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Holoholo: Shibi on the rocks caught on homemade damashi!

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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. 

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

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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.

Small tungsten jig outfished bait and a normal jig!

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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.

Motorized kayak damashi and jigging action!

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The wind forecast finally dropped to fishable conditions. It promised a 10mph East wind directly onshore on the Eastside, and a 15mph North East wind coming down the mountains on the south side. So I headed East and had the launch and water to myself due to the social gathering restrictions.

The wind felt like 12 mph heading straight into it but I could push through with the help of my Bixpy motor mounted on my rudder. It was 2.5 miles out to the 130ft spot I hoped held opelu but no schools showed up on my oldie but goodie Garmin Echomap 44CV. I paddled around with the motor assisting me, at about 3mph, as I scanned around for bottom marks.

The first scattered mark, slightly off the bottom, produced a lai which I kept for a buddy who makes flies out of the skin. Next up was a surprise nabeta which must have been in a sand patch I didn’t know was there.

Then I went deeper, all the way out to 180ft but didn’t see anything good and my frozen opelu went untouched. The wind brought me back in, and I started exploring the shallower water. A very active mark showed up on the bottom so I used the motor to hold me in place against the current and dropped the 2-hook damashi rigged with CHL Minnows. As soon as I lifted it off the bottom the pole arched and line pulled off the reel! I was trying to remember how heavy the branch line on the damashi was, and was hoping it was at least 10lb test. The fish battled me all the way up, on the light drag, and I was surprised to see an uku that later was weighed 2lb 10oz. The other branch line was broken off so maybe two uku hit the rig. I had been searching for uku in this area in the past and never expected to catch them on a damashi!

When I checked my opelu it was gone and the 2oz tungsten bullet weight I was testing had teeth marks on it! Man, that was a crazy frenzy.

With the bite this hot and my damashi rig only having one hook now, I switched to my jigging setup rigged with a 2 oz, 2.75 inch prototype tungsten jig I’ve been hoping to test. I couldn’t find that mark despite having set a “Man Over Board” on the GPS so I searched around the area.

Found another good mark in 90ft, dropped the jig on it and “kapow!”. A good fighting fish jerked the tip, pulled a bit of line and gave a good account of itself. The compact jig had fallen like shot and must’ve hit the omilu on the head, haha.

I had another jig shape to test so I switched and went hunting for a good mark again.

Dropped the second tungsten jig on the mark and “whammo”, hooked up! This fish wasn’t taking line but still felt fun. A nice moana came up. Both the omilu and moana were released. I was stoked to see how well the tungsten jigs worked.

I moved off the spot and only saw scattered marks on the fish finder so I went back to the damashi, with 3 hooks this time. By now it was midday at the top of the big King Tide and the current went slack. Fish didn’t bite for a while but then it picked up with a smaller uku and omilu. I released those and the misc reef fish that were keeping me busy.

When small, brown hagi started coming up it was time to head for home. I ran the motor at a 3/4 speed and the battery died about a half mile from my landing. Running between 1/4 and 3/4 speed for 6 hrs drained the battery. Now I know and will keep more juice in the tank just in case.

Without the assistance of the Bixpy I couldn’t safely do the 7 mile round trip, and wouldn’t have been able to stay over marks while I dropped on them. Thank you Bixpy!

Stay tuned for more testing of the compact tungsten jigs. Even though they are only 2 oz (60 gm) they fall like a 3 oz (90 gm) jig because of their compact shape.

Back to the South Side to kayak hunt for preds

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Since the summer brought bigger surf to the South Side, we had been taking advantage of the small surf on the East Side when the wind allowed. In general, there were more fish than what we encounter in the South, but the fish were not the predators like uku and pelagics we were hoping to run into. We found protected, sandy bottomed areas that held tasty fish like nabeta and juvenile opakapaka but not the rocky drop offs that attract the bigger fish.

Surf and wind dropped on the South Side this past week, and Frank and I went back to one of our favorite spots. We started off looking for bait but couldn’t find any sizable bait balls, so it was time for Plan B. In 100ft of water, I dropped down a frozen, well preserved, year-old local opelu, about 7 inches long. Within a minute, I felt the taps, then the tugs, and then line peeled off my reel. Hanapa’a, but the fish felt really weird. No sustained runs, instead, quick downward pulls.

After a jerky 2 minute fight, this popped up. I thought it was a big omilu but noticed the 4 yellow spots on the side and the down turned mouth. Stoked, I let Frank know of the catch and he set up to drop bait.

Yellow spot / yellow dot / island jack papio are often caught in very shallow water as they feed on crabs and shrimp. Fly fishers seem to get them more often than whippers, since their flies do a better shrimp imitation. Yellow spot are one of the best tasting papio because their diet gives them a fatty, less fishy taste.

My next drop got tap, tap, tapped, then picked up. Initially I thought it was a big jack but when it slowed and felt heavy I knew it was a shark. Even with the 2-speed Avet SX reel in low gear, I had to endure a 20 minute bicep burn. Man I hate these things. It had taken me from 100ft to 200ft, with Frank keeping watch, before I could raise it high enough to cut it free. On the way back to shallower water, we dropped our damashi on deep bait marks, and when that failed, dropped opelu down but nothing bit.

I rested my arms and let the Bixpy motor take me back to where the yellow spot bit, but all our bottom fished and trolled baits eventually got ripped off without hooking anything. I even tried dropping a small 60gm tungsten jig to hook the bait stealers but they were wise to it. The yellow spot and shark had hit on the slack low tide, and the bite oddly slowed as the tide rushed in. Maybe it was midday slowdown?

Frank caught a nice sized nabeta on the damashi, and I caught some taape and moana just to feel some tugs, but that was it.

The shorter paddle on the South Side was appreciated, and it was nice to hear the ratchet sing but I could do without the shark-isometrics.

Hanapa’a writer Kelly caught a 7lb yellow spot in 4 feet of water a few years back, so I weighed mine to see if it was close. A few ounces less at 6lb 9oz! Here’s Kelly’s write up. I thought these fish don’t eat other fish much, but I guess a tasty frozen opelu was too much to resist. Glad the yellow spot bit before the shark shut things down for us.

Badly sliced yellow spot about to be eaten as sashimi

Kelly and Hanapa’a writer Coach Haru said to clean the fish right away, remove the head, gills, and blood, and wrap the fish in paper towels to extract the blood. Let the muscle tissue loosen over 2 to 3 days, then eat as sashimi. On Day 2 I ate the fish as sashimi and poke and found the meat to be soft but not too soft, and very mild tasting. It was better as poke, with the sesame oil adding some richness as well as flavor.

Photo by Joanna

A friend who enjoys uku received the fish on Day 3 and his wife Joanna made a Thai vinaigrette sauce so they could eat the fish over mixed greens. Joanna doesn’t like fishy raw fish and loved the yellow spot.

Inshore fishing is still sloooooowww…

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Photo by Jon

Inshore fishing is still slow. I haven’t seen much bait fish (mullet, iao, oama, aholehole) this season and haven’t seen preds busting on schools near shore. It’s still a little early for oama but the other bait fish should have been in by spring time. I looked back at the July posts last year and fishing was slow this time too and picked up in August but not like the warm El Nino years where a lot of oama came in and stayed into the beginning of winter.

There’s also been a lot of people shore fishing since the shutdown started, so that must translate to fish caught and spooked. The guys that are catching are going at dawn and dusk, in spots that haven’t been pounded yet. And if they’re fishing the daylight hours, they’re using small, realistic baits.

How has the fishing been for you? Drop a comment to let us know. Mahalo!

Still a little early in the “season”. Here’s an early bait prediction.

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Photo by Matt

July is right around the corner but there aren’t a lot of bait fish in. The early oama that came in last month have grown to mid-size but the second wave of oama hasn’t arrived.

There were some halalu piles, like the one Matt found to have his personal best catch, but a lot disappeared and there’s speculation that they were illegally netted.

The iao (Hawaiian sardine) weren’t in at my whipping spots and the predators that follow them into the shallows were missing. I checked two spots with some new lures and bolo’d both times!

Thad’s omilu on Lawaiaflies

The guys (and gals) have been starting at dawn with flies on long leaders behind floaters and have been experiencing improved omilu action.

We’re hoping a waves of oama and halalu come in soon but it is looking like an off year compared the recent banner years. How do you guys think this season will pan out?

Kayak damashi action

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On an epic light wind day last week, Frank and Kelly SUP trolled for papio past the break on the east side and I went deeper on the kayak to try for opelu and hungry predators. The water was so glassy inside that the papio bite was tentative for the SUP crew but they scraped up a few 1 to 3lb omilu to take home.

I couldn’t find any opelu and nothing ate the frozen opelu I put down so I tried to salvage the trip by catching good eating fish on the Ahi USA damashi tipped with CHL Minnows and ika strips. Over the reefy transition to sand, baby kaku and nunu came up. Then 8 inch baby opakapaka began to mob the Minnow.

Finally I struck nabeta gold and even brought up a lai. The CHL Minnow outfished the strip of ika and didn’t attract hagi so I stopped using the ika.

On a calm day with minimal current and wave action, it was so peaceful to bounce the damashi on the bottom and feel the electric action of the rod tip.

I shared the nabeta with friends who hadn’t tasted the fish before, and gave the lai to Frank for grinds and lai skin. Good fun fishing in the deep.

-scott

Holoholo: Hand-tied flies end the Rubber Hook Curse

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JDM expert and whipping aficionado Thad fills us in on how his last 3 months of fishing has turned around.

Thad: The papio bite at my usual spots had shut down since the start of February, so I tried targeting oio for a while without much success.  Other guys I know that were fishing similar spots were landing nice oio regularly so it kept my hopes up every weekend.  Its not like I wasn’t hooking up though – I’ve been stricken with the “rubber hook” curse, fighting decent sized fish on most trips only to have them spit the hook before I could land them. 

So the weekend before the COVID-19 shutdown, I decided to try the usual spot again, armed with some new flies Matt (IG: hookum_flies) had tied and given to me to test.  For someone that just started tying flies a week or two earlier, they were well made and looked sure to fool a fish into biting.  The morning proved to be slow again, but I managed to hook what felt like a good sized papio on Matt’s Golden Blaze color.  Just as I was bringing the fish to the surface and could see color, the rubber hook curse struck again.  Losing fish is just a part of the fishing experience, but I felt a little disappointed that I couldn’t send Matt some pictures of his creation in a fish’s mouth.   

Skipped fishing the next two weekends after the COVID-19 shutdown.  By the time I felt comfortable enough to get back out there, I had also received some additional flies from Lawaiaflies (IG: lawaiaflies) that I was excited to try.  Armed with the new flies on April 26th, I tried my luck again, expecting it to be another slow day but hopeful I could send some fish pictures to some fly makers.

I decided to start with an orange and white fly from Lawaiaflies, appropriately called the Creamsicle.  Not long after I started whipping, I got a solid strike and landed a scrappy 12.5” omilu.  It felt great finally being able to land something after losing so many to spit hooks.  I quickly tagged it with a PIFG tag and released it to fight another day.  For the next hour and a half, I continued whipping without any action, switching between flies from different makers. 

Walked to another spot I hadn’t fished in a while, to see if anyone was hungry.  I tied the Creamsicle back on and immediately foul hooked a small omilu on the top of its head. 

A short while later, another small omilu decided to take the same fly.  Man, this Creamsicle color was really productive!  Just as I was thinking I may need to order more of this color, I got a big blow up on my big Tough Bubble that immediately cut my mainline.  I’ve caught several big kaku there so that was the likely culprit.

It was time to start heading back in so I put on another bubble and tied on Matt’s Golden Blaze fly.  I tried a slower retrieve this time, working the fly a little deeper in the water column.  It worked and I was able to land a very colorful moana.  I took some pics for Matt and called it a day. Reports I’ve been hearing from friends and the recent papio bites (albeit small ones) seem to indicate that we may be working our way out of the slow season.

Early Mango Season = Early Fishing Season?

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It is believed that the same environmental factors that affect the timing and the duration of mango season also affect the inshore and nearshore fishing. Amount of rain the previous year, amount of sunlight, temperature, wind patterns etc.

Mango season started earlier than normal and our Hayden tree has way more baby mangoes than previous years. Oama have been sighted in a few spots at least a month earlier than normal, and akule have been abundant this year. Initial indicators seem to point to an earlier start to the inshore and nearshore season, and hopefully an abundant one.

Get out and fish in the sun and humidity where Covid-19 has a hard time surviving!

-scott

Holoholo: Surfboard Fishing Report

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Holoholo writer Kelly cheerfully reports that the fishing just past the reef has picked up recently. Despite the Covid-19 social distancing mandate he’s been able to legally bring home much appreciated kau kau for the ohana. Thanks for the update Kelly!

Kelly: In March and April, the papio bite was still pretty slow. I have been surfboard fishing near the breaks every couple of weeks at a variety of spots, mostly on the South and East shores on lighter wind mornings.

Usual catch has been a couple of 1-2 pound omilus with plenty of bait stealers which I am guessing are baby papio. South side has been having good size barracudas, about 3-4 pounds which I have been keeping for kau kau.

Here is a photo of the spicy kaku poke we made 🙂

There have been some random catches like moana, nunu and rois. The one noteworthy catch was a nice six and a half pound kagami on the east side which hit a frozen oama that had been getting freezer burnt from last summer. 

Baby Beast and Mini Feast from the East!

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Surf was booming on the north and west shores and surf on the south side was projected as high as 5ft so we went east to a new spot Erik, our small boat buddy, had recommended. Erik provided all the intel as far as where to launch, where the opelu were, where the nabeta were, and if he were free he would have met us on the water! How many guys would share their secret spots like that?

Frank and I made it out to where the opelu were supposed to be, but it was after 9 in the morning and we couldn’t find a good mark. We paddled over to a deep reef and Frank damashi’d up moana and taape on ika strips while I bottom fished with frozen opelu. I was surprised how few nibbles I was getting so I went all the way out to 200ft and had a hard thump that took the whole fish. I put my second to the last opelu on and dropped again. Thump, thump and a strong run. I was thinking shark but soon there were really hard head shakes. Not as quick as uku head shakes so I assumed it was ulua. The fish took out a lot of line so I buttoned down the Avet SX Raptor 2-speed to stop it, and after struggling to gain line in high gear, I dropped to low gear and man what a difference! The fish didn’t make another sustained run again and it floated so quickly it came up on the opposite side I was expecting and scared me!

I debated keeping the white ulua but had always said I’d release my first kayak caught ulua so I did. Looking at the photos again, it was probably just a bit over 10lbs but at the time I thought it was much bigger because of the bullish fight. Nothing else bit the last opelu in the deep so I went to look for nabeta.

Tipping the damashi with ika strips Frank gave me initially yielded hagi until I moved off the deep reef and onto sand. I dragged the weight instead of bouncing it and could feel fish lightly tugging at the ika and not hooking up. Finally I hooked a yellow nabeta (deepwater gold!). I had to wade through little puffer fish and nunu before I got 2 more nabeta in the deep, then I went a little shallower and started getting reef fish. By then it was time to go in so I turned up the Bixpy motor to contend with the offshore wind, and could sustain a 3.5 mph pace by paddling along with the jet. Without the motor I’d be struggling at 2 mph and be hurting the next day.

Usually I don’t do well the first few times out at a new spot but we were productive because of Erik’s accurate directions. We left a few stones unturned so we need to go back!

Kayak fishing improvements worked!

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2 problems have been plaguing me kayaking the deep: 1) It’s been very hard to paddle against the current and stay on the productive spots, and I’ve had a recurring stiff right shoulder. 2) Been hooking more sharks than fish, and they don’t bite through the line like you’d think they would. After trying to raise a shark or two so I can cut it free, I’m spent, especially my left arm that holds the conventional rod.

To solve Problem #1, I’ve put a Bixpy electric motor on my Trident Ultra 4.3’s rudder. I just had to replace my rudder with theirs that held the compact jet motor, and was still able to use my existing rudder controls. The lithium ion battery that powers the motor sits on my fishbag in the rear tankwell and only weighs 7lbs. I can select the 12 forward speeds and 3 reverse speeds from the remote control I wear on my wrist.

Problem #2 was made worse because I’ve been using a high speed, gold Trinidad 14. Awesome smooth reel but the gearing of 6.2:1 doesn’t generate much torque and it’s been hard to turn the handle on heavy sharks. I met Avet rep Ben Frazier at the Fred Hall Show this year (right before they suspended the future shows due to Covid-19), and told him that I was having issues going from freespool to strike drag on my star drag Trinidad, and when I ended up fighting a shark, it was hard to lift and crank with my rig. He recommended the small (17 oz) SX Raptor lever drag reel with a low and high gear and max drag of 26lbs!

Look at the wake the Bixpy is producing!

Well the light wind day came to test both out, and my kayak fishing buddy Frank was able to join me. Very light WSW winds started the day and I cranked the Bixpy up to full speed at 5mph. Not bad since I can’t paddle that fast myself. I ran it on the 3rd or 4th speed while paddling along at a relaxed pace to get to our bait spot, and was easily getting 3.0 to 3.5 mph.

We couldn’t find bait and trolled out to 300ft for nada. I tried bottom fishing out there but the current was ripping near the bottom and my bait never hit solid ground. Soon we realized the west wind and west current had taken us more than a mile downwind. Frank coordinated his pedaling and paddling on his Hobie Revo 13, and made great progress heading back to our safe zone. I gave him a head start and used the Bixpy up to max speed at times, and finally caught him. Frank trolled frozen opelu and I bottom fished a fat opelu chunk after having two smaller frozen opelu pulled off by bait stealers.

Besides a humpback whale showing us his dorsal fin, it was a slow slog until I had my burrito sized chunk taken for about 5 seconds before the hooks pulled out. I dropped the tail half of that chunk down and a shark was on. Going from free spool to strike on the Avet lever drag was very easy and the shark slowed down. When it took line again I inched the lever drag up toward the max but made sure I could still pull off a little line with my hand so it wasn’t so tight the shark could yank me overboard too easily. In high gear I couldn’t gain much line so I dropped down to low gear and was amazed at how easy it was too turn the reel handle. When the shark ran, the drag would slip smoothly while I cranked but otherwise I could just crank and put a little line back on the reel. The shark really did’t run too far, and I put the rod butt down in front of my lap, like I was in a fighting chair and started to lean back and crank.

That was working well but when the shark lunged, I had to make sure the rod tip was parallel with the bow. I ended up getting the shark up in less than 15 mins, which is much faster than I have with other sharks. The low gear definitely helped a lot.

I was worried the shark would pull me over when it came up broadside so I braced my feet on the rails of the yak and kept moving them as the shark came within inches.

Judging from its pudgy shape and high triangular dorsal fin, I think this was a sandbar shark which isn’t supposed to be a man eater. Still it was spooky to have such a heavy animal with sharp teeth so close.

The south west winds started chopping up the water and it was time to head in. The rudder mounted Bixpy popped out of the water a few times as the kayak bow dipped into a small wave, but otherwise the motor, supplemented with my paddling, got me in at 3 mph. I had 2 of the 6 battery levels left after the 5 hrs outing.

I was very pleased with how the Avet SX Raptor and the Bixpy motor performed and look forward to fishing more productively with both.

Holoholo: Fishing during the winter months

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Our Middle School Holoholo writer Matthew is social distancing like the rest of us, and took up fly tying! He also wanted to share how tough this Winter has been for him.

These past few months have been great for a lot of people, but they’ve been the worst four months in all the time I’ve been fishing. During December, January, February, and March, I went fishing a total of 39 times, sometimes going two different spots in one day (mostly because winter and spring break fall in those months) and only caught a measly total of 7 notable fish (not counting a bunch of Hinalea, Nunu, and Lizardfish), which were a 2-3 lb Omilu, a 2 lb Omilu, Three good size Moana, and a small Kaku. Not counting as a fish, but I did catch my first ever Samoan Crab on rod and reel. I tried a bunch of spots, deep and shallow, and tried just about every technique from flies, kastmasters, grubs, to dunking but still not much. I had the mentality, “If I keep pounding I’ll eventually get something”, but eventually it seemed like it would not get better, so I’m giving up until summer, or until this coronavirus passes, which I hope it will. On a positive note, pretty much everyone else has been catching a lot of stuff, with more Papio popping up on my Instagram feed. Certain hammahs have been catching like it’s still summer at certain deep spots, or wading. 

In the downtime, I decided to pick up fly tying. I’m figuring if I can’t catch fish I might as well stock up for when the fish are actually biting. At first, I had no idea, and the flies looked horrible. I had no idea what to do, and I just used nail polish to get the flies together at the head. I kept trying, got a little better, my UV flashlight and UV resin came in, and I was able to finally add eyes to some flies. 

After a lot of refining the design of the flies, I think I am starting to get the hang of it, but I still have a very long way to go to get to the level that other local fly makers are at. Eventually, I want to sell some to pay back the significant amount of money all the fly materials and tools cost. If anyone has any tips for me they would be greatly appreciated, from materials to different designs I could try, everything would help me. 

Good luck to all of you guys that are still going fishing now, although it seems like everyone is doing quite fine. Stay safe and healthy during this outbreak and practice social distancing.

Fish bite after the rain too! – PB uku catch, clean and cook

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The lingering Kona Low storm we had last week finally cleared and the winds dropped for a day, so I prepped to kayak fish. Only problem was that all State and City beach parks were closed to enforce social distancing! When it was confirmed that fishermen could transit through the parks, I parked outside, wheeled my kayak through and launched on an empty beach.

The wind was initially light and I paddled my way to the bait spot. Small bait schools passed under me but I could never connect with them. Gave up and went out deeper than I have been, to try to avoid the sharks. This must’ve been the spot because 3 boats kept drifting into my social distancing space. I guess they had no problem accessing the boat launch.

Felt hard taps about 20 secs after dropping down a frozen opelu and I was on with a hard pulling, jerky fish. Tightened the drag and tried to get it up before Sharkey caught wind of what was going on. It pulled hard until about 15 ft from the surface and was pretty worn out at color. Hooked in the corner of the mouth on the rear VMC inline hook. CHEEEHAAAA!!!

Its tail was sticking out of the Promar floating net but luckily was too docile to try to squirm out. Definitely the biggest uku I’ve landed and was stoked to get another since local fresh fish in the market is really hard to come by because of food supply issues.

Missed a fish on the next drop that pulled the bait off. Then had a bait reduced to just the head. Dropped the head back down to catch the culprit and something that felt like a school bus ate it and didn’t want to be lifted off the bottom. I finally broke free of that. My next bait got picked up by a heavy, head shaking fish and I was able to stop it and bring it up a little before it got real heavy and jerky at the 5 min mark and the line cut midway up the 40lb fluoro leader. I think it was some medium sized jack that got sharked.

The east winds picked up at this point and all but one boat headed for safety. I took their advice and paddled in to a deserted beach.

The uku ended up being my personal best at 23 inches and 6.5lbs. Since I didn’t have many pics to put up I decided to video the fish cleaning process, and planned to pull stills of what it had in its stomach. Well, turns out it had a small opelu, a baby tang-shaped fish, and something that looked like a small squid, but they were pretty decomposed looking so I decided not to use the stills. Fishing buddy Kelly reviewed my slowly improving fileting skills and pointed out areas of improvement:

  • Cut the fins off before scaling, so they wouldn’t get in the way
  • Scale the fish completely even in the hard to reach spots
  • Pat dry the fish if rinsed with water
  • Cut with long strokes to leave a smooth edged filet
JDM SK11 all purpose shears

I decided to share the compressed 2 min video of the catch and time lapse fish cleaning so others could learn from my mistakes. Shout out to Thad, our JDM fishing tackle purveyor, for providing the super sharp, super strong “SK11” all purpose shears from Japan. I was able to cut through all parts of the fish including the center bone!

The fish was shared with family and friends, consumed raw with citrus finger limes, steamed, baked and fried.

Wasabi kewpie mayo poke with red finger lime

I made a point to emphasize that the fish was only touched by my Coronavirus-free hands through the whole process, unlike a fish you find at the market. 😉

Fried uku bones

Everything wanted to eat before the storm!

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Last week, the wind dropped right before a significant rain storm was expected. The fishing conditions weren’t ideal though. The tide was falling to a negative low, and it was just a few days after the full moon. Usually the slack low tide means sharks and ulua, but I couldn’t pass up the safe kayaking conditions.

The 8am sun was partially blocked by the gray clouds so it looked like dawn. I was hoping the fish thought the same. My first drop of the store bought damashi meant for opelu got hit by something much stronger. The small gold hooks bend easily so I kept the drag a little loose and just wanted to see what hit the tiny fly in 75ft of water. What finally showed was a brightly lit omilu. Proof that omilu do frequent the deep structure areas when there aren’t bait fish to draw them into the shallows.

I kept trying for opelu but the bait balls were small and moved too quickly. There was some type of bait fish on the surface getting hit by birds and dolphins but I couldn’t catch up to them. With no live opelu, I paddled out to 110 ft and lowered a frozen 9 inch opelu down. Before it reached the bottom something yanked at it before running off with the bait. The fish pulled the rod tip under water a few times in a very spastic fashion and fought very jerkily. I’ve fought bigger fish in the last 4 trips with nothing landed so I was cautiously hopeful this was an uku. Was stoked to see one but surprised how small it was compared to hard it pulled. Small oio are the same way. They pull as hard as they can and wear out.

Buoyed by the instant bite I dropped another opelu down and it sat for about 20 secs before something started tasting it. Then the line took off and soon it became apparent the sharks had arrived. I tried to bust if off but it took a long time to do so and the braid parted high up. Next 3 baits were eaten within 30 seconds and were sharks too. The sharks felt like they were smaller than the normal ones but still a pain to bring to the surface.

After losing time and tackle I switched to the Daiwa tungsten jig that hooked ulua before, and had a hit that didn’t stick. My arms were worn out by then from fighting sharks so I went in.

wahanui

I had dropped the GoPro down once, in the area where I hooked the omilu (about 75ft) and looked at the video at home. At least 3 wahanui and a toau swam up to the camera as it reached the bottom and there were the eerie sounds of whales in the background.

I kept the omilu and the small uku because I hadn’t kept fish for a long time and we wanted safe, Covid-19 free fish to eat. Both fish weighed 2.1 lbs and the omilu had a 5 inch fat red oama in its stomach.

Negative low tide, big moon, yet everything wanted to feed before the storm. I’ve never experienced a bite like that before. I just gotta figure out how to stay away from the sharks.

Live opelu is way better than fresh opelu!

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Old timers have told me that opelu is the “magic bait for pelagics”, like oama is the “magic bait for papio”. Since frozen oama still works when slow trolled for papio, I’ve been buying opelu from the fish market and trolling and bottom fishing that off the kayak. It hasn’t worked that well trolled (one 11lb mahi last spring) but has worked for uku (and a lot of bait stealers) near the bottom.

Hayabusa damashi fly on gold hook

Boaters and kayakers who catch their own opelu have been telling me to save money and just catch my own but that’s much easier said than done. I’ve been striking on when others have been bringing up multiple opelu and was kind of just going through the motions of dropping the damashi down until I finally caught an opelu on the last trip. That made me realize it was possible to catch one or two for bait, and since fishing is all about confidence and sticking with it, I was determined to catch opelu and hook something good with it. To increase my odds I was using the expensive store bought Hayabusa damashi flies with gold hooks.

You can see the damashi fly springing free

I went out this week on an overcast, slightly drizzly day. It was about 9am when I reached the bait grounds but because the sun was blocked it looked like dawn. My version of dawn patrol. The fish finder marked a lot of small fish near the top of the water column and I dropped down, felt something hit but it was pulling harder than opelu should. Baby aha – ugh. Next drop was another aha. I’ve never caught them on the damashi fly before and was gonna find another bait pile but decided to drop one more time. This time something smaller was on, and because my opelu confidence had dropped due to the aha, I brought it up slowly and when it got to the surface it was a perfect sized 8 inch opelu that popped its head out of the water and shook the hook! Arrgggh…

The school moved and I spent another 45 mins in different spots trying to catch them. Gave up, slow trolled a 9 inch fresh opelu that got taken near the bottom and the hooks pulled once again. So I started fishing the 9 inch fresh opelu cut in half, with two hooks to see what I was missing. Sadly, I landed 2 big taape and a hagi. So that’s probably what has been stealing my dead opelu, not the small uku I was hoping for. Disillusioned, and now fighting a 10mph south wind, I came across a promising bait school in the area where I’ve lost ulua and sharks but hadn’t seen a lot of bait before. The bait stealers had depleted my fresh opelu supply so I decided to try for opelu on the damashi again. To my surprise I got bit on the way down! This one was bigger than I preferred but stayed on the hook and was dropped back down with two hooks in it.

I slow trolled it around and nothing bothered it until I went back to the spot I caught it. It started getting nervous and then something ran with it for a few seconds and ripped a 4 inch wound in its stomach. That was probably the small uku since hagi and taape wouldn’t be able to catch the opelu and leave such a big hole. I dropped the now dead opelu back down and the bait stealers picked it apart.

The south wind had settled down but there was a lumpy west swell that was bobbing me around, enough to come over the side of the kayak at times. The bait ball was still around so I dropped the damashi down and caught another 10 inch opelu. 3 opelu in one day if I count the one that fell off at the surface, my personal best! I put the opelu down, maybe 30 ft off the bottom and went back to opelu fishing.

The opelu got nervous, and the rod began to bounce a little as line was pulled off an inch at a time. This went on for about 10 seconds and I gave the pred time to turn the big opelu around and swallow. Then the pred took off, pulling my rod under water and I had to clear the bow of the kayak. The fish was strong and heavy but I was able to stop it with a strong drag setting, so it wasn’t a shark. The fish was turned and I was short pumping it back so it wouldn’t find the reef like last week, and then about a minute and a half into the fight it felt like the hook slipped and got stuck somewhere else. Then the fight got really jerky like the fish was getting attacked by something and it transitions to the heavy pull of a shark. 15 seconds later, the leader above the first hook was cut fairly clean with a bit of abrasion above the cut. I was running the GoPro on my cap and shared the video of the fight with friends (sorry too many landmarks for general viewing). They think that maybe a big uku ate the big opelu and made its initial strong run, and was coming in when a shark or sharks mauled it.

I like that the bait stealers leave the live opelu alone and only something fairly big will grab it. Also like that you can tell when it’s about to get hit because the opelu starts jerking the rod. So in the end I bolo’d once again, but am getting closer to hooking and landing the prize fish on live opelu.

Holoholo: Whipping report, 2nd week in January

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Jeremy is a long time fisherman who loves whipping, but will be adding fly fishing to his game this year. He’s been posting catches on his private IG account @jeremy.poi while the rest of us have been getting skunked, so I asked him if he’d mind sharing his most recent catch report with us. There’s a lot we can take away from this!

Jeremy:

Everyone knows that during the winter the bite really slows down, but can’t catch fish if you don’t go fishing so I try to get out there as much as I can.  This past weekend I braved the weather and was glad I did.

On Saturday morning, my friend and I decided to do a dawn patrol session.  It was super windy and rainy, but we love fishing so we just threw on our jackets, grabbed our gear, and headed to the spot just as the sun was about to come up.  The tide was really high and the water was a little dirty, so wasn’t the best conditions for wading, but we slowly worked our way out into the water.  I continuously made casts as I walked the reef and about 15 minutes into our session, I got a nice hit.  It’s a decent sized fish and I can feel the head shakes, so I know it’s a papio.  I get it to hand and see a nice 14” white papio on the end of my line.  I take a few quick pictures and release him safely.  First white of the year for me, so I’m happy and the pressures off. 

I continue to work the reef and cast into “fishy” areas.  About 30 minutes later, I feel a strong tap on my lure…miss…then another miss.  And then finally, on the third hit, I get a solid hookup.  Hanapa’a!  Line starts ripping off my reel and I know it’s a good sized one.  It takes about 60 yards on the first run before I get it to turn.  I’m only running 8# braid with 10# leader, so I need to be patient and not horse it in.  I slowly gain line, but the fish is still strong and takes multiple smaller runs.  I could feel the line rub slightly on the reef a few times, but after a back and forth battle of about 10 minutes, I was finally able to see the fish, grab my leader, and land this 5# o’io.  Chee!  Took some pics and thanked the fish for the awesome scrap before releasing it.  And that’s when I notice my hook.  The fish wasn’t hooked in the mouth, but on the side of his face on the gill plate, and my hook was opened up.  Got lucky on landing this one. 

Tip of the day:  Set your drag only as strong as your weakest link.  I run my drag on the light side since I’m running light line, but the wire of my hook is thin as well, so my weakest link in my setup was my hook.  Thankfully my drag was just loose enough and I didn’t lose this fish.  

Another fun session in the books.  Always nice to be able to get out there and do what we love.  And catching fish once in a while is nice too.  So all the guys not fishing due to the junk weather, take a chance and make some casts.  Fish still have to eat, so hopefully it’ll be your lure.  Good luck and tight lines!

Fish Report – 2nd week in January

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We’ve had a few weeks of wind and rain which lowered the nearshore water temps. As expected for this time of year, the bait fish aren’t in, and the predators don’t have much reason to make their way in to the skinny, cold water. White papio/ulua are being caught at night/early morning, since they feed on other things besides bait fish, and some omilu have been caught in the deeper water reachable from shore by the really dedicated guys. If you need to feel a tug, even if it’s from a kaku, you might want to fish in the late afternoon after the sun has warmed the water up and is just beginning to set.

The blustery wind seems to have put the offshore fish down a bit, with the kayak guys reporting catches of opelu and not many pelagics. The shallow bottom fish like uku and weke ula have been grudgingly biting. We’re hoping that when the wind settles down, the food chain adjusts to the temperature change and starts feeding with vigor on all the nutrients recently stirred up.

My Thanksgiving turkey has scales on it

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I was on a 4 trip bolo streak where I started each day by looking for opelu and ended with paddling in because the winds got too strong for me. The last trip started off with a lot of small fish caught on damashi (moana, malu, baby uku, lizardfish, hagi) but no opelu. When I switched to bottom fishing, my fresh halalu baits were bitten in the center and pulled off the two hooks but the fish weren’t big enough to swallow the bait and find a hook. These weren’t the typical hagi or aha bites. Instead they looked like a snapper type fish that just ate the good, soft parts of the fish.

There were a couple days before Thanksgiving with a few hrs of light wind according to the wind models, so I picked the only day I had free and was gonna head straight for the uku grounds. Before I got there the winds were already blowing 10 – 12 mph so I stopped at a shallow spot on my GPS that always had bait but I’ve never caught anything there. The current was running west and the winds were blowing east, so it was choppy but I was being held in place. Down went a fresh opelu I had bought the day before and soon I felt the tell tale taps of what I hoped was an uku. It took more than 30 seconds before the fish got hooked and then it took off. Maybe it’s because I hadn’t fought a fish in so long, but the fish felt strong! The carbon fiber drag washers in my gold Trinidad 14 gave line in a controlled manner and after a minute and a half I netted my Thanksgiving uku. Just like that my bolo ended.

I tried to add to my Thankgiving haul but I missed what felt like 2 more uku and had the rest of my baits mauled by hagi and other pests. The wind was white capping the water at this point so I went in.

The 20.5″ uku was bled a little when I caught it, put on Arctic Ice blocks in my Hobie fish bag, then transferred to a cooler when I got home and covered with cubed ice overnight per recommendation from boating friends who catch uku by the boat load. I’m hoping to get enough meat off it to be sashimi and a little poke for a family Thanksgiving meal.

This Thanksgiving, I thank God to be able to live in the greatest country in the world, in the State of Hawaii with the nicest people and the best weather. I hope your Thanksgiving is spent with loved ones and yummy food.