Red hot 2 hr fishing window

September 23, 2015 By Scott 17 Comments

new best day ever!

Today was supposed to be the light wind day of the week so I took 6 live oama and 4 fresh dead ones out for a surfboard troll. I planned to fish a different stretch of the beach by paddling into the wind and letting the wind bring me back to the launch point.

I started with a recently deceased, medium-sized captive oama so I wouldn’t waste a livey on the way out to the surfline. Nothing bit it after reaching the break and trolling parallel to it for 10 mins, so I was about to put on a livey on instead. All of a sudden my ratchet screamed and the rod bent over. I hadn’t heard my ratchet scream all year so I was initially spooked! It was actually hard to pull the rod out of the holder; man I missed those screamers. The fish pulled drag in a straight line, then let itself be worked in halfway, then took off again. While I was loving the fight, I strongly suspected it was an oio that decided it needed to add oama to its diet, and I really wanted a nice sized papio instead. The fish started shaking its head, which gave me hope, then pulled line straight out again. After a hard fight against a tight drag, the largest omilu I caught in 2 yrs flashed on its side. It was hooked on the front hook and somehow had broken off the hook that was in the oama’s tail. I was stoked and I had only been fishing 20 minutes. I contemplated heading back in but I didn’t want to waste the live oama.

I put a live one on and something pulled it off without sounding the ratchet. I wonder what could have done that? I put on another livey and this one got eaten by a 10 inch C&R omilu. The next livey hooked a 15 inch (head to tail) omilu that pulled drag nicely and was added to the catch bag. 2 good sized omilu make a decent catch so again I contemplated paddling in but I still had 3 live oama and 3 dead ones.

The next 3 live oama were mangled and crushed but I couldn’t hook the culprit despite the two hook setup. I put a dead oama on and saw the floater go under. When I retrieved the line all I got back was the oama’s head. I put the second to the last dead oama on and let the wind blow me back to the launch site. The ratchet went off but the fight felt a little weird. There was a lot of resistance but the fish wasn’t pulling a lot of line. When it got close, I realized why. Somehow a 14″ omilu was hooked on the front hook and a 10″ omilu was hooked on the rear hook! And another omilu was swimming with them, trying to join the party. Crazy. I shook the 10″ omilu off and kept the 14″ (head to tail) omilu. That was more than enough fish for one day, so I dumped the last dead oama and went in.

Darin’s oio

Darin, whom I had met before, was dunking ika from the beach. He said a lot of undersized papio had been hitting his baits in the last hr, with one legal omilu in the mix. I wished him luck and ran into a guy who had been hooking legal white papio on his Crystal Minnow from shore. His C&R lure action was in the last 30 minutes. While we were taking he noticed that Darin was on a nice fish. What the heck was going on? Were all the planets in alignment or something? We went over to watch Darin’s fish make numerous strong runs before being subdued. The oio went 21″ and 4lbs and Darin packed up his gear to get the fish home in good shape for fish cake.

There wasn’t a particularly good solunar activity period today but something made the fish feed aggressively at the break and at the shoreline. I suspect the fish are trying to make up for all that lost time spent hunkering down during the stormy, humid weather. The trade winds have cooled the water nicely and it looks like the papio season isn’t over yet.

The larger omilu I caught went about 19″ (head to tail) and made 3 lbs on my not too accurate hand scale. Not that big as omilus go but bigger than any omilu I’ve caught last year and this year. With so many papio competing for not much bait this season, I suspect larger than normal papio are coming onto the reef to find food.

Oio on a Waxwing, are you serious?

July 28, 2015 By Scott 9 Comments

If you weren’t a believer before, this may convince you. I fished a Blue Sardine Boy Waxwing at the surf break in hopes of catching something worthy of the Waxwing Lure Review I’m writing for Lawai’a magazine. Prior to this I was using the smaller Baby size. The Boy is 3.5″ long and weighs 7/8 oz. With a tail wind, it casts really far; with a side wind it curves more than the Baby because of its larger profile.

It’s the perfect lure for me to throw seated on my board at water level. I only need a few inches of line past the tip of my rod to cast, and the lure swims so well because my rod tip is so close to the water.

For reference, I’m wearing size 9 surf booties

I didn’t get a bump for 20 mins and was wondering if it was too large a lure to use. In comparison, the Boy is 2.7″. Then I got a hard strike and a strong run. I fish my drag really tight to set the swinging, upward facing hook, and the fish pulled line in hard spurts. It swung me around, toward shore, instead of into the waves and took all my fluorocarbon top shot. Not sure how much line that is though, maybe 70 yds? I was convinced it was the biggest papio I hooked on my surfboard and when I finally had the fish at color I saw a long thick shape and thought it was a kaku on steroids. It was a 5lb plus oio and was foul hooked behind its eyes. Oio have very tough skin, luckily, and both hooks were embedded. I took some pics and let the fish go.

An oio on a subsurface lure right in front of the white wash. Oio normally feed on the bottom and are rarely hooked on fast moving subsurface lures. I’m working with some Lawai’a supporting tackle shops to put a promotional Waxwing package together. There were a few mods to the lure system I had to make to improve my catch ratio. Stay tuned.

Full moon, high solunar Waxwing whipping

June 2, 2015 By Scott Leave a Comment

low tide, big surf

I fished the high solunar activity period on the Waxwing test grounds I fished last week. The tide was rising fast but the bite was slow. Even though there were schools of aholehole and mullet fingerlings in the muddy shallows, the black/chrome Waxwing just got a few follows and bumps from the small white papio.

omilu like the Waxwing also

I saw 10 inch kaku, and even saw the same oio rooting in the sand 5 feet from shore that I saw last week, but nothing attacked with vigor until I hooked a small omilu. That omilu hit the lure just as it landed in the water, and was hooked on its bottom jaw.

nice oio on a slow day

A regular at the spot, Brian walked out 5 ika baits and fished through the high solunar activity also. He was rewarded with a nice 5 lb oio and called it a day as the tide hit 2 feet.

I’ve joined the solunar activity non-believers. Low visibility conditions, rising tide and small moon seem to cause the fish to bite better than these high solunar activity periods.

Oio seem to consistently bite during these slow periods. Too bad they don’t eat Waxwings on a regular basis.

Hunting oio on a narrow reef shelf

April 1, 2015 By Scott 8 Comments

Decided to give the most recent spot a rest. On a friend’s recommendation, I explored a narrow strip of reef that falls into a deeper channel. The terrain was the common crushed rock and tufts of seaweed found on the inner reefs of Oahu.

The bite on the shallow reef during the rising tide was slow so I made my way to the outer edge. I picked up an obake weke halfway out, which I thought was a good sign that oio would be around. Sadly, nothing else bit as I waded deeper and deeper.

I was using a 7ft 11inch casting rod and a heavier 3/4 oz weight. With the help of the wind, I could cast much further than normal. I walked out to hip-high water, and tried to hit a reef section in the channel. I let the bait sit and eventually felt very light taps. It felt like something was pecking away at the bait and I forced myself to wait it out. After about 25 seconds the fish took the bait and pulled line off the reel. Oio! But because of the rocky terrain the fish ran under a rock outcropping and I could feel the line rub. My drag was sticky too, and the line pulled in spurts.

look how well it blends in

The fish dragged all my fluorocarbon top shot through the rock hangup and I was into my braid backing. I turned the fish but it was still hung up on the rock so I waded out to chest high water and was able to free the line. The oio came in easily at this point because it was fighting the increased drag of a stuck line.

I walked it back to shore to take some pics and release it.

my tabis are size 9

Nothing else of consequence bit after that. In the past, catching a 4.5 lb oio measuring almost 22 inches at a new spot would’ve been great accomplishment. But after this week’s 6 pounder, it was kind of anti-climactic. And fighting the 6 pounder with a locked down drag must’ve warped the drag washers. I’ll have to rebuild the drag system before the next screamah hits.

Whipping for oio on the flats

March 23, 2015 By Scott 9 Comments

Fishing the afternoon rise alone, I didn’t have a dunking friend to compare results against. I wanted to see if I could get an oio to bite my cut bait in the general area that the dunkers had out fished me last week. My Calcutta 200 TE was spooled with a 15 lb fluorocarbon top shot, up from the 12lb I used last week, so I could use more drag to turn the silver speedsters.

making circles around me

As I walked out on the just rising tide, I was startled to see about 4 tailing oio at the deeper end of the flat. They didn’t spook when I cast to them but they didn’t take my bait either. Eventually losing track of the tailers, I cast into the edge of the channel where I had hooked and lost last week’s fish. Just like last time, I felt a light nibble and then a take. This time the fish sped up and took about 75 yds of line, then slowed down under the tight drag and let itself be pulled back. It made a series of spirited runs but was under control unlike the fish I lost last week.

pooped

In a few minutes the fish was spent and had given up. The oio looked to be about 4 lbs and more than 22 inches. While I was deciding whether to keep him so Chester could make taegu ala Bruddah Bill’s recipe, see below, managed to shake off the hook and slowly make his escape. Oh well, a bigger fish would be a better use of Chester’s time.

A few small omilus and an obake weke bit before the water got deeper and a lot murkier. I called it a day knowing the drag bait technique does work on the flats oio and my inshore bait caster setup can easily over power a 4 lb oio. Whatever took out 160 yds without stopping last week was much larger and stronger than today’s fish. I’m beginning to think it was a shark since it didn’t spurt like most oios do.

I need to do another head to head with a dunker to see which technique is more effective on flats oio. Stay tuned.

The recipe below was featured in Lawai’a magazine.

Whipping vs. Dunking on the flats, which is better?

March 18, 2015 By Scott 6 Comments

I whip/drag cut bait because I love to feel the initial take and don’t like waiting around for a fish to pick up my chunk of bait. But most noteworthy flats catches are accomplished by guys wading out and dunking bait in the sand pockets with larger gear than my whipping setup. Landing a big oio with fly gear is also noteworthy, but beyond my skill set.

The last two days I fished with friends who dunked while I dragged bait. Here’s how we did.

Yesterday I ran into Kris and his wife Ai at the spot he caught his big oios last week. He kindly took me out on a guided trip and we fished the rising morning tide. They cast into prime spots and held their poles while I dragged bait with my regular setup (7.5 ft inshore casting rod, Calcutta 200 TE baitcaster with 12 lb flouro mainline, no leader).

snagged omilu

My smaller hook, lighter line and moving bait got more strikes, even snagging a small omilu in the top of his head!

rock fishing

The bite really turned on when the water rose and turned murky. The small omilus and occasional weke were hitting every bait. I tried a live crab to get something larger to take, but the crab clung so tight to the bottom I was bringing up rocks!

Kris and Ai were bringing in their share of small omilus and weke on their dunking gear when Kris hooked the fish of the day.

Kris and Ai

The 15 inch omilu was Kris’ largest papio to date, and he was stoked, especially after catching his personal best oios at this spot the week before. Ai loves to eat papio but after seeing how beautiful they are alive, she couldn’t bear to kill it. Kris was stunned but set it free.

On this day, my lighter, more active whipping method caught more fish but Kris’ dunking method caught the largest fish. Ai was a hybrid, initially dunking and then switching to whipping when the bite really turned on. All caught fish were released.

———————————————————————————————————————————–

Today I took Chester to Kris’ spot. Chester hadn’t gone oio fishing for a long time and really wanted to make taegu and lomi lomi oio. He loaded up with a 40 lb leader and 30 lb main line to increase his chances of bringing in the oio that bit his dunked bait. He planned to just take one fish, and brought out a cooler on a bodyboard to ensure the flesh would be well preserved. Chester started where the flats drop off into a sand channel and I dragged bait over the crushed rock and ogo grounds inside of his spot. I eventually got a small nibble as my cast bait settled to the bottom. It was a lighter tap than a small omilu would make, and felt like a bait stealer. The fish initially ran a few feet and took a bit of drag. Then it realized it was hooked and steadily swum off, in a calm manner like it had someplace to go, but wasn’t in a hurry. I was told by Kris to let the oio run, and my drag was set under breaking strength for 12lb test so I just enjoyed the pull. When I looked down the 100 yds of fluorocarbon top shot was gone and I was into the 100 yds of 30 lb power pro. With 160 yds out I had, at most, 40 yds left and tightened the drag. The fish continued to swim steadily, unconcerned that it was tethered to me, and 10 yds later the hook pulled and got stuck in a rock. Arrgggghhhh! I made the walk of shame over to free my hook. The hook was fine but my line was a little frayed.

Chester’s first oio

I walked back to tell Chester what he missed, and I’m not sure he really believed me. We went back to fish the spot I lost the oio, and slowly worked our way towards shore as the tide rose. The whipping bite was a lot slower than yesterday, and over an hr period I just got a couple small omilus and an obake weke. Chester had his bait stolen a few times and was lapsing into a coma when he felt a weak tug followed by a short spurt. He was thinking that a small omilu had taken his big bait and then the rod doubled over and his drag screamed out. Chester kept the drag relatively tight and tried to muscle the fish in as fast as possible. 5 mins of hard runs passed and he had the fish on the surface. With shaking hands he grabbed the oio and threw it into the cooler. He estimated it was close to 5 lbs and would provide enough flesh to make both taegu and lomi lomi oio.

Chester’s 2nd oio

He said he’d keep his word and would not take another oio, even if it was larger than this one. As he caught his breath I scrambled to try to get my second shot at an oio. Sadly, the bite slowed even more so we made our way back to shore. 2/3 of the way in, Chester was soaking his bait, watching me play with the small omilus. Chester’s rod doubled over without warning and the drag rang out. Because he was able to muscle it in within a couple mins we assumed this fish was smaller than the first. At color we couldn’t believe our eyes; it was even larger than the first fish. After a few pictures of his second largest oio ever, estimated at more than 6 lbs, he said he’d be letting it go. I held it behind its head to revive it in the water. It felt like holding on to a thick carp. I know the pictures look like they’re of the same fish, but if you look closely the second fish is much thicker.

Chester’s gloved hands holding my skinny fish

Mission accomplished so we headed in. On the way I hooked a 14 inch omilu as a consolation prize. Legal, but skinny, I let it go.

Today was so much different from yesterday. The bite was a lot slower and there were oio bites whereas yesterday we were in the middle of an omilu frenzy. Fewer omilus allow the big oio a chance to wolf down a bait. I wonder what caused this to happen?

In these conditions Chester’s dunking method trounced my whipping method. He only caught 3 fish but 2 were impressive oios. While I was lucky enough to hook one oio on my moving bait, I was under gunned with 12lb line. I’ll be moving up to 15 lb test in the hopes of proving I can subdue a monsta oio on inshore whipping gear.

Stay tuned for the next whipping vs. dunking challenge.

Hunting oio with new fishing friends

March 11, 2015 By Scott 5 Comments

Kris’ oio

I received a hot tip from Kris, whom I met through this blog. We’ve been sharing fishing reports and have been planning to meet and fish. He caught 3 oio on the flats yesterday and provided this photo as proof. He released all 3.

That report couldn’t have come at a better time since I was planning to fish the flats with Joel and Dean. Joel writes “Spyda’s Blog“, which artistically chronicles his recent shore casting outings and classic past trips. I had met Joel and Dean through this blog also. We waded out at the bottom of the zero foot tide with hopes of some screamers.

moana

Midway to the break we got our first baby omilu strike. As we got near the leading edge of the white wash, the bite really turned on. Unfortunately Joel had to depart for a previously planned meeting and left us to the frenzy. The reef residents were ambushing our baits before the baby omilus could get to them. Dean missed a big strike that pulled drag, and I brought in a legal moana followed by a 9 inch moana kali.

baby moana kali

I hadn’t caught a moana kali on the reef flat before and was very surprised. Hopefully there’s a healthy population of these, with some reaching steamable size. A smaller moana rounded out my goatfish run.

Dean fished a deep sand channel with a plug and I fished a deep drop off with `opae lolo. I got a strong hit on one of the lolos but the fish managed to rip the body off the hook. I went back to my cut bait to save the precious `opae lolo bait.

The air temp was in the low 70s and we were freezing under cloudy skies. As we headed in to thaw out, Dean hooked a strong obake weke that took a while to be worked in. We left the fish biting and didn’t get the screamer we were hoping for. Later, Joel informed us that he spooked a large oio in 18 inches of water as he headed in.

All the more reason to plan another trip.

(Today’s fish were released unharmed. Sorry for the lack of better pictures, it was hard to turn on my camera phone with numb fingers and I wasn’t close enough to Joel and Dean.)

Hunting oio on the evening zero foot tide

January 14, 2015 By Scott Leave a Comment

voggy skies, skinny water

The oio weren’t tailing in the shallow reef mounds the last two times out so I tried another spot this evening. This beach has a flatter terrain with a few sandy channels inside of the break. Light Kona winds made for a voggy, glassy surface. The 5 inch omilus were pestering my cut bait on the invasive ogo patches so I cast into a small sand break between the mounds and dragged the weighted bait back.

I felt some light pecking unlike the rapid jerks the omilus make, and something squirted off with a few yards of line. Then the fish realized it was hooked and took off on a smooth 75 yd run. Ahh, finally an oio after so many trips. I had been worried my medium casting rod and level wind reel setup might not be able to handle a big fish since the little omilus put a bend in the tip, but the G Loomis Greenwater rod’s backbone kicked in, and the Shimano Calcutta 200 TE (eBay!) smoothly released the 12 lb fluorocarbon. Resting the rod butt on my holiday-built belly, I took in line when the oio stopped running, and let it take line when it wanted to. The fish let itself be pulled to within 5 yds of me, and then it took off on a 50 yd run. There weren’t any sharp rock piles to get cut off on so I enjoyed the short battle.

4lb oio, I think

In a few minutes I had it close and it was bigger than expected despite coming in rather quickly. I didn’t know of anyone who’d be ready to scrape an oio and make fishcake / lomi oio so I took some clumsy photos and released it. It’s hard to tell how large it was from this picture, but the fish was almost 20 inches (head to fork). I’d guess it was close to 4 lbs because it was fairly thick.

oio imposter

Knowing the oio were around, I put on the top half of a mantis shrimp. I had cut the shrimp in half, lengthwise, because I didn’t want to risk getting stabbed by a lively shrimp. I cast further out into the same channel and despite the previous commotion, I felt something trying to kill the mantis shrimp piece. Expecting the line to peel out again, instead the line pulled in spurts and a medium sized obake weke came up.

I went back to cut bait and finished the day with more of the pesky 5 inch omilus.

All the fish were released unharmed.

Oio seen tailing on the flats

December 30, 2014 By Scott 2 Comments

shallow oio feeding grounds

The tides haven’t been good to troll my remaining oamas and the north winds have made the water pretty chilly. Instead, I’ve been wading the flats on low, evening tides in search of oio. I’ve actually seen them feeding with their tails out of the water (tailing) but haven’t been close enough to take a suitable picture with my camera phone. The oio look to be 5 – 8 lbs. I’ve tried casting my cut shrimp setup near them but haven’t gotten any to take.

A helpful guy I met on the beach told me of his secret bait. He had three strong hits when I was out wading and ran out of bait. I gave him some shrimp but the picky oios snubbed that bait. I’ll try to acquire his secret bait and give that a try next time. It was great to see so many oio consistently feeding over the last few outings. The lay net ban on the South Shore has definitely helped restore the oio fishery.

about to be freed

On that conservation note, I returned the large weke I caught 2 weeks ago. It hadn’t eaten anything in captivity, including live opae, but was still very healthy as it swam to freedom. Too bad I couldn’t train him to tell me where the oio were hiding.

Fun flats whipping in less than ideal conditions

November 15, 2014 By Scott 6 Comments

Pete from NorCal was back and looking to go another round on the flats. Here’s how we did the last time we went hunting for late season oama. The tides were less than ideal during this week and the best option was to fish the wade-able low tide this evening and cast cut bait and Makata strips. The tide was falling, unfortunately, not rising.

obake weke on the shallow flats

Whipping from shore hasn’t yielded anything substantial recently and we only had a couple hours to fish, so we had low expectations. To make things even more challenging, Pete was using a freshwater spinning setup without much line. The cut bait was getting all the small papio bites so we stuck with that and worked our way out towards the surf break. Pete hooked something that fought like a small oio and had to tighten the rear drag on his small spinner to bring it in. It was the first obake weke I had ever seen in that area and it put up a very respectable fight. If we had quit then, it would have been a successful outing.

We had 20 more minutes to fish so we made it to a sandy channel in the shallow rubble and then every cast resulted in a strike. The 4 inch papio were swarming our baits, then I hooked a beefy Christmas wrasse that took line, followed by an almost legal omilu. Pete landed a grunting humuhumu.

Pete caught the target fish!

On his next retrieve, Pete’s reel started screaming. The fish pulled line in long bursts like an oio which really surprised me given the commotion caused by the previous fish landed. Oio are notoriously easily spooked. I expected Pete to get spooled on the light setup but he patiently worked the fish in, lost some line, and regained some. Finally we could see what it was, a 2 lb oio, the premier flats fish. I later felt Pete’s drag and it was set pretty tight from the battle with the obake weke. Pete masterfully manhandled his first ever oio with trout gear!

end of a successful day

He turned my camera phone on me to as I made my last cast.

All things considered, our short outing was very successful. All fish were released unharmed.

South Shore Inshore Sweep on the orange weight!

May 7, 2014 By Scott 4 Comments

calm, overcast conditions

The flats were calm with light Kona winds and overcast skies. Tide was too low for the surfboard so I walked it.

Great day to try the weights painted orange to resemble the eggs of sand turtles.

After 45 mins of inactivity I gave the orange weight 5 more casts before changing back to the regular red color, and boom, an almost legal omilu hit.

Then two legal moanas bit near the reef dropoff.

The bite slowed so I tried the gold kastmaster and all I got was a very confident lizardfish.

Back to the orange weight and cut bait and an oio was on! Papio, oio and goatfish, is that close to an Oahu inshore sweep?

Not sure if the orange color helped but it didn’t seem to hurt.

Decided to catch, photograph and release (CPR) so the fish were alive and moving when I took their pics.

South Shore oio on the flats

May 3, 2014 By Scott 4 Comments

I’m new at fishing the flats for oio. I’ve caught them, though rarely, off sandy beaches and in deep reef channels but am new to stalking them on the south shore flats. The first time I did this, my friend hooked one in a sandy channel as we waded a minus tide but I got blanked. The second time the tide was filling in nicely but I think the sun was too high and the oio had come and gone. Third time’s the charm.

Yesterday, it was overcast and just finished raining in the early afternoon, and the tide had already risen to half a foot. That translated to about 2 feet on the flats. I waded out, casting, while dragging my board. Caught a small omilu on my 3rd cast but figured the slapping sound the board was making would scare the oio so I straddled and cast. 2 casts later I hooked a screamer. I felt kind of foolish sitting on my board in 2 feet of water holding the rod as high as I could so I eventually got off and tried to keep the line off the reef. I was expecting to feel the line rub against the reef followed by me yelling as I got cut off, but I guess the flats don’t have protruding coral heads. The fish made runs of 50 yds or more against the smooth drag of the Calcutta 200 TE bait caster and eventually tired.

Since I had lost the previous 3 oio to coral heads and my friend wanted to make fish cake, I bagged it. I did feel a little bad about killing the fly fisher’s catch and release quarry.

I rested my arms a bit and floated out to a sandy channel and 2 casts later I was on another oio. Before I could decide whether to keep this one it unhooked. Another small omilu and the bite was over even though my fish finder was metering fish on the flats and in the channels. Maybe the tide got too high and the oio made it inside to the shoreline?

I have some theories regarding why the fish bit when and where they did, and even have a secret rig to try out, so I guess I have to go back and gather more data! Click here to see how the experimental rig worked out.