Targeted larger fish on the Windward side. Found some that put the hurt on me, and a couple that went home in the fish bag.

January 12, 2026 By Scott 4 Comments

I am grateful for the fish caught out of the Westside on the previous two trips that went to holiday parties, but wanted to catch fish larger than 3lbs. My plan was to use larger soft plastic lures from Completely Hooked Lures, to deter the smaller fish from biting, and drag live opelu around to find a stray mahi mahi or kawakawa. If that failed, I’d drop the 120g tungsten knife jig down in deeper water since I have yet to land a fish on it.

I have been using the Sprat (top lure) and it catches everything including large opelu, but still attracts smaller moana and smaller taape. The Gobie and Grub have thicker profiles so hopefully that are too much of a meal for small fish. That funny little lure on the bottom is a prototype that Landon of Completely Hooked Lures sent over with my order, to try on picky opelu.

I took out a damashi rod rigged for opelu with a CHL Minnow (smaller version of the Sprat) and the prototype little lure on 15lb. I had a second damashi rod rigged with Sprats, Gobies and Grubs for the larger fish, on 25lb.

At the first stop where I normally target moana kali, there were opelu bait balls around and sure enough the lighter damashi rig brought up opelu on both the Minnow and the little lure. The opelu bite was good and by the time I had 6 in my bait tube, there wasn’t anything else good on the bottom. So I headed over to a slightly deeper spot that has held small uku, and big jacks. On the way over, in what I think is a flat hard bottom, was a layer of something right off the bottom. I dropped the larger damashi rig down and a 2lb omilu came up. That was very unusual, finding omilu not on a rocky reef. I released it and caught another omilu right after. Not wanting to be catching hard fighting fish I have to release, I moved on to the uku/ulua spot, but just caught the rubbish fish (trumpetfish and taape) that bite when the conditions are too calm.

So I put a live opelu out with a sliding tungsten bullet weight in front of it, and towed it out a mile. Something took chunks of it behind its head and killed it but was too small to take the hooks. I put another one out and something else took chunks in the stomach area. Odd that those fish didn’t chip away at the entire fish but that was an indication that pelagics weren’t in that specific area.

I reached a spot in 180ft where kahala have hit jigs in the past, and I dropped the mangled opelu down to the bottom. Sure enough something strong grabbed it, and my drag’s strike setting wasn’t strong enough to stop it from rocking me. Assuming there were more kahalas around I dropped down the 120g tungsten knife jig. It took 45 seconds to reach the bottom, and I could barely feel any resistance jigging it back up. On the 4th drop it got hammered and I had the drag set very tight so I wouldn’t get rocked. The fish was so strong and the jig rod’s butt dug into my side. I was huffing and puffing but couldn’t stop to rest because the fish would then turn its head and swim down to rock me. After less than 3 minutes, which felt like 10 mins, a white ulua (GT) surfaced. I had let it depressurize about 20ft below the surface so it was able to swim down fine. Here’s the truncated video of that battle. If you’re interested in purchasing the 120g and 180g tungsten knife jigs, you can find them in the Store here. They’re pricey because they are tungsten, but they won’t tire you out until something big hits it.

I rested up a bit after that jig battle, and motored back to that big fish spot and dropped another chunk of fresh opelu on the bait rod, with the strike setting set higher. Sure enough another fish hit it and I was in for another grueling battle. A slightly bigger ulua came up that I released. Convinced there was nothing else down there but strong fish I didn’t want to fight, I put another live opelu out and headed back to shallower uku spot. Up to this point I just had opelu in my bait tube and nothing in my fish bag.

Finally, I landed a decent sized yellow spot papio after going through moana and big taape.

It took a while to catch a second yellow spot, right after a big opelu was hooked on the big damashi rig, and it was time to head in.

So I struck out with the live bait but the larger damashi lures did seem to attract larger fish, and I was finally able to fish deep enough to catch something on the 120g tungsten knife jig. Pretty good fishing despite very calm conditions and a junk moon phase.

The yellow spot ended up weighing 2lb and 2lb 10oz after being bled, and both were males developing sperm. Maybe all those papio were on the bottom getting ready for a spawn?

My neighbor Brian turned the larger yellow spot papio into something almost too beautiful eat.

Deepwater tasty critters on the damashi

July 1, 2020 By Scott Leave a Comment

Hadn’t been able to kayak fish for 5 weeks so when the wind forecast dropped I got my gear ready. Surf was too big on the south shore so I headed back to God’s Country, the Windward side of Oahu, land of plenny fish and nice people.

I wanted to catch some fish for some friends who had helped me out, and the most productive kind of fishing I was capable of was using the damashi for tasty critters. The wind was stronger than expected, at 12 to 15 mph, and the water was lumpy from the big south swell. It took a while to get out to the spot I found the last time, but the rudder mounted Bixpy jet motor pushed through the slop with ease.

I made a bunch of drops with two sizes of CHL Minnows, drifting around until I brought up a small nabeta. 1 in the bag! The second one came up soon after and then I drifted off the spot and couldn’t find them again. I went further out, made drops until I felt more resistance on the line than a nabeta could make. Juvenile opakapaka, or “paka pups” as we call ’em! Their swim bladder pops out on the ride up from the depths so even if I deflated the swim bladder I’m not sure they’re gonna survive. There’s no size limit for opakapaka but without a Commercial License I’m only allowed 5 “Deep 7” fish, so I bagged it and went deeper for hopefully larger paka.

Paka pup fell off the top hook and floated helplessly

A double of larger paka pups came up and one fell off the hook and floated away. I motored back to get it and it definitely couldn’t decompress and head back down on its own. I poked its swim bladder with a hook and left it in my footwell. It stayed alive but wasn’t too lively and its swim bladder was still distended.

Another double of paka pups came up so I went shallower to find the nabeta and to avoid catching more pups.

I felt a little wiggling on the line and up came a silver, slender fish? Opelu? Noooo… baby kaku! These guys were cute but still stink like the larger variety. Another came up on the next drop so I moved away from Kaku Kindergarten.

I’m partial to green shades of Minnows when fishing deep but the pink ones worked too

The wind has pushed me shallower and I started catching little boxy porcupine fish so I cranked the Bixpy up and headed past the Kaku Kindergarten. The first drop yielded a nabeta so I was on the spot! Then I got a double nabeta – woohoo! I’m now counting in my head whether I have enough of these deep water golden nuggets to share.

Then I felt a heavier fish fighting back and up came a blunt nosed deepwater lizard fish and a paka pup. Uh oh, I was past my limit and didn’t want to kill anymore of them so I headed in with 5 nabeta and limit of pups.

A really nice guy, camping and boating with his kids, helped me pull my kayak out of the water and gave me a brand new Hayabusa damashi (the expensive kind) when I told him I suck at catching opelu. The folks I meet on this side of the island still live life the old Hawaiian way. It feels like I’m being transported back in time when I’m out here.

The fish were small but my friends were able to get a taste of how good steamed opakapaka and fried nabeta can be. I’m hoping to get more pups when they’re bigger.

Kayak damashi action

May 18, 2020 By Scott Leave a Comment

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: Late Season 2019 Whipping Report

October 15, 2019 By Scott 14 Comments

Thad, our JDM expert and shoreline whipping enthusiast, provides this report in early October.

Thad: Like many years before, I wasn’t able to fish this season’s peak summer months for oama, halalū, or papio due to other important things going on at home. Seeing and hearing of all the action my friends were having made me envious but I knew fishing would always be there and the next summer season would be just around the corner.

Recently, I’ve been able to venture out to do my regular early morning fishing sessions and was expecting the predator action to be slow so I went oio fishing instead. My friends were able to catch and release some legal sized papio while we targeted the oio so I wondered if the season had truly slowed down. It was already the middle of September and the bait schools weren’t as plentiful but it seemed like the papio were still hunting inshore.

The following weekend, I decided to devote my time whipping some CHL grubs Scott had given me to try. It was a decent morning with five omilu landed and several more that came off. Nothing big, but all legal sized ranging from 10 to 12 inches. Were these the last remaining papio of the season? Only one way to find out.

Two weeks later I decided to try my luck whipping some papio flies my friend Brandon makes for me, which I’ve had much success with in the past. The result of this morning session was several more hits and misses, with a 10.75 and 15 inch omilu landed. My fishing partners also landed a 13 and another 15 inch omilu on grubs. Still some pretty good action for October.

This past weekend I went on a solo mission – which is usually when the big ones bite right? I noticed a small school of tiny baitfish darting around the shoreline as well as a small pile of oama. The first cast of the morning with Brandon’s “Sparrow” fly produced a 10.5 inch omilu. Several casts later, something blew up on the fly only a few yards out and took off. There was no slowing the fish down on the first run. Then I felt the fish pop off much to my dismay.

I continued casting but whatever it was, it wasn’t around anymore so I decided to change it up and try a Mark White oama lure. One the second cast, another solid hook up and short run before the lure popped out of the fish’s mouth again. I like to change up my lures often so I went with grubs to see if there were any takers but no luck. It was nearing the end of my fishing time so I switched back to the trusty Sparrow fly to cast as I worked my way back. Sure enough, I got a few more tugs here there before I landed an 11.5 inch omilu to end the day.

Since I wasn’t able to fish the peak months of the season, I have no way of comparing the recent action to how it may of have been in June – August. The recent action has been pretty good though, so I have no complaints.