come up in the whitewash he reached down to grab it with the gaff and it stuck! Chee hoo! It was an 8.9 lb shibi (ahi under 100lb).

I never thought that a shibi would be the fish I’d catch with a damashi. Let alone my very first damashi I had ever tied and on frozen shrimp! Everything came together in an almost surreal way. A trip of a lifetime equaled to a fish of a lifetime.

Holoholo: Omilua speared on inaugural boat trip

October 19, 2020 By Scott 3 Comments

Holoholo writer Hunter, true to his name, has gone from shore fishing to hunting under water. He typed this on his phone one night, while fishing, and sent it over via IG DM! Congrats on your big omilu Hunter!

Hunter:

I woke up at 5:30am on a Saturday morning. My dad had just bought a new boat from his friend for a cheap price. We decided to test it out with one of his friends. As we drove closer to Heeia boat ramp my excitement grew. Arriving at the parking lot we saw my dad’s friend waiting for us in his car. We parked the boat in a stall and got all the stuff ready. As we launched the boat and tied it to the dock I grew nervous for no reason at all. It might’ve been excitement but it felt like butterflies. We all jumped in the boat and headed out to the spot.

The water was flat but choppy. We drove at a slow speed as we were only beginners. Arriving at the spot we could tell it was clean. I jumped in and was amazed to see clear waters and fish all around me. We swam around, shot a couple fish including a munu and an uhu. As we made out way back to the boat I dropped down on a small Munu. I saw a small papio as well. As my eye drifted from one side of the hole to the other I saw the outline of two big fish.

My heart started beating faster and faster as I approached what turned out to be 2 big electric blue Omilus. But just as I got into range they noticed me and started booking it. I rapidly ascended to the surface to report what I had just seen. With excitement I shouted “Ulua!” My dad and his friend came over. His friend told me what to do and to be careful as they were very big fish.

I slowly ascended being conscious that this might be my first omilu ulua. I tried to stay calm but my heart was racing. I landed on a small ledge across from the hole where the omilus were in. As they circled in and out the biggest one made a mistake and came too close to me. I took the shot and hit him right next to the head. He went crazy tangling my line and pulling my gun. 10 minutes of absolute chaos. Finally he got tired and as I went down to retrieve him I was basically having a heart attack at that point. I pulled the fish out and relief fell over. I brained the fish I couldn’t help but smile cheek to cheek.

When we got back in we decided to weigh it at Nankos. It came out as 14.41lbs. It was a day to remember in my books.

Fishing day after full moon, super calm conditions, how do you think we did?

October 5, 2020 By Scott 9 Comments

The night before had clear skies and a bright, full moon. The next day had very light kona winds but big surf except for the South Shore so Frank and I returned to our regular spot. We planned a late start because the tide was gonna bottom out at about 10am and sure enough nothing bit until the tide began to move.

Fish could be coaxed to take our frozen opelu chunks but because they had fed the night before, they grabbed between the two hooks and stripped the baits. Thankfully the sharks were smaller than normal and chewed through the leader quickly instead of getting hooked in the corner of their mouth and dragging me around.

It was so slow that our highlight catches were a whopper nabeta Frank caught on his bottom fish rig baited with opelu chunks, and an 11 inch omilu that hit my damashi tipped with opelu skin. I’ve never caught so many omilu in the deep before and released it so it could swim close to shore and give my shore fishing buddies some action. 🙂

Was a great day to paddle around, but the full moon and calm water surface had the fish taking naps. Dark skies the night before and some chop on the water seem to be the best conditions for kayak fishing.

Poll Results: 2020 Shoreline Season – how good was it?

October 3, 2020 By Scott 5 Comments

Based on the 39 participants who participated in the poll, only 1/3 said it was about the same as previous years. Just 5% did better than previous years and more than 60% complained that this year was slower than previous years.

Why? For sure it’s bait availability was a factor. There were less bait fish, including oama, near shore, so the preds didn’t risk coming so close to all the people traipsing in the water. And yes, there were more traipsers due to the shutdowns of many businesses.

There’s a strong possibility that the fact that this is the first season after an El Nino, which caused reduced rainfall and slightly cooler water and air temps, made it difficult for baitfish production.

It’s not like the papio died off and are permanently gone though. We’re catching much more papio in deeper water than we normally do. I guess they’re foraging for food out there.

Small tungsten jig outfished bait and a normal jig!

October 1, 2020 By Scott 9 Comments

We were blessed with light wind this week so I was out on the windward side again, working on my damashi skills and doing more tungsten jig testing. Even though the big tide was rising, there wasn’t much current so it was easy to pan around, mark fish, then drop on them.

I started out looking for opelu, couldn’t find any, so I went past 100ft to a depth Capt Erik told me to check. Sure enough there were marks along that depth contour and my first weke nono (Pflueger’s goatfish) came up. I was stoked to find one, but since it was a little one I let it go. Drifted off that mark and must’ve been over sand because a nabeta came up next. Then it was non-stop deepwater lizardfish so I put one on my bait rod and dropped it down. Nothing touched it. Hmmm…

I took off the lizardfish and put a previously thawed and refrozen opelu on, and motored out to 200ft and back into 150ft with no love. Grabbed the jig rod with the 2.5″ 2oz tungsten weight and dropped down. Boink! A lizardfish grabbed it! Caught another lizard after that and decided to get off the sand and head in for the zone I had action on the last trip.

So the little jig was gobbled up the pesky lizardfish but could it attract a much bigger predator? I was over some spread out marks and was hopeful since that jig has been hit on every third drop or so, and kablam! Something strong and heavy yanked the rod tip down and was peeling out line. Now this was a decent fish and I really wanted to see what had hit the jig. A few minutes later a 15lb class kahala was expelling bubbles near the surface. My first kayak kahala on a jig, and a really fun fight on the Shimano Game Type J XHeavy rod and gold Trinidad 14 reel.

I motored/paddled back to that spot, and 2 drops later a stronger fish pulled line in long spurts. It shook its head so I assumed it was a bigger kahala but it turned out to be a GT that had just made ulua status. I had to tighten my drag further than I had with the kahala, and was surprised how much stronger the ulua was. I would say that the ulua fought harder initially but the kahala pulled more steadily. I couldn’t believe how the little jig, just 2.5 inches long, was causing these bigger fish to frenzy. I released the mini ulua also.

So now my confidence was super high and I dropped the jig again, and on the way down something swam off with it. This was an even stronger fighting fish and I tightened the drag as much as I dared. The runs were spurty and I could feel twanging on the line. Then there was less resistance and I cranked hard for a few seconds, came tight again and whatever was on the line at that point surged for the bottom and then the mainline cut. Either the fish was swimming towards the surface when the line felt slack, or I was reeling up a fish head that then got finished off by a shark. And the shark took my lucky blue jig whose eyes I painted with nail polish. 🙂

I put on a center weighted 100gm lead jig, found the mark again and… nada. I never got a bite again. Was it because the jig was too big or did the fish move off? The tide was reaching the slack high but I think the little magic Tunsten jig would have gotten bit some more. I just have a few of those left and look forward to trying them again!

Here’s what the fish looked like swimming off. Not the most graceful release of the kahala butat least he didn’t have any problems will a full air bladder keeping him on the surface.