A community of fishers sharing knowledge and Aloha
Sufix 832, arguably the best braid you can buy in the U.S., is always out of stock in the summer. It’s finally available from the supplier, so we have a good assortment of pound tests and colors, at our regular very low prices but not many of each. Click here to get yours before it sells out.
Normally, the month of September marks the gradual start of Fall weather, with periods of humid, light wind days. Not this year. Instead we had trade winds and showers throughout the month. I’m blaming the La Nina again, in fact the “experts” are saying yet another La Nina has started. That’s good for lessening the drought and keeping hurricanes away, but bad for offshore fishing.
I was only able to go out once in September, and it was so choppy on the Windward side that my Bixpy motor’s power cable disconnected because I hadn’t completely tightened it. Instead of paddling the 2 miles back to shore to reconnect it, I climbed out of the kayak when the winds calmed, and floated my way to the rudder to try to re-tighten it. Climbed back in, still was malfunctioning, climbed out, tried to tighten it again, and on the climb in my PFD got hung up on the kayak’s rail and I flipped the kayak!
I have never flipped in all the years I’ve been kayaking so I was stunned, 2 miles from shore, alone, with an overturned kayak. (It’s always much safer to kayak with a partner.) My heart began to race as I worried I couldn’t get back in. I righted the kayak, hung on the side a while to catch my breath, and ungainly scrambled in like a wounded crab, and ended up with my legs tangled up under me. My 3 rods/reels got dunked, lost a few small items, and broke one of the flush mount rod holder extenders. Thank God I was able to make it back in without getting hooked or stabbed.
Paddled back to shore with the help of the onshore gusts and tightened the motor’s power cable. The motor started without glitching so I kept testing it and eventually ended up 3 miles out. I wanted to “get back on the horse” and shake off my misadventure. Nothing good was caught in the choppy conditions.
Lot of good lessons were learned though.
One of the two Ram flush mount rod extenders I was using to hold my rods behind the kayak seat broke, leaving its base wedged in the flush mount. I couldn’t remove that piece, and it was impossible to find that exact Ocean Kayak flush mount rod holder online that would match the screw holes in the kayak, so I ended up having to take the flush mount out and chip away at the protrusion with every tool I owned so it still could be used.
I ended putting that partially filled flush mount in the spot of another flush mount I don’t use much, and put the undamaged flush mount in the spot behind the seat.
Instead of the Ram flush mount extender that couldn’t be locked tight enough to troll with, I’ll see how the Scotty flush mount extender works out. It’s strong and rigid but since it has no give, if I take a strike and the drag is tight, the kayak could flip or the flush mount could rip out of kayak’s base!
Well, they say it’s not IF but WHEN you will flip your kayak. I don’t want to go through that again, but now I have a better awareness of what do if I end up in the water and can’t get back in.
I would hang onto my kayak and first call for help on my VHF radio, and if that doesn’t bring a rescue, I could activate my PLB (Personal Locator Beacon). Bummer is, my rescuers may not be able to bring my kayak in also.
Hoping October has some light wind days!
We’ve been hearing more reports of small schools (less than 300 fish) of oama sighted and beginning to feed fairly well; with papio, some very large, attacking the schools. Normally this occurs by the beginning of August, so the oama schools are really late, but our guess is this is the best it’s gonna be for this year.
Gettum while you can!
We had been tested two shapes and four sizes of tungsten jigs from a reputable tungsten manufacturer, to make sure the jigs’ structural integrity held up and caught fish. Since the jigs performed well, we brought in a production batch of one shape to test further, striped with glow material to stand out in the depths.
The clear coat protected the paint from sharp teeth and snaggy reef, and the stripes glowed longer than most glow jigs. And, they continued to catch fish when the predators were keyed on very small baits.
I’ve even put small pieces of bait on the assist hooks and bottom fished to catch fish that were stealing the my larger baits!
We have a few of these production jigs left in the 80g (2.75″) and 100g (3″) sizes that we are now selling in the Store.
A large batch of 40g and 60g jigs in the second shape, perfect for shore jigging, and mimicking tiny baits just arrived. Soon to be placed in the Store and a fish’s mouth!
Big Island kayak fisher Shea shares their best outing yet, right before a storm was supposed potentially flood the island.
Shea:
The ocean on the windward side of the Big Island was crystal clear and flat as a lake and winds were dead calm through the work week, and the remnants of Hurricane Linda were supposed to pass by on Sunday, so my buddy and I decided to head out on Friday. Even with the full moon and a sub-par fishing forecast, we figured maybe the incoming low-pressure system would turn the fish on. We launched in the dark and immediately noticed that the water had some “morning sickness” as the surfers say. The winds also started blowing onshore 5-10 mph with higher gusts, so going out to the grounds was slower than usual. We got out to the bait zone just as the horizon was lighting up with hues of red and orange.
It wasn’t long before we started passing some massive schools of taape or some other bottom fish. Experience has taught me that sometimes the opelu will be close by. Sure enough, a cloud of bait spanning 25-75 feet deep soon came into view. I was able to hook four on the first drop, but only managed to get three onto the kayak. I decided to take my chances and head out deeper to catch the dawn patrol. I sent my first opelu out on a 44 lb wire stinger rig and slowly pedaled out over the drop-off. As I passed over into deeper water, the fish finder came to life with marks from the surface all the way down to ~150 feet. Some of the marks had the telltale cloud shape of opelu, so I dropped my sabiki rig down hoping to pick up a few more.
Something much stronger than an opelu immediately started screaming drag in short runs from my bait rod, and as I was fighting what would turn out to be a rainbow runner on my 10 lb test sabiki, something grabbed my live bait and took off on a short run. I tightened the drag on my Penn Spinfisher VI 8500 in an attempt to set the hook, but whatever was on the other end had come off. Thinking either my bait was gone or my line cut, I focused on landing my little rainbow runner, and just as I was brining it onto the kayak, my live bait rod bent over and screamed in its rod holder, listing my kayak over to the right. I guess my bait wasn’t gone after all!
Whatever was on the other end put up a decent fight, but it had obviously burned a lot of energy in its initial run. After a few minutes of tug-of-war, the fish was within 20 feet of my kayak, but I still couldn’t see it in the dark water.
Suddenly, the fish broke surface right next to me and I realized that for the first time in 7 months of kayak fishing, an ono (wahoo) was within reach of my gaff! I sank a rushed kage shot into the back of the fish’s head, then readjusted and got a decent stab clean through.
The ono curse had been lifted, and the stoke was real! My Hobie fishbag was not nearly long enough, so I radioed my buddy and asked if we could stow the fish in his. Turns out he was also hooked into a scrappy shibi ahi (yellowfin tuna). Nice double strike!
The fish finder screen was still lit up, and my ono would have to wait until my friend was done with his fish, so I decided to quickly tie on another wire stinger rig and get my second bait out. Not even a minute after letting my second opelu swim out, something grabbed it and I was on again! The bait couldn’t have been more than 50 feet down when it got eaten, so I figured it might be a shibi or another ono. After a brief but intense fight, the biggest uku (green jobfish) I had ever hooked broke the surface! My kage actually bounced right off of its skull so it took a few tries, but I was able to get the point to stick and wrestle it aboard.
I tied on yet another wire stinger rig and sent out my third and final opelu, then slowly made my way back to where I’d hooked the ono. I had passed over some promising looking bait schools while fighting the uku, so the plan was to try pick up more bait and perhaps give some to my friend. At the time, he was improvising using a live 2 lb rainbow runner and trolling out deep. Before I could even find the bait school, something devoured my last opelu and took off on a screaming run. After a couple decent runs, the fish started coming up easy and I saw the sillhoute of a shibi circling under the kayak.
After a fair amount of struggling, I rushed my kage shot, lost my grip, and watched in disbelief as the fish took off with my spear sticking out of it!
Luckily, the shibi came back up quickly and even still had my gaff in it. Nice easy and free lesson to be patient and wait for a clean shot, especially if the fish is hooked well!
My friend had managed to catch another opelu while I was fighting my shibi, so we decided to give the area another drift. With no baits left in the tube and not much energy left to pedal around and look for more, I decided to drop a 120g Majorcraft Jigpara slow-fall vertical jig into some promising marks on the sounder. After what must have been 7 or 8 missed strikes, I finally got a decent hook set into something. It turned out to be a rainbow runner slightly larger than the one I landed on my sabiki. There must have really been a lot of these guys out there.
After landing it, I looked over and saw that my buddy’s rod was bent and he was battling something. As I pedaled closer, I could see the long silver outline of an ono circling around under his kayak. Double shibis and double onos! Definitely one for the books and I don’t think either of us will be forgetting this day’s action anytime soon.
Here’s the video action of the story you just read:
The rain squalls and wind took a break on the Windward side so I was finally able to take Terry out on his Scupper Pro to explore the deep. He had guided me on my inaugural Westside kayak outing a couple weeks before. The deepest he had previously gone on the Windward side was about 130ft and that’s where we started dropping the damashi in hopes of finding nabeta. All I could manage was a puny skinny nabeta I released. An opakapaka pup of about 8 inches came up next and I tried depressurizing it so it could go back down but it floated so I had to keep it. Then the deep water lizardfish swarmed us.
We kept going deeper in hopes of finding the opelu piles. Terry put down a lizard fish as live bait and took a big strike that managed to come off his hooks. That gave me the idea to drop down a twice frozen opelu while hunting for the bait schools and after a while my reel went off! After a spirited, jerky fight a very round kawakawa came up that had taken both hooks so far down I had to cut the leader. I brained it to calm it down, and bled it over the side until the runoff ran light pink. The kayak cockpit looked like a crime scene and took a while to wash off.
Terry headed into the shallow ledge to damashi for reef fish, and I tried to find more pelagics. Sure enough my multitasking skills tripped me up. My damashi rig snagged my bait rig and as I tried to clear the mess I wrapped the bait rig line around my rudder. So I headed into the shallows to look for Terry. I couldn’t raise him on the VHF radio even though I could hear other kayakers 2 miles away, and turns out his radio wasn’t receiving properly. I finally reached him when I was a half mile away. This drove home the point to test your safety equipment and make sure all are in proper working order. Had I needed help Terry wouldn’t have heard me and I would have had to call the Coast Guard or nearby boaters. Terry has since been in touch with the radio vendor to trouble shoot the range problem.
Terry had been catching small and medium moana on his damashi and had one out as bait. I joined him, and found good marks on the deep end of the ledge, as I drifted shallow. Small weke nono and moana climbed on but nothing big so I reset my drift and went over a better mark with bigger fish. Dropped the 60gm tungsten jig with glow spinner blade, which makes the jig look like it has a fluttering tail, and made contact with something that yanked a lot but couldn’t pull drag.
Up came a Heller’s Barracuda (kawalea or kawelea, depending how exact you want to be) that tried its darndest to either throw the jig or bite through the leader.
Nothing bit Terry’s live moana and we had been out for 5 hrs and still had a couple miles to paddle in (paddle and motor in, in my case), so we set a comfortable pace and let the trade winds help us. It was so nice not to have disorganized following seas to worry about.
The damashi bite was better than it had been the last few trips. Dunno if that was because the water had warmed or if we were just able to fish more effectively in the calm water. Some odd ball fish landed were baby kaku, small trumpet fish, baby porcupine fish and some mystery fish that busted our light leaders.
I picked up some ice on the way home and left the kawakawa and kawalea packed in a cooler over night. When I cleaned the fish the next day, they were in great condition. The kawakawa weighed 10lbs after being bled the day before, but was fat because it had eggs and a belly full of decomposing small fish of various species. One looked like an oama that hadn’t made it in from the deep yet. That’s a good sign, maybe the oama are making their way in now.
Kawakawa has a bad rap as a bloody tasting fish, but if bled well, cleaned properly and wrapped in paper towels to remove more blood, the flesh has a great consistency and more taste than small yellowfin tuna. There’s also so many usable parts. The kawakawa was shared as follows: center bone for my neighbor to deep fry, fillets with dark meat removed for a friend to eat raw, eggs for my oama buddy to palu, belly strips went into the freezer to be used as bottom fishing baits, and the bloody scraps went to my sister’s cats. I also prepped the opakapaka pup and kawalea for my neighbor to steam.
If you haven’t been working the grounds this summer, Matthew tells you what you missed and what you can expect to happen in the next few months.
Matthew: Summer is now pretty much just a memory, and the action is unfortunately starting to slow down. I expect that we might only have a few weeks left of decent fishing before the action reverts back to levels commonly experienced during the winter months. The saving grace for the remainder of the season could be the arrival of the Oama, which still have not fully arrived inshore yet. Many are struggling to find schools of Oama and I personally only know of a few. Those few are not big schools and are not really biting too well.
For bait fishermen, the numerous Halalu piles over the course of the last month or so have served as Papio magnets, and those fishermen have been quite successful. However, some of those piles have been netted or just left without warning. The few piles that remain are guaranteed to be crowded and not so fun to fish. Without the Halalu piles to draw in the fish, and with the Oama still being nowhere to be found, there won’t be much incentive for Papio to come inshore. Sure, there will always be a few Papio hunting for smaller reef fish and Lizardfish, but unless the Oama come in, there definitely won’t be as much action as we saw in July and the first week of August.
In general, the fish have been dead set on biting at true dawn and true dusk, with not much action between those times. I’ve been getting the vast majority of my action from 530-630 A.M. and 630-730 P.M. Pretty much all of my trips have produced no action for the “junker” time, but then had one or two bites from a bigger fish towards the “better” time period. Unfortunately I got to experience the sting of a bunch of total whitewash trips over the last two weeks, something that didn’t happen to me during June and July, except for maybe a few times.
I think that it is still a good idea to squeeze a few more Papio out of this season before the action goes completely dead. After all, it will take a few weeks to make the full transition to “winter fishing” again. But after the action dies down, it may be a good idea to reconsider other types of fishing. Freshwater fishing is a year-round option, as well as Oio fishing, Moi fishing (when in season), and other small game alternatives (reds, reef fish, nenue, kala). Of course, you can still fish for the straggler Papio as well.
This summer was definitely the best season that I’ve ever experienced, with several big Papio caught and many smaller ones. A few of my friends also had great success fishing for big Papio as well. Overall the year so far has provided much more action than the previous one, so perhaps this winter will hold more fish than in the past. Stay safe out there, have fun, and good luck fishing!
Go gettum! -Matt
Well the 2020 oama season was a bust, as was the nearshore fishing and life in general. Looks like the 2021 oama season hasn’t really started yet, and it’s already the middle of August.
Here’s how the past years have gone:
Sorry for the bleak prediction but it’s looking like a terrible oama season unless they come in late and strong. With NOAA’s announcement of another La Nina winter, that’s unlikely. The silver lining is the halalu piles in the traditional places that are drawing large papio in the early morning hours.
It had been 8 weeks since my last decent catch and the wind on the South and Windward side of Oahu wasn’t letting up any time soon. I had been planning to meet up and fish with Terry, a contributor to the Hawaii kayak FB groups and a customer of the Store, and so he offered to show me his go-to Westside spot. The day was forecasted to be blowing over 12 mph everywhere else but only 8 to 12 on the lee side of the island.
I got to the spot a little after 7am, taking just 10 mins longer than it does to go to the Windward spot we had been planning to try. Terry was already setting up his Scupper Pro, which he skillfully outfitted with rod holders, fish finder, drag chute, insulated kill bag, bait tube, etc. I used to fish off a Scupper Pro and carried much less gear yet but looked more overloaded and disorganized than Terry’s setup.
The water was only slightly dimpled and the wind felt like 8 to 10mph but wasn’t impacting us at all. After a mile paddle we were at our first spot in 90ft of water. That’s a mile and a half less than the paddle to our Eastside deep spot! There were marks on the bottom that didn’t look like opelu but we dropped our damashi down to see what was around. A small moana came up for me and since Terry recently caught a 4lb uku on a moana in that general area, and I normally don’t do well with live moana, he put it on his live bait rig. I then hooked something that fought like a small papio but it shook off right before I could see what it was. Then I hooked a nice sized blue nabeta. Spoiler alert, that was the highlight of the day for me.
Terry began to get big bites on his homemade 20lb fluoro damashi rig. He had what felt like a good size papio break him off, then caught a beautiful 1.5lb weke nono.
He had been drifting around with his moana down for an hour and a half, and checked it to see if it was still intact. It was, and as he lowered it again the line took off! After an odd feeling fight he brought up a 3.5lb uku that was hooked in the mouth and in the side, thus inhibiting the way the uku could swim. We both were stoked with his action and I dropped a refrozen whole opelu down which immediately got mauled and yanked off the hooks. Felt like a small uku and I was expecting to connect with another soon.
Well, I just had my opelu baits chewed and pulled and Terry had two of his live moana steathily removed so he took me to the spot less than a mile away where he had caught his previous uku. We saw some bait marks that didn’t bite, I lost more baits including a live malu (sidespot goatfish), trolled around, jigged around, but couldn’t catch anything else.
I was super impressed with how Terry could cover the grounds without aid of pedals or motor, and fish over deep spots. He’s not exactly a spring chicken (neither am I), but showed no signs of tiring from the paddling. We both got a little stiff sitting on non-elevated kayaks seats though.
Our cars were intact with beach goers nearby and all was good. I did hit pau hana traffic on the way home and would need to leave by 2pm next time. My take of this area is that it does get fished often because the weather is favorable, but there still are reef fish inside. That’s a good sign that the fish population is healthy, but the fish weren’t big enough to swallow my hooks. That happens on the South side a lot too. Just gotta find the ledges that are holding the bigger fish.
Terry broiled the weke nono filets in a sake, vinegar, shoyu, ginger marinade. Was a bit dry but his wife said was ono. The next day they ate some of the uku as sashimi and steamed the rest Chinese style. Was winnahs! I saw my neighbor walking his dog as I was unloading my fishing gear and gave him my lonely nabeta. 🙂
Just wanted to share some products that have worked out really well.
So I broke my supposedly waterproof Galaxy S8 Active when I dunked it in fresh water after it went under in my PFD (personal floatation device). I needed a temporary phone right away, and got the Walmart-only AT&T Maestro.
AT&T Maestro Android smart phone – Surprisingly capable for only $70. Just needed to insert my AT&T sim card and optional SD card, and run through the normal new phone setup. Did the job as the temporary backup. Was comparable to a higher-end smart phone with the following exceptions:
I really needed a phone that had good call quality and took great photos. I didn’t want to pay $900+ for a “flagship” phone so I decided to try an Amazon Renewed (nicer way to say refurbished) phone with a 90 day warranty.
Samsung Galaxy S10 (refurbished on Amazon) – Debuted in 2019 as Samsung’s flagship phone, for $900. Was available in July 2021 as an Amazon Renewed (refurbished) for $240. Figured, if this refurbished phone lasts more than a year I’ll still be better off than with a $900 phone that only lasts 3 years or so. I was surprised how much better the S10 was than my S8. Don’t believe all the negative reviews about the refurbished phones on Amazon. Amazon sells “renewed” iPhones also. If you purchase a phone “locked” for your phone network, it should work with your sim card just as easily as if you purchased from your network’s store, AT&T in my case, and you have 90 days to see if you got a lemon.
Mr. Heater Handheld Shower – Cabelas.com – $44.99. Just put water in a bucket, drop in the base that sucks up the water, and go. Even has a suction cup so you can mount on a stationary object and rinse hands free. 6 foot hose, rechargeable lithium ion battery. So many uses at the beach including washing off the little one’s feet. Much more water efficient that dumping a 5 gallon gas can on your gear like I have been doing. There are other brands of battery powered hand held showers on Amazon, I just haven’t tried them.
Gator Guard Gator Patch keel protector – I have an Ocean Kayak Trident Ultra 4.3 kayak that has a decently thick wall of plastic. I drag it onto rocky beaches, boat ramps and parking lots more than I should, because it’s just so much faster than putting the wheels on in the water and placing padding under the kayak in parking lots. So the keel gets scratched up and if I kept dragging it around I’d possibly wear through the hull. I’ve stuck on strips of Gator Guard’s Gator Patch, which are kind of pricey, easy-to-apply UV resin fiberglass strips. Those patches are now getting gouged up instead of the kayak’s plastic, and hopefully won’t wear through. I don’t feel nearly as bad dragging the kayak around now.
ExpertPower LiFePO4 compact battery – I’ve been using the 5 Ah lithium iron phosphate battery on my kayak for 5 months now and it easily holds its charge for the 6hrs it’s powering my fish finder, and weighs less than 2lbs. Much lighter than a sealed lead acid battery and holds its charge longer. Currently selling for $34.99 with free shipping to Hawaii on the ExpertPower website. Hard to believe a LiFePO4 battery can be so cheap and shipped free. Here’s the initial review of the battery.
Big Island kayak angler Shea (IG: @shea_ue, YouTube: Affordable Wahoo) shares an incredible early morning shore whipping bite. There’s even an action packed video capturing most of the retrieves and strikes! Sounds like the papio are in, and are hungry!
Shea: My friend and I got to the grounds just at 5:15 AM, just as it was getting light enough to see the heavy offshore rains on the horizon. I was armed with my light shore casting setup: Okuma Hawaiian Custom 9’0 medium paired with a Daiwa Fuego LT 3000 spooled with 12lb Fireline braid. We were both using plastic casting bubbles and some craft fur “deceiver” patterns that I tied back in 2019. This was the first time in over a year that either of us had been to the area so we weren’t sure what to expect. The plan was to just see what was biting practice catch and release.
It was still pretty dark when I made my first cast out over the reef’s edge. I retrieved it with my favorite pop-pause action, using short downward sweeps of the rod to chug the bubble forwards a couple feet, then reeling to pick up the slack. Something exploded on the fly just as it was passing over the drop-off about 30 feet out. After a brief but intense battle, I scrambled down the rocks to the waters edge and landed a healthy 15 inch white papio (juvenile Giant Trevally). It had inhaled my fly, but after some finagling with my pliers, I sent the fish home with a good release. A couple casts later, another smaller white papio around 9 inches long grabbed the fly way out in the deep and came in without much of a struggle. My friend landed her first fish of the day, an 8 or 9 inch omilu (Bluefin Trevally) a few minutes later. This was also her first ever papio on a fly!
We kept moving along and working the edge of the reef and it wasn’t long before I took another strike just as I was bringing my fly into some structure. This fish felt a little bigger and pulled drag as it dove over the edge and I could immediately feel the grating of my leader against rocks. Luckily, the fish decided to change direction and unpinned itself from the bottom. A couple minutes later, I was able to slide an ~16-17 inch white papio onto the rocks, work the hook out from the corner of its jaw, and nose dive it back into the water. My 8-foot 25lb test Mason soft monofilament leader was pretty scraped up, so I decided to retie.
On the very next cast, a scrappy 11 inch omilu inhaled the fly and came in pretty easily after a short run. I couldn’t believe how fired up the fish were over this fly! I had tried using it at this exact spot a few times back in early 2020, but didn’t hook anything but a few aha (needlefish). Baitfish such as halalu, sardines, and nehu are much more abundant this time of year, so perhaps that helps explain it.
The wind picked up and we decided to change up the game a bit and re-rigged with 10lb J-line fluorocarbon leader, a size 3 “aji” hook, and soft plastic glitter strips. We used the tailwind to bomb casts way out there for a half hour or so, missing a few strikes and landing a couple small lai (Doublespotted Queenfish). My friend lost the glitter strip I gave her on a cast, then found a Campania grub on the ground and landed a 9 or 10 inch omilu on it. Way to improvise!
The big lai weren’t cooperating, so I changed back to the fly and a couple casts later, had the most explosive strike of the day as a white papio almost went airborne on the lure in 3 feet of water. It did the usual strategy of diving right over the dropoff, but this time I held the rod tip as high as I could and managed to keep the line off the rocks. I think this was the largest one of the morning, somewhere around 18-19 inches long and very healthy. This fish really surprised me, as it was already 7:30 AM and I’m used to the white papio bite stopping right after sunrise. Sometimes it pays off to wake up early and just go even when it’s cold and rainy, because you never know when you’ll be in the right place at the right time!
Here’s the video capturing all the action.
Tight lines and fish responsibly everybody!
-Shea
This is what I currently take out on the kayak. All but 3 are tungsten jigs, from 20gm up to 100gm. Jigging is my third option after damashi and bait fishing, so I haven’t had a recent catch on them but when the fish marks on the sonar are active, or the damashi rig gets destroyed, almost certainly the jig will get bit.
The more compact, non-elongated jigs above could easily be fished from shore, if you were casting into deep enough water. A flutter blade makes the jig look even more alive when retrieving diagonally.
We’re finding that the specific jigs work best when they match what the predators are feeding on. When they’re on inshore bait fish and krill the small tungsten jigs work really well.
According to Big Island kayak fishers Haru and Shea, when the deeper water fish are chasing opelu, the longer, slender jigs get nailed, and the jig length helps keep toothy fish like ono from biting off the leader.
These two are my only long, opelu looking jigs. The bottom one from Little Jack (JDM) really looks like an opelu (please zoom into the picture), and the top one from Williamson has bevels that are supposed to make it fall and swim enticingly.
Looking at these jigs is making me want to move jigging up to a higher priority! What do you guys think about these jigs? Good shape” Good colors? All but the top two have already hooked fish. Hooked doesn’t equal landing though, when the hookee is an angry ulua.
On my way out to the 3 mile spot on the Windward side, I was porpoising through choppy water when the kayak stopped tracking. I turned around and was shocked to see my rudder-mounted Bixpy motor on the side of the kayak. It was still connected to the power cable, and since I was alone that day, I didn’t want to risk getting into the water to put it in the kayak. So I paddled the 2 miles back to shore in following seas with no rudder, as the yak pulled to one side. Good thing the wind blows onshore on that side of the island.
Back home, I found out the plastic Bixpy rudder broke off from constantly lifting out of the water in chop, and the power cable was damaged. Even though the rudder mount was out of warranty, Bixpy sent me a new one and I ordered replacement power cables.
The SmartTrack rudder that was originally on my Trident Ultra 4.3 is spring loaded to return to position after being lifted up by hand or by swell, and is more robust than the Bixpy rudder but not meant to hold a motor. I attached the motor to it and stress tested it in adverse conditions. The rudder mounted motor stayed in place in the 20 mph headwind and choppy, swelly condtions, and performed better than the Bixpy rudder because the SmartTrack rudder kept the motor pointing in the proper plane. I even climbed out and circumnavigated the kayak and climbed back in twice. I got winded climbing in the second time but it was good to know I could if I needed to.
My Samsung Galaxy S8 Active phone (3 yrs old) is supposed to be waterproof and was in my PFD jacket pocket went I went underwater twice, so I dunked it in fresh water just in case, to rinse off. About 30 mins later the screen went black and the phone started buzzing intermittently. I couldn’t shut it off and ended up taking it apart to prevent further short circuits, then drying it in a ziplock back with those moisture absorbers you find in food packages. Subsequent research showed that the S8 phones are prone to water damage if submerged, especially in salt water – ugh.
Since my cell is my lifeline as yours probably is, I got a $70 Walmart smart phone (AT&T Maestro Plus) that night and am really surprised how capable it is. It can do everything my S8 Active could do. They had to save money somewhere, so the case and buttons are plasticy, the display isn’t as crisp as my old phone, and the call quality is a notch lower. But all in all, it’s pretty darn good for being 1/10 the replacement price of my S8 Active. I guess the previous years’ cutting edge cell phone technology eventually trickles down to the budget phones.
These equipment breakdowns caused me to miss two light wind days but it could have been much worse. It was a wake up call that bad things can happen when you’re offshore on a kayak, and you should be as prepared as possible.
Well, my S8 Active was still broken after I reassembled it, so I may eventually purchase a middle-of-the road Samsung Galaxy and use the Walmart phone as the kayak and backup phone. On the kayak I’ll be putting the phone in a waterproof case, and using the Rogue Fishing Company tether to keep it from sinking to the bottom. Lessons learned.
At Hawaii Nearshore Fishing, we feel strongly against “burning spots” that others have worked hard to find and learn. Photos and videos are edited to not reveal landmarks, and we don’t mention specific locations.
Regarding “where da oama stay?”, our recommendation for oama pro and newbie alike is to walk the likely areas on various tides and times of day and see if the early season oama have come in. If you find them before the word gets out, you’ll have them all to yourself for a few days.
Our prediction is that it will be a “recovery year” for bait fish and papio, much better than last year but not as good as the warm El Nino years. There have been more fruits on the trees than last year, and the early papio season has been better than last year’s, supporting the “recovery” theory. Have fun and be safe.
Shea started kayak fishing 3 yrs ago, briefly on an Ocean Kayak Scupper Pro, soon after, moving up to an Ocean Kayak Prowler 15. He built his safety awareness in the confines of Hilo Bay, unintentionally flipping the Scupper Pro twice and found the Prowler 15 to be a much more stable fishing platform. He has only been fishing offshore for 3 months, mainly on a 2015 Hobie Revolution 13, but attributes his rapid success to the years of learning how to catch live opelu outside the bay as well as hours of watching kayak fishing videos on YouTube and receiving tips from the kayak fishing community. He fishes on the Big Island with Coach Haru when their schedules match up. I asked Shea if he wouldn’t mind sharing his most recent outing with us. Here’s his recap, with video of the day on the bottom of this post.
Shea: The surf on Hawaii Island’s east side was flat – 1 foot and winds were forecasted light and variable all through Memorial Day, so my friend and I decided to launch at 4:30 AM. We reached the fishing grounds just as the horizon was lighting up and started searching for opelu to use as live bait. It didn’t take long before we started marking large bait balls feeding 25-50 feet down, and I dropped my home made sabiki rig baited with HiPerformance Lures “fish sticks” and managed to pick up 6 baits before the sun was even up. On previous trips, I had only caught 1-2 opelu after hours of trying, so things were off to a much better start than usual! We moved out into deeper water and passed over huge bait balls that weren’t biting, so I decided to drop an 80g jig that Haru had given me on a previous trip. Within the first 10 cranks of the very first drop, I hooked into a fish that doubled my Tsunami Trophy jigging rod and peeled the 40lb braid from my Penn Slammer III 5500 in long, powerful runs. It didn’t take long for what I’m pretty sure was a good sized Ulua to find some structure to cut me off on.
I tied on a 120g Jigpara Slowfall and dropped again, immediately hooking into something that felt much smaller. It turned out to be a 2-3 lb Uku, and I decided to let it go to and put out my first live opelu on a wire stinger rig in the hopes that some predators might be hanging around the bait schools.
I let out ~100 feet of line and set the drag on my Penn Spinfisher VI 8500 as light as it could go to mimic the “liveliner” function on other reels. After 45 minutes or so of no action in spite of many promising marks on the fish finder and a couple drowned baits, I decided to switch to straight 40lb fluorocarbon leader and hooked another live one through the nostrils with a 5/0 Gamakatsu Live Bait hook. I was still free-spooling this bait out when line started flying off way faster than I knew an Opelu could take it. I gave it about 5 seconds before clicking the bail over and tightening the drag down to set the hook. After a few good runs and a heavy pull that made me think I had a shibi, the fish started giving in and spiraled up to the surface. I was surprised to see a chunky 19-lb Kawakawa float up on its side. I sent out another live bait, then dispatched and bled the fish for ~10 minutes.
Just after stowing the fish in my fishbag, I noticed some promising marks on the bottom ~170 feet down, so I dropped the jig and pulled up a 4-5 lb omilu. After taking a couple pictures, I tossed him back to hopefully become a reef donkey someday.
As I was dragging my bait back up to the ledge, I felt the telltale tugs of something grabbing my opelu and quickly flipped the bail open. After a few seconds of letting line fly off the spool, I closed the bail and tightened down again and the first run of this fish was much faster and longer than the kawakawa’s had been. After five minutes or so of tug-of-war, I got my first view of the fish ~50 feet down and briefly saw the sickled outline of a shibi before it took off on a run straight down. Another five minutes of pumping and cranking later, the shibi was exhausted and surfaced, giving me a chance to hit it with my home made kage gaff. Not wanting to take any chances, I sank my handheld hook gaff into the fish as well and pulled it aboard. This was definitely my largest shibi so far, weighing in later at 29-lbs. I brained and bled the fish out and stowed it in a Hobie fishbag behind my seat.
At this point I had what I thought were two live baits left in the tube, so I gave one to my friend who had just lost his last bait to what we believe was an ono. I tied on a wire rig hoping to use my last bait to try for an ono, but the last bait had a busted lip from my damashi and had drowned. I sent it to the bottom on a 4 oz bank sinker, hoping for a shot at a bigger uku instead. After drifting around for a while, my rod bent over slowly as if I was hung up on the bottom. As I pulled the rod out of the holder, line started ripping off the reel and after a seven minute battle, a small ulua came up to the surface. Not the uku I was hoping for, but it was a nice fight. With two fish already in the bag, I decided to release this fish after taking some pictures.
After previously fishing the windward side in 6-foot swell and pouring rain and being unable to catch more than one or two baits, this trip really stands apart and will probably stay with me for some time. It’s not often that the east side is calm as a lake, so I feel super lucky that we got this break in the weather. I gave away most of the fish to my friends and family and made sashimi, tataki, and poke with the remainder over the course of the following week. The kawakawa meat aged especially well and still tasted great even six days later.
-Shea
Check out the video:
Matthew is back with a very timely shore fishing update.
Matthew: It’s only been a few weeks since I wrote my last post, but a lot has happened since then. Like flipping a switch, the Papio bite has turned on all of a sudden and is excellent as of now. All of my friends have caught Papio on their last trip or two and most of the time have caught more than one per trip.
I was pretty dead set on fly fishing a few weeks ago, and landed another nice Oio which was my second on the fly rod, but then the weather report for Sunday presented some not-so-ideal weather conditions. High winds, cloud cover, and a fast rising tide would have made it extremely difficult to sight fish. I decided to go check out an old Papio spot, and was treated to a nice Papio on my very first cast. Welcome back to Papio whipping. I hooked up to three more that day but lost them all, but was still satisfied with the one Papio.
A few days later, I went Papio fishing at the same spot and was treated to the best day I’ve had whipping. I landed seven Omilu ranging from 11-15 inches, had many more spit the hook, and saw countless chases and boils. This is probably an average day for someone fishing on another island, but for two hours on Oahu, it was a “once-a-year” kind of trip.
Fly fishing was now completely tossed to the curb and I was now hooked on Papio fishing once again, my old passion. I was invited to my friend’s beach house for dinner and I figured, why not bring my pole just in case? Sure enough, I had some time and I threw a few casts at an area that I was completely unfamiliar with. As dusk approached, I was able to land my biggest Papio in a few months, which put up a great fight.
The next Sunday, I had a chance to go with two guys I’ve been fishing with for a while now, and hit up one of the old spots. We had yet another good day. I landed a Papio and a Lai, one guy landed three Papio, and one guy lost one and had a bunch of bites.
So, enough of that… But what about predictions? So far, this season is looking like it is going to be an above average season, and it’s been looking like it for a few weeks now. The Halalu and sardines are in a select few spots that I know of and the Oama are starting to make their appearance at some of my spots too. I’ve been seeing some Iao on the flats, which almost always means that predators will be drawn towards shallower waters. Other fishermen have been sharing similar results to our catches and have been reporting the same uptick in bait sightings. Hopefully this year will make up for last summer’s subpar action.
In summary, the season is just starting, but if you haven’t gotten out fishing yet, now’s the chance. I’d guess that the good fishing will last until mid-August, and then by October the bite will probably be dead or at least slow again. Stock up on summer gear, stay safe, have fun, catch some fish, and I’ll catch you on the next report??
Late Spring / Early summer is the best time to catch pelagics on live opelu. Problem is catching opelu during this time is really hard because the opelu know the pelagics are hunting them. Best shot at the opelu is at the crack of dawn before the pelagics are on them but I’m not even driving to the launch at that time. Still, I was hoping to catch some hungry, stray opelu and drag them around in the deep.
I decided on the Windward side because the winds were lighter than the South side, and hit the water at 8:40am, 3 hrs after sun rise. Bait was scattered and sure enough they didn’t want to eat my damashi. In fact, the only thing falling for it were the deep water lizardfish. No nabeta, no opakapaka. The conditions were so nice that I decided just to run the Bixpy motor on the lowest speed and drag the damashi out to 300ft just to see what kinds of marks would show up on the fish finder. At 200ft something latched onto my damashi hooks and I was completely astounded to see two small, yet perfectly sized opelu come up. It was after 10am! I put one on my live bait rig and tried to keep the other alive in a juice bottle, head first, changing its water every so often.
I tried catching more opelu but failed so I went out to 300ft (a whopping 3 miles from land) and turned around and let the current push me in while I tried to hook something else with the damashi. Sure enough, with my damashi on the bottom in 280 ft, the opelu was taken and the line was going out fast. It probably took more than a minute to bring in my damashi, so the fish had run out a lot of line. I was really hoping that it was my first shibi (small yellowfin tuna) and it had some frantic head shakes, but when it came up I saw silver and sadly thought it was a kahala. Instead it was a tired kawakawa because I had fought it with so much line out, so when I bled it over the side it actually died a few mins later and the blood stopped flowing.
I had drifted in and was at about 250ft when I dropped the second, now dead, opelu down. It got slammed near the bottom and this fight was a strong up and down battle. I put the Avet SX Raptor in low gear and grinded it up. Because the fight was so short, the kawakawa came up green and took longer to get in position to kage. It stayed alive while being bled over the side, and after 5 mins I got tired of leaving a bloody trail for sharks to follow so I bagged in my my Large Hobie kill bag. There wasn’t room for another big fish so I headed into the shallow drop off to check on the reef fish.
The last time we fished the drop off was in April and the water was a chilly 74 degrees. This time it was 77 degrees and the damashi got hit on every drop until the hooks and lead were broken off. Misc reef fish (lai, moana, hawk fish, etc) were released. Looks like this year’s inshore season is about to go off.
I feel so blessed (and lucky) to have stumbled upon the two opelu the way I did, and be able to put them in front of kawakawa. The kawakawa, being big, bloody fish required a lot more special handling than a 5lb uku. I had to stop to buy ice on the way home to supplement the Arctic Ice in my fish bag, and had to cut all the darker, bloody meat away from the filets to maximize taste and shelf life.
But the recipients of the fish ate ’em within hours of receiving it and said was similar but tastier than yellowfin tuna and less *fishy/bloody* than aku. That was a testament to the instructions Kelly provided (bleed well, ice well, clean all the guts and dark meat out right away, wrap in paper towel and change the towel when it gets bloody).
It’s been a few months since I’ve checked my “big fish” South Shore spot. The last two times the only critters present were little bait stealers. Boaters had been getting ono and mahi mahi on the troll recently so the plan was to get out, catch opelu and troll ’em up out to 300ft. Unfortunately the few bait marks didn’t bite so I paddled around with the Bixpy motor assisting me, and nothing bothered my 8″ frozen opelu. Since the water was so flat, I went out to a spot about a mile away from my normal grounds, that held tackle busting ulua in the past.
Before I reached the spot I saw some promising marks and dropped the frozen opelu down. Felt some hard pulls and something ran hard with the bait. I thought it was a small shark but it settled into a familiar jerky fight. A long, skinny uku surfaced but had some fresh wounds past its dorsal fin. Something left a 6 inch bite mark, biting down from the dorsal fin towards its tail. Maybe that’s why the fight was so intense early on. What grabbed it wasn’t that toothy since the uku wasn’t shredded, so we’re thinking big ulua.
I drifted around that area, but nothing wanted another opelu or jig. On my way back to my regular grounds something really heavy ate my opelu and didn’t want to budge. I eventually broke it off and lost the rest of my baits, including live moana, to bait stealers too small to eat my big hooks.
The uku was 22″ and only 5.5lb because it was a male that had spawned out. It was pretty busted up on the outside but luckily the bite marks didn’t enter the prime meat.
Water temp was 76.5 degrees, up from 74 degrees two months ago. That’s still a little cold for May, but on its way up to the peak temps of 84+ degrees in the summer. The big fish are back but the opelu are really hard to catch now.
We’re always looking for new products that will enhance our fishing experience, and sharing recommendations with our readers. An ad for an improved phone tether showed up in my Instagram feed recently. I’ve been using a waterproof pouch on a lanyard attached to my pfd (personal floatation device) when I kayak fish, and it’s kept my phone safe, but I often can’t unlock my phone through the pouch. Even if I can, I have a hard time texting through it. Since my Samsung Galaxy S8 Active is waterproof, I really didn’t need the pouch. I checked reviews of Rogue Fishing Company, and their products, and all looked very positive.
So I joined their email list to save 15% off my first order, and ordered their 3rd generation phone tether ($19.99) and their rod/paddle leash ($17.99). A few days later the products arrived. I was very impressed with the ergonomics and quality of the components.
The leash of the phone tether is a compact fabric covered coil, the loops that hold the 4 corners of the phone are a durable silicone, and the carabiner and metal ring are corrosion resistant. The position of the silicone loops are designed to not interfere with the phone’s camera, and should stretch to fit most phones. Here’s Rogue Fishing’s product description and video of the Protector 3.0.
Even though my phone is supposed to be waterproof, if water gets in the charging port, a warning is displayed so I taped over that port temporarily. I took the phone tether and rod leash out to the deep this week. I could text on-the-water fishing reports to my buddies and ugh, answer phone calls freely. I resisted the temptation to take photos on the water, and instead used the GoPro on my cap.
I had been using a hard plastic, coiled paddle leash for years. It does the job and is very strong, but is heavy and rattles around on the deck of the kayak when I paddle. Rogue Fishing’s rod/paddle leash is much more streamlined, lighter, quieter, and the clip that attaches to my kayak doesn’t rattle. Even the elastic loop that cinches to the paddle has less resistance when I rotate the paddle, so it’s less taxing to use. Here’s the product information and video for the Defender Rod and Paddle leash.
Both the tether and leash were big improvements on what I had been using. I’ll post an update in a few months of hard use.
Update 6/5/21: The Protector phone leash and Defender Rod and Paddle leash are in the Store now.
Holoholo writer Matthew broadens his shore fishing skills and tackles fly fishing.
Matthew: Fly fishing… It can either be peaceful and enjoyable or a complete mess of frustration and tangles. Sure, it looks easy to cast a fly setup. Wave the rod forward, wave the rod backward, and let go of the line and watch it sail. It seems so simple and easy, or so I thought. After picking up a fly setup for the first time, I headed to one of my go-to Oio spots and tried casting. It resulted in a disaster, a horrible wind knot, and a hook in my shoulder on the first cast. Luckily I took the advice of another fly fisherman and started off with barbless hooks, and the hook didn’t go in too far. What happened? It turns out that muscle has nothing to do with casting, and it has a lot to do with form and timing. Timing, timing, timing, timing. I still have not gotten anywhere mastering it yet.
After taking a few more horrible casts that would’ve made anyone laugh had I been fishing with a buddy, I made my way out past the shoreline and tried blind casting downwind. My casts were still pitiful and the line slapping the water probably scared any fish away within a hundred yard radius. Long story short, it was a tough evening. I ended up with a Nohu (poisonous Hawaiian rockfish), which fought like a rock, and a bunch of actual rocks that I pulled up from the bottom.
I headed out the next day at midday to attempt, with emphasis on the word attempt, to catch an Oio sightcasting. I got lucky and saw one within minutes, as I already knew how to spot Oio, which is the only component of fly fishing that I am decent at. Casting accurately, enticing a fish to bite, and fighting a fish on fly gear are things that I still suck at. As you might expect, the line on one of the false casts slapped the water with a loud SMACK! and the Oio hightailed it out of there. Aargh, this is harder than it looks. I saw several Oio after that, and all ended relatively the same way, the line hitting the water and the Oio spooking.
The next day I went out and dedicated more than half the trip to just learning how to cast in the shallows, and I got a lot better at it. After getting the timing slightly better and incorporating the double haul technique, my casts were looking better. I headed out and after a while I was able to spot a lone fish around four pounds heading straight towards me. I waited to see if it would turn, which it did, and I made a cast without spooking it around 12 feet in front of it. I thought, “Damn, the reef is so gnarly here that if I hook this fish I’ll probably lose it”. To my surprise, it ate the fly and the fly line started going through my fingers, and not to my surprise, it reefed me almost instantly. Aargh. I retied my leader and ended up spooking even more fish before I decided to call it a day.
The next week, I tried at a new spot, and saw a few fish, but the wind was so bad that it was nearly impossible to make a decent cast. I ended up blind casting, but to no avail.
I was starting to get really frustrated with fly fishing and was considering bringing back out the spinner rod and reel for my usual Sunday Dawn patrol. After thinking about it for some time, I decided to give the fly rod another chance, with a new strategy and new flies in hand. The only problem was that I didn’t check the weather and it ended up being very windy and with clouds overhead. Not the best conditions for sight fishing. I proceeded forward, sighting some fish, until the rain came. There I was, the only idiot on the flat, in horrible wind and rain. I took out my phone to video, so I could at least bring something home, right? I ended up scrolling on instagram for a little bit, in the middle of the water, until I looked around and spotted a blueish-green blob around 20 feet away from me. By some miracle, an Oio had presented itself right to me, probably not being able to see me because of the ripples on the water and choppy waves. But I could see it, and that’s the main thing.
I put my phone away, silently stripped out the line needed for a 20 foot long cast, and decided to lead the fish by a LOT. Luckily it never changed course and it came within 5 feet of my fly sitting on the bottom. I started with a long strip to catch its attention, followed by some short and fast ones. To my amazement, the Oio lit up and swaggered over to my fly. I gave it two hard, fast strips, and on the second one, I felt the weight of the fish, and set the hook. The fish felt the pain and took off toward the horizon as I frantically tried to release the loose fly line. Once it got into the reel, I applied mild pressure on the reel with my other hand and kept the fly rod high. Once it stopped running, I could feel it rubbing against rocks and ran over to free it from three different coral heads (in hindsight, I was lucky). I started working the fish in but forgot I had to feed the line into the reel evenly (I’m used to spinners that have a level wind mechanism), so the line piled up on one side and the reel jammed. I quickly let some line out and filled the other side of the reel, getting the fish in closer until we locked in some circles around each other.
After what felt like an eternity, it froze on the surface and I netted it. I was ecstatic and let out a pretty loud yell. The fish was bigger than I originally thought, measuring at 22”, and since it was a “fatty”, I’d probably estimate it at five and a half pounds. I took some pictures and it was released back into the water. Wow, what a rush. I went home a little after that, stoked to the moon and back, happy that I had managed to land my first Oio on the fly rod.
I’m still a beginner and learning as I go, and most likely got lucky with that fish. Thanks for reading this long story. As for the Oio, I’ll be back for more, that’s for sure. And as always, good luck to you all.