Frank and I returned to the beach where the mystery fish swum away with my JDM sub-surface lure.  This time Frank was well armed with a new 8.5 ft spinning rod (on sale at Charley’s) and a new Shimano Stradic 4000 XG FK reel Masa, our JDM lure expert, sold at a great price.  Thanks Masa!  Armed with the same lure we used the previous week, we explored a new spot on the flat. Light colored kaku immediately responded to our lures, and nibbled on them but didn’t get hooked.

Still in mid-thigh deep water, and wading towards the drop off, I couldn’t believe my eyes.  A 5 ft plus black tip shark passed by me and was headed straight for Frank. I calmly called out “Shark” and didn’t expect Frank to be too concerned but he froze in his tracks.  The shark veered off  about 10 feet in front of him and we never saw it again.  Frank later explained that despite all his years in the ocean, he had never been standing in the water with a shark zeroing in on him.  I guess I would have been unnerved too but I’ve seen black tip sharks in the shallows twice before and both times the sharks weren’t very interested in us.  I assumed that sharks and kaku in the same area meant there was bait around for them, and as long as we weren’t the bait, it bode well for us.

The dropoff looked fishy but my Calcutta 200 TE bait caster free spool button got harder and harder to depress, and eventually jammed. An internal lever had gouged a hole in the reel’s aluminum frame and was stuck in gear.  After just 20 casts I couldn’t put the reel into free spool and was out of commission.  I was bummed but realized this was a great opportunity to watch Frank whip.  He was making long casts over the drop off with his new equipment and thought he felt some tugs but his lure ended up getting stuck in a small channel cut, 5 ft down.  There was no way his floating lure could have dove deep enough to get stuck there so I suspected a roi hit it on the surface and buried himself in the reef.  Because of the value and scarcity of the JDM lure, Frank asked me hold his rod and swam down to free the lure. I didn’t remind him of the shark that seemed so enamored with him.  He popped up with lure in hand and there was no fish attached.

He followed the contour of the reef drop off and hooked something that provided water resistance but not a lot of fight. Every so often he could feel a kick.  It turned out to be a foul hooked, medium sized roi, suggesting that the fish that got his lure stuck on the bottom was indeed a roi also. We didn’t have a knife to dispatch the reef fish killer so I used my long pliers to squeeze it behind its head.  What a beautifully patterned fish with a creepy mouth.  Zoom into the photo to see the rows of backward facing teeth used  to ensure that swallowed reef fish can’t back their way out.

We didn’t connect with papio or awa awa but we did see so very efficient predators.  With all the life out there, we intend to return soon.