Big Game Trolling - any tips?

[cherrald]

As my wife is from Santo Vanuatu, I go over there all the time - and go fishing. I've fished my whole off beaches catching whiting, bream, dart, tailor, flat head etc. When I started fishing in Vanuatu it was completely different. I could catch the bream in the rivers, but I got smashed off all the time by BIG fish.

I’ve now been venturing out in boats over there and catching some deep water fish, and doing some trolling. I’ve finally found a good spot catching poulet and snapper in about 200m of water. The water over there is SOO deep. 500m offshore you are in 100m of water.

My trolling has been ok around the reefs. I’m using the rapala magnum hardbody lures, and the one that gets hit every time is the green mackerel 30ft diver. On it I’ve caught Mackeral, Yellow fin, Dog-tooth tuna, Coral Trout, Green Jobfish, Trevally and Red Bass. I was using 100lb mono until some BIG yellowfin carried it away. I now use single strand steal and get the same amount of hits.

There is a FAD set up by the fisheries over there in very VERY deep water that I went trolling around last time I was there. We saw a mahi mahi, and several sail fish, but got no hook ups. I was trolling 2 rapala magnum divers and a wild thing skirt. The skirt got about 4 strikes but no hook ups, and the rapalas didn’t get a touch.

I know there are REALLY big fish there and I want to catch them. My tackle gets upgraded every time I go so I’m ready now. I’ve just bought 2 big and one medium skirts to take back. Apart from being expensive ($90ea) I’m not sure about what configuration to put them out the back, how fast I should troll, and what settings should I set my drag because I lost a lot of fish having my drag set too high before, but these were reef fish and mackerel – not big game fish. So, I’ve never gone for big game fish before and would be grateful for any advice you could give me. Even about how I’m supposed to get the fish into the boat (we keep a spear gun to shoot them if they’re really big).

Here’s a few photos of some of the fish I’ve got over there. The biggest Yellowfin was 7.5kg, the travelly (6.5kg) was caught off the beach!!! The red bass (5kg) and other fish were all caught trolling.

[Fish_gutz]

while fishing with the locals in tonga a few years back they just laughed at our little overhead setups and they used what looked like whipper snipper cord but was 100 plus pound line and used skirts and once hooked up tied the line of to a pillar on the boat and then upped the throttle to drag them around checking the line every now and then to see if it was still fighting until they were buggered then just handlined them in and give them a touch up with the bat then into the boat and out go the lines for another troll. These fellas weren`t interested in the sport side of hooking and landing good fish more so it was a food gathereing mission and the sooner they had a feed the sooner they were home to relax. some of the fish caught the week we were there were wahoo to about twenty kilos mahi mahi about the same and some big yellow fin tuna and dog tooth tuna. We gave them some spoons to use which they seemed to like but skirts were the favoured lure. Cheers Andrew.

[MarkM]

Set your drag to 1/3 of your line strength ie: If using 24kg set it to 8kg or a bit less. If you dont have out riggers, set a short corner and a long corner. Troll at about 8knots .Make sure the lures are swimming down the swell as you troll so they look more realistic.This will determine the distance from the boat. Short corner, approx. 5-10m, Long, 15-20m+. A teaser works well too.Get yourself a gimble belt and harness and HANG ON!
Good luck!!

[madjewiefisher]

As my wife is from Santo Vanuatu, I go over there all the time - and go fishing. I've fished my whole off beaches catching whiting, bream, dart, tailor, flat head etc. When I started fishing in Vanuatu it was completely different. I could catch the bream in the rivers, but I got smashed off all the time by BIG fish.

I’ve now been venturing out in boats over there and catching some deep water fish, and doing some trolling. I’ve finally found a good spot catching poulet and snapper in about 200m of water. The water over there is SOO deep. 500m offshore you are in 100m of water.

My trolling has been ok around the reefs. I’m using the rapala magnum hardbody lures, and the one that gets hit every time is the green mackerel 30ft diver. On it I’ve caught Mackeral, Yellow fin, Dog-tooth tuna, Coral Trout, Green Jobfish, Trevally and Red Bass. I was using 100lb mono until some BIG yellowfin carried it away. I now use single strand steal and get the same amount of hits.

There is a FAD set up by the fisheries over there in very VERY deep water that I went trolling around last time I was there. We saw a mahi mahi, and several sail fish, but got no hook ups. I was trolling 2 rapala magnum divers and a wild thing skirt. The skirt got about 4 strikes but no hook ups, and the rapalas didn’t get a touch.

I know there are REALLY big fish there and I want to catch them. My tackle gets upgraded every time I go so I’m ready now. I’ve just bought 2 big and one medium skirts to take back. Apart from being expensive ($90ea) I’m not sure about what configuration to put them out the back, how fast I should troll, and what settings should I set my drag because I lost a lot of fish having my drag set too high before, but these were reef fish and mackerel – not big game fish. So, I’ve never gone for big game fish before and would be grateful for any advice you could give me. Even about how I’m supposed to get the fish into the boat (we keep a spear gun to shoot them if they’re really big).

Here’s a few photos of some of the fish I’ve got over there. The biggest Yellowfin was 7.5kg, the travelly (6.5kg) was caught off the beach!!! The red bass (5kg) and other fish were all caught trolling.
How ya goin fella

I was over there oct last year,went out with a top bloke there and got into some big YFT and Mahi Mahi and hooked up on a massive marlin but lost him.

For the marlin we troller large skirts with what looked like salmon or taylor inside it .

For the tuna we used smaller skirts.

With the Mahi Mahi we used strip baits with no wait just let them out with alot of slack let them have it for a while then strike good fun and not to bad on the tooth The strip baits were stripey tuna that we got while trolling around with a pink skirt

The blokes name is Shaun he has his boat at the back of the vegi market its a walk around (they own Breaka's resort).

Hope I was of some help

Cheers MJF