Longtail Tactics

[Jack_Lives_Here]

Starting to get the hang of the wand and have tried to tackle some of those Longtails that are out in the bay. There was plenty of schools of Mac Tuna yesterday- nailed my first one on the fly also ;D, but the Longtails seemed very sporadic with the feeding and at times only one or two fish feeding and then gone - It was like crystal ball stuff.
Is it a patience thing, right time right place thing or is there a plan of attack that I'm overlooking ??? ???
Any feedback appreciated. ;D ;D

[Maxg]

Sit back, watch the ups and downs, distance apart, time between ups and sort out where they might up next, or a few nexts into the future. Be there, stopped and when they up, drop the fly in there. Works with most of the small tunas, well it did a few years ago, haven't been boating for tuna for yonks, too rough too old too poor. Max

[Jack_Lives_Here]

Thanks Max. The Mac Tuna were pretty easy to work out. We just worked where they were feeding / travelling to and got in front and drifted back to them with fly ready.
The Longtails were just all over the place - frustrating as hell. Some of the Fish I saw come out of the water were a good 10kg +. Shep managed one on the spin rod of about 7kg and lost another ALOT bigger. :(
I'd love to have one of those line burners grab my fly ;D ;D

[Voltzy]

Jack

The longtails are frustrating when they are like that. You have a few options.
Firstly, you can identify an area where they appear to be more concentrated and quietly drift through it casting at any visible feeding fish or using a technique that many of the north coast guys use- dredging big flies down deep.

Secondly, drive around looking for a school of longtails as opposed to the small pods/individuals. The competition aspect of it means that they are usually less spooky and keener to eat flies.

Thirdly, you'll often see longtails in schools of mac tuna. Quite often you'll see them get stuck into the baitfish and then the macs join in. I'm not sure what the longtails do when this happens but after watching the blue planet video i think they might hang around underneath the macs. Yesterday off bribie I pulled a longtail off a school of macs using a fast sinking striper line.

Lastly, often for some unknown (to us) reason, the longtails behaviour will change and things will get easier. Yesterday, a bit later in the day, the longtails formed schools and we were able to get some quality shots in. We still had to work hard for them but we had them to ourselves ;D
About an hour later they went back into bastard mode...

Anyway all those methods have worked for us. Longtails (and all pelagics) are great fun, i really enjoy fishing for them.

Voltzy

[Wesley_Pang]

Voltzy,

Damm it I knew it, the longtails would school up and go ballistic after we got sick of chasing the Mac Tuna at Bribie in the morning and packed up and launched from Fisherman's Island in the afternoon. George will give me a hard time!

We got down to Rous Channel after the tide changed in the afternoon and the Longtails started to feed, but too scattered to target.

The Longtail were popping up in singles or small pod all over the place but did not ball up the bait at both locations. I should have known it was just a matter of wating for them to hear the dinner bell and start to feed hard.

I tried the Striper IV flyline with a big Deceiver. Blind casting and letting it sink under Mac schools.

I guess persistance is the key.

Wes