Our First trip out on the GBR we caught 4 Marlin in 3 days of fishing. 350,500,500, and a 900 pounder on the last day to top it off!!! Epic trip and stoked that its only the beginning of what looks like a great season to come!!!
There have been some big fish around. We caught this nice one a few days ago! Hopefully we can find another one like it in the September Challenge tournament this weekend. It will be my last week of fishing here in Kona for the year then i’m headed down under to Cairns Australia for the heavy tackle black marlin season. We still have a few openings in our schedule if anyone is interested!!!
I have been lacking on reports but fishing has been steady. This one we let go yesterday estimated at 850 pounds made our season!!
The Boys from Pelagic put a quick update of what was going on Last month up on The WatermansJournal.com website Watermans Journal Kona Report
The Hawaiian International Billfish Tournament (HIBT) is in full swing and the Blue Marlin are on the chew, with a few big ones being caught as well. Congrats to Captain Jason Holtz and crew Brian Toney for catching a 638 pound blue on 50 pound pound line today!!! Tomorrow is our day standby for photos and video!!!
Fishing has been great here in Kona the Last few weeks. Been getting some good photos with my new camera and have been getting some great Gopro video as usual. There are plenty of Blue Marlin around and a few big Ahi Tunas, Spearfish, Mahi Mahi and Wahoo as well. My favorite time of year here in Kona. I have been lacking on reports and video as we have been fishing everyday. I will have a few video clips up just as soon as I get some time to go through the millions of video clips we have been getting.
The fishing is starting to fire here! We caught 2 Blue Marlin yesterday on a half day and released another Blue today on an afternoon half. Other boats are catching fish as well. The Nightrunner weighed an 840 yesterday! Here is a video of our action.
Congratulations to Randy Llanes and the crew aboard the Sundowner for winning the Marlin Magic Lure tournament by weighing and 860 pound Blue Marlin on the second day of contention here in Kona. Unfortunately for the Kona fleet there was not one qualifying fish weighed for the legendary World Cup tournament. The World Cup was held on July 4th. July 3rd yielded a whopping 974 pound Blue marlin here in Kona and July 5th was the day the Sundowner crew weighed the 860 to win the Marlin Magic Tournament, the World Cup was won with a 768 pound Blue Marlin caught in Bermuda. Needless to say it just wasn’t Kona’s year to take home World Cup. We got lucky on the 5th of July and managed to tag 2 smaller sized Blue Marlin and take home the win for the most tagged marlin in the Marlin Magic Tournament. Here is a short video of our fish.
Just finished up the Kona FireCracker Tournament. My good friend Captain Davey Boy Crawford of the game boat ‘Kona Blue’ ended up taking the win, weighing a 538 pound Blue Marlin and tagging a smaller blue both on the first day of the two day tournament. The tournament was little slow as far as numbers of billfish caught but we ended up taking home a daily prize for the biggest Ahi tuna of day two. Captain Chip VanMols put our long time faithful angler Randy Wei onto the 135 tunafish which Randy made short work of and resulted in me getting a good tug on the leader…Thanks Randy. Heres a short video of our tuna capture.
Ahi Tuna aboard Monkey BIz II Kona, Hawaii Captain Chip VanMols
We just finished up the “Kona Kick Off” tournament this past weekend. Congratulations to Captain Jason Holtz on the Marlin Magic for taking the win. The Marlin Magic crew weighed a 757 lb Blue on the first day and tagged a smaller fish on day 2. Aboard the Monkey Biz II, we hooked a nice Blue estimated at 600 lbs on the second day but unfortunately pulled the hook after a short battle. As day 2 came to an end, we also missed another shot at a small Blue. That’s how fishing goes and the way I see it is we just increased our odds to stay hooked in our next tournament. this weekend in the Kona Fire Cracker Tournament.
Finished up a 4 day 50 pound tackle tournament this week, had a fun time we released 2 blues to 400 pounds and 3 Short Billed Spearfish in 4 days. The big story of the week here in Kona was of my good friend captain Teddy Hoogs releasing a gigantic blue marlin that he called 950 pounds on 50 pound line. Judging from the photos and story I think 950 was a very modest estimate, the fish was probably the biggest blue marlin ever released on 50 pound test and would have been very close to the world record that stands at 1166 for 50 pound class. A very noble act by the captain and crew for releasing the big girl.
Today we started fishing the Kona kickoff 2 day (saturday and Sunday) tournament, fishing was slow for us today but there were 5 or 6 tagged fish today (under 300 pounds) and 2 fish wieghed. My friend Captain Jason Holtz on the Marlin Magic brought a huge Blue Marlin into Honokohau harbor that tipped the scales at 757 pounds and is a very solid first day fish that will be very hard to beat. With that being said there are big ones being seen every day here so its not over just yet. More to come tomorrow…
Kona, HI
