still small but getting bigger

The papio are definitely coming onto the reef to dine on oama.  And this year there are so many oama around that the papio are discriminating.  I went to a deeper water reef area to troll oamas I had  caught yesterday.  3 lively ones resulted in 3 papio.  2 freshly dead ones weren’t touched at all.  Picky papio!

The first papio fell off my back hook as I was trying to measure it.  The top hook ended up stabbing my finger but luckily didn’t go barb deep.  Still sore though!

I was watching my orange floater behind me as I trolled over the spot I hooked the first papio and saw it go under. I thought I was seeing things until my ratchet went off.  I bagged the 10.5 inch (head to fork of tail) papio and put a fresh dead oama on.  Trolled all over for nada.  Then I put on the second to the last lively oama and within a minute the 12 inch (head to fork of tail) papio hit.

With two papio in the bag I set the last lively oama free.  The papio are hitting the oamas hard now.  The trick for me is to find where the larger ones are. My previous spots are loaded with 8 inch papio with small man complexes.