TIMEWASTERS TRIP TO THE FCGFC TOURNEY Part 1

[Smithy]

TIMEWASTERS TRIP TO THE FCGFC TOURNEY

It is definitely going to be a good year for Black Marlin down the East Coast of Australia this year going on the results for the tournament. The 12 boats competing in the Fraser Coast Gamefish Tournament tagged 50 Billfish between them. In total over 250 strikes were recorded for all species. The reports were coming through that it was going to be a good year but the results from the Townsville comp didn’t sound that good.

The two disappointments were the poor attendance and only a couple of heavy tackle Billfish were tagged from the 4 boats fishing heavy tackle at various times. The boats that didn’t attend will be kicking themselves for missing a great comp with heaps of fish present. Last year there were something like 25 boats in attendance with a high proportion of boats under 7m. This year with an increase in length to 7.5m for the small boat cut-off only 4 of the 12 boats fell into this category of which we were one. The next two tournaments at Mooloolaba and the Gold Coast should see big roll-ups when the word gets out about this comps results. The other interesting aspect of this tournament is the mother-shipping. When we pulled the lines in on the Sunday afternoon we were 57Nm from port. Because of these distances the FCGFC organise for mother-ships to be present for fuelling and accommodation. This adds a great social component to the comp when on our mother-ship, the 60ft sailing vessel "Stefanie" we had around 30 people on the back deck on the Saturday night sitting around, drinking and talking about fishing.

For the comp we went something like 31-23-17 but using the comp species we were 31-23-13. On Billfish we went 15-8-4. This saw us take out the small boat trophy and Paul, one of our anglers, the champion small boat angler. We were probably coming third overall after the second day but faded to about fourth overall. Steve Sherman’s blue Riv "Mazarra" took the top honours. They tagged something like 13 Billfish for 2 ½ days fishing beating John Smith’s 36’ Blackwatch "Blackjack" by one Billfish I think. Cameron O’May who usually skippers John Louis’ 34’ Blackwatch "PASU" took out champion angler with about 8 billfish fishing aboard "Blackjack". The 36’ Blackwatch "Black Bart" from the Gold Coast took out the heavy tackle prize with about a 150lb Blue tagged on 37kg from 2 days fishing heavy. They came into the light grounds for a couple of hours on the Saturday as well as Sunday morning and managed to tag about 4 Blacks and Sail to ease into third spot overall. The 43’ O’brien "Pelagaro" that has been cleaning up in the last few SEQ heavy tackle tournaments missed out on tagging a heavy tackle billfish for 1 ½ days trolling and the 35’ Bertram "Obsession" from the Gold Coast was the only other boat to get a heavy tackle Billfish for the weekend.

[Smithy]

With the shelf off Fraser only 8 Nm from the bar we elected to fish heavy tackle on the first day. Start fishing was 7:00 and we probably made it to the heavy tackle grounds around 7:20. Once over 100m it drops to 150m pretty quickly. We had a strike within minutes of deploying the lures. We were unsure if it was a strike or not but the first time we wound that lure in the leader was scratched for a foot or so. The lure in question was a Diamond Head Medium Sprocket on the long port side. The other lures in our heavy tackle pattern were a Diamond Head Large Sprocket in plain green and gold in close on the port side just near the two bird teasers and one Witchdoctor, a pink and blue Softtease long on the starboard side and a home-made black and purple slant face short on the starboard side. About an hour later we had a double hookup which ended up being a rat Yellowfin and a Skipjack which wasn’t an eligible species. We tagged the Yellowfin and continued trolling. We found another lot of birds about an hour later and pulled another double on small tuna. We debated whether we should bridle them up but the birds were working way to fast for trolling liveys. We resumed trolling the lures working some GPS points from last year and we finally found some birds which we stuck with for the rest of the afternoon. We picked up a nice Mahi Mahi to break the boredom in the afternoon which wasn’t worth any points seeing we caught it on the heavy tackle grounds so we put it in the esky. We trolled until cease fishing at 4:30 finishing up 6-5-5. We did 130Nm and used 180 litres with the 4-Stroke 115.

On day two we decided to fish light tackle (8 kg) seeing as it wasn’t happening on the heavy grounds. Some of the leading boats had 2-3 billfish under their belts after the first day by fishing light. There were also a lot of other species caught. We ran across the bar then headed east to the light tackle grounds which fired during the 2000 tournament. It was wind against tide and we could only make about 12 knots east. We pulled up around a mile short of our marks as it was pretty ordinary conditions and we were about 20 minutes past the start fishing time of 7:00. Within minutes of heading north we had a school of about 6 Cobia come up into the spread whilst we were setting the lures. The first to get hit was a bibless minnow, next was a black and purple pusher on the port rigger. This popped on strike then another peeled off the school and creamed the lumo on the Starboard rigger. I grabbed the rod and set about working the stubborn fish to the tag. We did this securing our second lot of points for the weekend. We worked the area over for one other strike then trolled the 4.5 miles north to the 2000 comp hotspot. There was no action here after a thorough working over so we trolled a further three miles north to hit up the hotspot from the ’99 comp. This is where Kane Sutherland cleaned up on Danny Simons’26’ Express Blackwatch "Fair Game IV". There was no action here either so we started heading up to the 13 mile bar crossing. Damon Olsen has always said there are interesting bottom contours in that region.

A short while later I was connected to a Mahi Mahi which we successfully tagged. A little while later we had another strike which was on Paul’s new TLD-20 setup which was trolling a pink Cockroach. Seeing it was his outfit he took the strike. We called it for another Mahi Mahi after the first few jumps but it turned out being our first black raised since ’99. This was also Paul’s first Billy. We tagged it without a problem then took a few photos. Our 11:00 sked was something like 5-4-3. We worked this area over for one other strike. It wasn’t near any of our GPS points so we pressed on north.

[Smithy]

This is the area most of the boats must have been working. They must have been up at the 18-mile when we arrived but they kept turning up during the course of the afternoon. The afternoon session was amazing. We had a sked at 4:30 which was 16-11-7 of which three were Blacks. There were gannets diving, bait on the top, free-swimming fish as well as boats hooked up all over the place. Most of the 16 fish we raised during this session were blacks. At one stage we had two sniffing round then they dropped off then another came in about twenty seconds later. At one stage we were 4 tagged from 4 hookups but all of this action was cutting into our supply of shackle rigged SL-12S hook setups. We had a double on big Mack Tuna from which we got two tags away then later we had a double on big Mahi Mahi where one rubbed the other one off. Once we switched to stainless hooks our results on the blacks went down hill. We jumped 3 off late in the day because we were out of chemical sharp setups. Once the tags were in we were locking up on the leader but this was straightening the Gamakatsus. You are only allowed 6 other species a day in this tournament and we were happy with our full house even allowing for two lost fish. Everyone was well satisfied after this session. We did 110 Nm and used about 130 litres. We had a real run on the pink Cockroach at one stage but by the end of the day the honours were probably shared between all of the three main colours we were running, namely black and purple, pink and lumo. Other boats were onto pink as well. Some were raiding dead-bait squids in pink to dress up their pushers.

Rod March from Obsession charters in Hervey Bay was also fishing out on the same 4 and 13 mile grounds but he was not in the comp this time. Rod managed a Junior IGFA record for Black Marlin over the course of the weekend and on the Sunday they tagged a Sail then popped it off on the tippet which would have been an IGFA fly record. The fish were hot to trot and they had a few other hookups on fly as well.

On Sunday the boats in contention headed straight back to the 13-mile grounds. Other boats elected to save fuel and troll their way back to Urangan Boat Harbour at Hervey Bay. There were probably 6-12 Blacks raised inside the bay and around 4 tagged. Manatau tagged 2 on the way home. We could only manage to go 4-3-2 on the Sunday morning. The two being Mahi Mahi and the other two strikes were blacks. One popped off on strike out of the outrigger with the lumo on it. "Black Bart" probably took the honours with at least 3 blacks but "Mazarra" and "Blackjack" seemed to be constantly hooked up.

For the weekend we used 490 litres doing huge nautical miles for a plate alloy trailer boat. Including the mothership, alcohol, comp nominations of $95 each and the Calcutta which cost us $100 our bill was $1110 or $370 each. Not bad value at all!

We will be back next year for sure! We will just have to see if we do it in a big boat or a little boat!

Other costs were the four lures which went MIA. Youch! Plus wind-ons hooks etc. Look out Wellsys I can feel a big order coming on!

Check out the pictures at

http://www.momentoffame.com/category.html?id=23

[Brett_Finger]

Jeez Smithy.
that has gotta be a record post, you trying to outdo old Max? :P
thanks for filling us in on the fishing looks like i might have to make a point of being there next year!! ;D
Hookin,Brett