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Holoholo: Ala Wai JDM vs Non-JDM and King Tide fishing

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Soon to be 8th grader, Matthew, fished the target-rich Ala Wai Canal with traditional and JDM lures, and fished the bottom and the top of the King Tide on a beach outing. Here’s his very entertaining recap and recommendations.

Matthew:

Ala Wai

Most people think of the Ala Wai as a stinky, bacteria filled canal, and that’s very true, but fishermen see it as a gold mine for fishing. Some of the less brave fishermen don’t fish it, so that takes away most of the crowd. But the fish that do remain in there have seen just about every lure on the market, including grubs, spoons, and poppers. So you have to switch it up a little bit. I use JDMs, which are lures that are made in Japan. I took Jacob, other Matthew, Luca, and Vance to fish the Ala Wai. 

The first hour and a half was very boring, with no strikes, until I switched it up with the JDMs. I tried the Shimano Shallow Assassin Flash Boost 99mm, which is a solid lure, but I had never tested it much. First cast on it and boom, a nice Omilu hits it but the side treble got stuck in its scutes, which made it feel huge. I kept fishing with it for a while, and eventually landed a decent White Papio, and a good size Kaku. 

Editor’s Note: Shameless plug – there are still 3 Shallow Assassin Flash Boosts left in the Store.

Then I switched to the transparent JDM model of the Lucky Craft Sammy purchased in the Hawaii Nearshore Fishing store for $7.50. First cast, and I could see a Kaku following it in. I paused the lure for a second and it jumped on it and immediately went airborne. I tagged and released it quickly and got back to fishing.

I landed one more on the Sammy before I decided to switch it up to the secret JDM lure that I’ve been using recently. No surprise at all, I landed four fish on it, three being Kaku, all violent and exciting strikes, but then I saw a bait school getting busted on in the middle of the canal. 

I casted far out there and saw four or five White Papio each fighting each other for the lure. They missed it many times, but one eventually grabbed it and stuck on. Right away it started peeling drag. It took an easy 30 yards on the ultralight setup and I started to get concerned of the huge log it was trying to run into. I radioed back to my mom that I had a big one on, and I decided I had to lock down and boost it or lose it. Remember, this is six pound line main with a 2500 size reel, an ultralight setup. I locked down the drag and muscled it out from the log close to where I could see it. When I saw it, my heart dropped. 

One treble was in its mouth and hanging by a flap of skin. I loosened up the drag, and that must be when it saw me and it took another 30 or so yards. It kept resisting for another minute or so before I got it close again. I kneeled down and grabbed the leader, and brought it up onto land. It was the biggest Papio I had caught in a while, so I was of course happy, and tagged it and released it. This was on a rising tide, and was around 2.1 feet when this happened.

Beach Fishing

Cut back to July Fourth and a -0.5 tide. This was the lowest tide I had ever fished and I could walk all the way to the breakers. First cast and the lure flies off to Narnia and I never see it again. Strike one. I keep walking out to the breakers, and retie. I spook a giant Oio and it scares me to the point where I fall off the boulder I’m standing on. Strike Two. I landed hard on the bottom of the boulder, right on top of a Wana (Sea Urchin). Dang. Strike Three. 

I pull off the creature but leave the spikes on my foot, and wonder how I am going to get inshore, because if it took me 30 minutes to get out here with two feet able, how am I going to do it with one? I see my answer soon. I go into the sand channel, which is a lot deeper, but only up to around my waist, and walk all the way in. I quickly pulled the spines out of me, and was careful for the rest of the time not to step on that foot hard. 

First cast since I made it in and boom, an aggro kaku hops on. It had a tag in it, and was my own! It had grown an incredible 4.5 inches since April, which is a lot. But that was the only fish of the trip if you don’t count an eight inch Omilu.

Go to July Fifth and I go fishing on the huge 2.5 King Tide. The spot looked a lot different from when it was a negative tide. I set my dunkers out from 6pm. I started whipping but the only fish that came up was a slimy Nunu (trumpetfish0, but it was caught on the Shimano Shallow Assassin Flash Boost 99mm. It got dark really fast, and I started to eat my food.

The rest of that night passed horribly quiet until 10pm, when we left. Not a single bell rang or a single bite. The dunking bite was horrible, as well as the whipping bite. Maybe because of the swift current? Keep tuned for future updates.

The yak fishing conditions finally came together, or did they?

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deep trolling oama

The trades finally died down, blocked by the remnants of Tropical Storm Fernanda.  The moon was small the night before, and Frank and I launched at the bottom of a big tidal swing.  It was overcast, with thunderstorms threatening nearby. I was concerned the water might be too flat, but there was enough chop to make the predators feel comfortable.  A very reliable source had found the school of white papio hitting bait that morning, and gave us the location.

All that raised our expectations even though we tried hard not to count our screamers before they hatched.

We paddled straight for the area where the whites had bitten that morning, and the fish finder didn’t mark much bait or larger fish along the way.  After about 30 mins of circling the spot, something pulled drag but by the time I cleared the line it jumped off.  I saw the splash in the corner of my eye, and so did Frank, maybe a poorly hooked, small awa awa?  That was the last good strike we registered.

For the next 3.5 hrs we checked all the likely and unlikely spots and got some weak strikes that pulled at our baits but didn’t stick.  On the way in, the area that was reported to have the white papio school had a lot of bait fish near the surface.  That bait wasn’t there when we first came through.

So what caused this bolo on a day that seemed to have everything lined up for epic fishing?  The whites may have attacked the bait fish early in the morning and dispersed them, or chased them inside where we didn’t check. That I can understand.  But what happened to the omilu, awa awa and aha that are normally around the reef channels during the daytime hours? Did the big King tide cause too much tidal current so they hunkered down in a calmer area?  We’re beginning to realize the big tidal swings don’t bode well for our deep channel fishing.  Or did the fish feel the low pressure of the thunderstorms nearby?