Trident Charters

Without the help of their fearless leader, the crew from the Metarie Small Animal Clinic returned to Venice again this year for another successful late spring trip. Jeff did a good job picking the date, getting one of the very few nice days in April. No doubt due to the offshore expertise of Dr. Baumer, a former pseudo-deckhand, the crew returned to the dock with 9 yellowfin tunas.

Steven Covington and his crew from Meridian, MS, should thank Mike Shankle. After going 1 for 9 on wahoos the day before, we somehow turned it around, going 5 for 5 with Steve and his buddies, and putting the boat back closer to “even steven” for the 2 day wahoo hook-up ratio. You know what we did differently? Nothing! That’s just wahoo fishing. Here’s Duncan with the last ‘hoo of the day that weighed in at 84#, our biggest so far this year. After a long initial run, this fish really threw us for a loop, wrapping the line around one of the lower units. Miraculously, we kept the wahoo on the line during an involved untangling procedure and ended up with a nice box of wahoos.  

Holy mackerel were there some boats offshore on Sunday. Apparently we weren’t the only ones that heard about the good forecast. After a slow day on the Lump the day before, our plan was to troll for wahoos, but there was one problem: there were already 5 boats at every rig by the time we got there…and we didn’t leave late. That’s when we had to get creative. After fishing a couple underwater structures, we finally located a pile of wahoos without another boat in sight. If you wahoo fish much, you know that a hook-up ratio of about 50% is par for diving baits, and that on any given day, you could be on the up or the down side of that ration. Well, Mike Shankle and his brother from Shreveport, LA, were on the down side. I’m not blaming them at all, but it was just one of those days. We couldn’t keep a wahoo on the hook to save our lives. Fortunately, the one we finally caught was a good one. After 8 bites without happy endings, we finally landed this nice 56# wahoo. That wahoo, plus our limit of beeliners from earlier in the day, made for a decent bag of fish for the boys from Shreveport.  

If I was young Louis here, I would stick with my current fishing partners. The crew let him catch the first tuna and the first wahoo of the day. At the end of the day, he tried to argue that you kept what you caught, but once the bill showed up he was more than happy to share.

Here’s a cool catch from a windy day of fishing some of the East Bay rigs: a rock hind. We see a fair number of these guys when we’re diving the rigs, but this is the first one I’ve seen caught on a rod. If you can believe it, the secret bait was a piece of shrimp on a 1/2 oz. jig head. This was just one of many cool fish Eric and John from Wisconsin and Minnesota caught with us on their 3 day trip.

I don’t think Bill Broyle and his crew from Starkville, MS, ever saw this one coming, nor did I for that matter. After a long lecture about how slow the Lump had been and how I had a good lead on some wahoo, we ventured out of South Pass. We caught a few wahoo early and even lucked into a yellowfin tuna with the diving baits. When we saw a blue fin that was too big to a be from a shark, our afternoon was about to take an unexpected change.

After a lot of coaxing, we finally got a little interest from the huge shark and eventually got a bite way out of sight in the open green water. Instead of a blistering run, we got just a little “click click click” of a bite. We got a close look at the shark early on in the fight and I knew my estimate of 300 pounds was way off. After another 2 and a half hours and several close encounters, we acquired a more appropriate form of anesthesia (thanks Hunter!) and finally got the shark under control and wrapped up. Rolling her up on the back of the boat and then running in Flat Boat Pass on low tide were both memorable experiences, as were Inga and Kevin’s attempts to get a weight on the shark in Venice, LA, where neither world-class marina has a big working scale. Nevertheless, the KRAKEN has a new boat record for mako shark, just barely edging out the 496# we got back in 2002. What a fish, what a fight, and what a memorable trip.

Louis Todd brought some clients with us last week and ended up with a nice Lump mixed bag of blackfin tuna, wahoo, and beeliner snappers. This crew will have some white and red meat for the grill and some solid snapper for the fryer. Anyone can catch a wahoo hooked in the mouth, but Louis tried a rather unconventional technique of hooking his wahoo right in the tail. A tail hooked 50# wahoo can make a pretty impressive first run, so even though we did catch the fish, I’m not sure I’m sold on his approach.

When the tuna fishing is slow on the Lump, you can usually find something interesting down below. This one is a first for us: a spotfin hogfish. Ken Jennings from Gary, Indiana brought this little freak up from the bottom. While we didn’t catch any tunas on this particular day, we also set a new boat record for the most beeliners caught in a day at 49. Thank goodness I found my electric knife.

This blue devil seemed to think it was a good idea to bite the KRAKEN and then chew on our engine trim wires before eating the bonita slab with the hidden hook. I have to be honest: I took it personally.

Buddy Hall from Orlando, Fl, was kind enough to share the half hour fight with this 201# mako with his brother Michael, providing some welcomed action on an otherwise slow day at the Lump.

I don’t know what your favorite fish is, but this one sure is mine.

Good news: our first trip of the year to the Midnight Lump was a successfull one. Mark Riner and his high school buddies from Nowalt, OK , fished with us this past weekend and had just about the perfect scenario. First of all, the forecast was marginal enough that most of the other boats got scared off, and secondly, the fishing report from the day before was poor enough that the rest of the boats got scared away. I felt it a little on the way home, but that’s just about what it takes these days to have a somewhat “private” day on the Lump. Mark and his buddy Janes tag-teamed this nice 100# yellowfin late in the day after catching some smaller tunas and (if you count the shark-eaten heads) a limit of amberjacks. We’re ready and waiting for the next break in the weather.