The Big One (Fish) You Needed To Getaway

I have been fishing since I was 9 or 10 years old and now I am 60. I used to stand on sea walls in Florida and throw a gig at mullet crowded in large schools and I would walk the flats on Cape Cod to find a treasure in one of the pools of water along the shore. The thing I like most about fishing is that it has equality. All people who make the effort can catch the same fish without discrimination.

My passion is to catch a 600 lb blue fin tuna from my 18' Boston Whaler. I see this goal as my personal affirmation of a long term fishing accomplishment. This affirmation is the culmination of time spent learning when and where to be, knots tied and equipment readied to go but no matter how ready you think you are, you are not really ready at all.

I am getting closer to my goal as we caught our first 150 pounder last year in Cape Cod Bay and this is the story

Last year at one of the Cape Cod Salties meetings the guest speaker was telling all of us how to fish using bunker spoons to catch large striped bass. The bunker spoon is fished best at a slow speed in water depths of 60 to 80 feet. I have been fishing the bay for many years and I had never heard of or seen a bunker spoon. Most of my methods were in depths of 10 to 40 feet using tube and worm or wire with jigs or site casting on the surface. After listening to our speaker, I acquired all the equipment I needed to try this new method including changing the roller tips to regular slide tips.

Emil and I were now off Barnstable just off the fingers. He was steering and I was doing the pole and rig set ups. It took a while to get everything ready because I had decided to put two surface lines out just in case some tuna were in the area. The bunker spoons go down very deep and off to the sides which left plenty of room to put out those extra surface lines. When I had made my last appraisal of the set up, I looked at the helm and notice that we were in 140 feet of water. I asked Emil what he was doing and he said, “There is a place on the plotter that says ”Tuna Ledge”. I laughed out loud and said, “Emil, we have been trying forever to catch a tuna and now you think you can just drive over to a place on the map that says Tuna Ledge and we will get one”

At that exact moment, the starboard stern reel went off. Now you have to know that Emil and I had talked about what to do and how to do it for the last ten years. He was going to put the rod fighting belt on and I was going to handle the boat. He would fight the fish and I would keep the boat in the perfect position, on the ready. Instead, Emil had to put out his cigarette and I had to do something to keep the reel from doing a complete spooling in less than a minute. In that time, the reel went right down to the knot and I hollered for Emil to back us up so I could get some line. Emil just looked at the other three lines behind the boat and checked with me for a second to see if the risk of tangling on the prop was worth it. I said go ahead – just do it!!!!!!!! A few minutes later, I had a third of the line back, but by now the fish had turned and pulled me to the front of the boat where I wanted to be anyway. Emil started to clear the three other lines in the stern when my fish started a second run on the reel. Before I knew it, I was back at the knot hollering for Emil to go forward. This time, Emil did not respond at the wheel he had a second fish on the last bunker line in the back. His fish was running south and my fish was heading north and I had no more line on the reel. I pinched my reel up against the bow railing and hoped for the best as my fish began to pull the boat forward. What do you do in situation like this when nothing is happening the way you had planned it for the last ten years? You just go with the flow, and as it happened, Emil was back at the helm putting the boat in slow forward, helping me take in more line for the second time. I asked what had happened and Emil said his line went slack and he lost the fish. By this time, Emil finally had the fishing belt on and as he came to the front, I handed off the pole to him and took the helm. I rested a little and watched Emil fight the fish, just like we had planned. I looked back to clear the other three lines and guess what? The last line I cleared still had a fish on it that was ready as ever to drag me around the boat. The first run was from right to left, just under the stern of the boat, causing me to dip the rod tip vertical into the water to clear the prop and then turned me to the left to pull me up to the front where Emil was still fighting his fish at a steady 45 degree angle. I could not believe it but this fish was practically manhandling me and I still did not have a belt and gimble on to give me a fighting chance.

Now things really began to get interesting. Emil and I were both reeling in large fish up at the same time. Who was left to do all the things we had discussed once the fish were at the boat? Just the week before I had seen how hard it was for three of us to gaff and land a fish on another friends boat.

Remember the roller tips at the beginning of this story? Well, our solution was at hand as my fish was now 25 feet directly under the boat looking me straight in the eye. It was a pure stand off. I had gotten to a point where no matter how much or how hard I reeled, I could not take in any more line. The line was pinched at a right angle to the slide rod tip and the fish knew it too. A few times, I bent down and bowed the rod tip to the fish as I reeled some line in, but there was just no leverage to pull the fish up to the boat. I got so tired at one point that I even let up on the drag and let the fish move down so I could rest. The retrieve was good until that 25 foot level and then the fish went under the boat and put me right back at a 90 degree angle to the tip. With no one at the helm, it was a stand off until the final big tug that opened the snap and let the bunker spoon release. At this point, I learned the hard way that a slide tip is good for a 50 pound striper, but the roller tips I had taken off are preferred because they allow the line to roll out and not get pinched on the weight of such a large fish. Yes, my fish got away but this is exactly what we needed if we were going to land any fish at all. Remember, we were set up for a large 40 to 50 pound bass not two 150 pound tunas.

(Anyone figured out why Emil was so quiet after his fish had spooled the reel twice? His fish was the same size as the one I was fighting)

Now we were ready to land Emil's fish and I could hardly wait to see what was not going to happen the way we had not planned. When I looked over the side for the first time to see Emil's fish it was just laying there on its side. No fight left in it at all, just a big beautiful 150 pound blue fin tuna.

(Now ask yourself why my fish was so green and Emil's was so exhausted?)

There it was, our ten year goal just floating in the water next to the boat. But wait a minute, Emil's fish was backward. His bunker spoon had hooked the fish in the tail. When a fish is hooked in the tail it fights twice as hard as normal for a while, that explains why a fish the same size as mine could spool the reel two times and the reason Emil's fish did not pull him all around the boat is because when a large fish is hooked in the tail and reeled in backwards it runs out of oxygen because water is not moving over the gills. Neither one of us realized this as I got out my gaff and made the perfect plunge just under the head to make up for all the hassle my fish had given me. Emil's first response was asking how I planned to get the fish in the boat. I told him to grab the second gaff and stick it in the tail and on three we would heave it over the side into the boat. Thank goodness my Whaler has very low side boards so we moved the fish right onto the deck; otherwise the fish can land on your foot and break a few bones. We were ok but tired and I know Emil sat down and looked at me as I looked at him to see if our wives had been right that we would need medical attention if we ever caught the big one. All we had to do now was run the boat back to Rock Harbor. The boat made it and so did we.

Nice work, Bill & Emil ...c'mon tuna on a bunker spoon?... nice rod holders on T-top! But do you need 2 gaffs to hold it in your driveway? BTW the bunker spoon expert speaker at Salties runs a boat called the "Squeegee Monkey" out of Sesuit, I think. Dick



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