A good friend, Scott, contacted me saying he was gonna take his 9 yr old son Dylan fishing and wanted to know where he should go. They were back home on Oahu visiting family and earlier on this trip, they had tried to whip for papio and catch oama but the fish weren’t in those spots. I texted the Holoholo writers asking for suggestions and they told me of a Windward spot that was kid friendly with bathroom nearby, that had bamboo-pole-kind fishing. My afternoon was free and I hadn’t seen Scott in 8 yrs so I asked if I could join them and hopefully we’d manage to get Dylan a few fish.
I hadn’t oama fished since 2019 and had to find my old tackle. I found the old oama poles but couldn’t find any spare small oama hooks or split shot so I brought those poles with buss up line and hooks, and the top half of a spinning rod. Didn’t need a bait bucket or bait pump since we didn’t plan on keeping anything. The net ended up staying in the car. Scott picked up a longer telescopic pole and split shot at Nankos.
We started fishing a couple hours before the peak afternoon King Tide and chummed up fish you’d see in a salt water aquarium along with some well fed balloon fish but the damashi-sized hooks I put on the two longer poles may have been too big, and Scott and I only managed to land two small pualu (surgeonfish). A few hours passed and we were hot and hungry, heading back to the car when one of the uncles there showed us where catchable oama were and gave us his leftover secret baits. Don’t ask me what they were ‘cuz I can’t reveal them!
Pieces of the secret bait brought in the whole school of oama, with baby papio dashing in every so often to grab some pieces. The big hooks couldn’t hook the fish so I got the crusty oama poles out of the car. 1 didn’t have a hook on and the other 2 had dried up bait stuck on the hooks! The hooks looked rusty and a little dull but we gave them a try, missing a lot of oama before we all got a few that were put back in the water. These were Dylan’s first oama ever, and Scott’s first in years. The uncle that blessed us really saved the trip and we passed that on by giving our leftover bait to the guys that fished near us.
Meanwhile, Holoholo writer Pono checked an oama spot on the North Shore with friends and they quickly caught a bunch and ended up releasing them alive since the papio weren’t around. Catch & Release Oama, kind of unheard of, but was a reminder that oama fishing in its purest form is about enjoying the outdoors and sharing that experience with others.
Oama and halalu are full bore now. Papio should be full bore soon. Enjoy them while they’re in.
