360 Tuna Fishers Forum banner

Big E Tuna Trip

8K views 77 replies 23 participants last post by  BAOSABI 
#1 ·
nice waiting also!
 
G
#3 ·
i was there, lots of grouper. i didn't see many very large yellowfin, but i did not stay until all fish were off the boat. Someone said they got a few around 100lbs. there were many more grouper than on the trip I was on. Raul said they fished spots tht they hadn't previously gone, and they were awesome. Josh said the diamond jigs worked very well yet again.

they caught a big marbled grouper that they thought was a new record (bigger than Kil's even) but it was only 25.4 lbs at the dock.
 
#8 ·
I finally caught my first YFT, Marble Grouper, and Warsaw Grouper on this trip. I think there was a total of 52 YFs caught. There was a lot of groupers and exotics caught on this trip. Two state record for a Long Tail Bass and a Grunt. One state record pending for an Oceanic Trigger. My friend Gary caught a 6.6lbs Queen trigger. Its was a beautiful fish. We even had a TPW guy on board fishing with us. We made a few stops on the way out for some snappers in about 200ft. of water. I hook up to my 1st Warsaw ever with the trusty old Hammered diamond jig. Everyone caught there limit on snapper. The 1st night, YF's were hitting Yummi flying fish, small 4 to 5in poppers, live flyers and some stick baits. I only got hits from fat black fins the first night. I was using 80g. Shibuki and Shimano Ocea pencils. I started out using the the Shimano Ocea in the blue mackrel color. After about an hour with no YF action I switch over to a pink Ocea. Two seconds after it hit the water I got a hit from a fat BFT. Next cast I hooked up with something but it threw the hook. Third cast a Cuda snap the line. That was the only one I had in pink. I switch over to Mr. Shibuki and caught countless BF's. Went to sleep about 6am to rest up for bottom fishing. The captain said that we were trying out some new spots. I caught my first Marble grouper on the 1st stop and another on the second stop. I think there were 6 or 7 species of gouper caught on the trip. On the last stop we had a bit of a shark problem. I couldn't get my 420g. Jitterbel jigs to the bottom without getting bit off by a shark. The groupers were bitting anything from cut bait to diamond jigs. Another Warsaw was landed on that stop. I think he had was using a Barjack for bait. Took a nap to get ready for the night bit. I started with a Ocea in ribbonfish color. Didn't get one hit for an hour so I tried the yummi for a while with no luck. Porpoises were all over chasing flying fish. I put the Shibuki back on an finally hooked up to a YF. That would be the only one I caught on the entire trip. Chunking and free-lining live flyers was producing very well on this trip. The biggest YF (100lbs.) was caught by the Captain while kite fishing with a live flyer. Now comes the BAD news. When we were on our way out, I went to heat up some food and found a bunch of bananas sitting on one of the tables. I didn't know who it belong to so I left it alone. I didn't want to steal bananas from a 200lb. guy and get my a$$ beat. Here is where the $hit hits the fan. I was woken up by my buddy Gary with the news of my brand new 08' SW20K was broken. We always play jokes on each other so I wasn't worried. After climbing the steps I found Raul sitting there with my SW in his hands with the reel seat broken clean off. Aparently the grill broke loose and fell over right on my reel. Here's the kicker. Before I went to sleep I had placed my rods beside the grill and I notice a guy moving my rods over in front of the grill so he could put his rods by his buddies. (Bad Karma I guess). Everything was cool other that having to switch my other 20K back and forth from jigging to popping. They cut me a check for the full amount as soon as we got back to shore so everything was cool. The next fiasco was with I very nice guy I met on board name Bruce. He was using an OTI 300g. jigging rod with and Avet. While fighting a decent size AJ, the rod snapped right before the 1st eye. He was still able to land the fish. Later we went to check the drag and it was only @ 13lbs. (Banana Curse). The next fiasco was with Gary. He was free-lining a live flyer on the bow while I was still popping. Gary hooked up to a nice YF and started the battle with his 665W. I few minutes into the fight we had equipment malfunction. We heard a loud pop that came from the reel. Gary looked at me and said "Bao I got a problem". The handle would turn be the spool would not. This is the 4th 665 that blew up to my knowledge within the last few months. I don't want to here this as much you do because I love my 665. We ended up landing the tuna by hand lining it thanks to Josh. The last fiasco was with me trying get another YF. Earlier in the day I got a knot in my line while jigging and getting tangled up with Gary. The knot was about 70yds. in and I was to lazy to deal with it. While fishing the last hour before we had to head back in I hooked up to something good with the Shibuki. While the fish was taking line, I saw that knot go through the eyes of my rod and as soon as it went out about 20yds., POP! My line snapped. I sounded like someone just cracked a whip and my only Shibuki was gone into the abyss. Other that the banana curse it was a fun trip. Big Thanks to TJ for loaning me his 8'6" rod. I loved it and can't wait to buy my own. It was also great to meet Bruce and Tuna Mike on the boat. Hope to fish with you guys again soon.


Bao
 
#10 ·
The tuna curse strikes again
I was up north 2 weekends ago on the Brooklyn and low and behold I spot not 1 but a bushell of the dam things on a table in the cabin right after boarding this bunch of new yorkers are all buddy's so I dont say anything after about 3 hrs of no fish fishing they spot them and go nuts so overboard they go about 2 hrs later, very few fish and 3 heavy squall lines later someone finds another bushell of at least 9 bannanas on the bow a group of sea sick asians brought aboard I think they must have bannana trees in brooklyn!!
Any way trip was fun,crew and boat were great.
No bannanas aboard sign is needed for the big -e
 
#11 ·
You can belive that banna stuff if you want. There was banna juice on the 76 hour trip in july. Look at how much was brought on bard then. 92 YF, 100lb Aj's and state record Grouper.

The owner of the Juice knows who he is, I brought it to his attention.

d-a
 
#12 ·
Before I went to sleep I had placed my rods beside the grill and I notice a guy moving my rods over in front of the grill so he could put his rods by his buddies. (Bad Karma I guess).
Bao

So someone moved your tackle into the way of the grill? Man that sucks. People should know better than to move other people's gear without asking.

Congrats on your catches, sounds like it was a good trip aside from the banana mayhem :eek:
 
#13 ·
You can belive that banna stuff if you want. There was banna juice on the 76 hour trip in july. Look at how much was brought on bard then. 92 YF, 100lb Aj's and state record Grouper.

The owner of the Juice knows who he is, I brought it to his attention.

d-a

I think banana juice is ok. =)
 
#14 ·
I forgot to mention one more fiasco that happen on this trip. The youngest deckhand on the boat was reeling up a possible state record for a Marble grouper when more equipment failure happened. He was using a boat rod with a 3/0 Newell reel. The Grouper was taking drag so the deckhand attempted to tighten the star drag and POP. The star broke into 2 pieces. He continued to reel the fish up until we heard another POP. The knob completely broke off of the handle. This poor kid was dedicated enough to land the fish while using the rail and turning the handle with his fingers a half turn at a time. That Grouper was a half pound shy of Kil Song's record.
 
#16 ·
Bao: Sorry to hear about the bad news, and I don't mean to be bursting any bubbles, but I doubt those bananas had anything at all to do with all those equipment failures. One was due to someone putting your new Stella in harms way (although I'm sure he didn't know the grill was going to go south), not sure on the rod or the Newell, but I'm starting to believe that the 665 2 speed is either simply the result of a poorly designed piece of crap on the part of Accurate OR we fishermen have been expecting more out of them than they can deliver. (Probably reading to much of that $hit on the internet about landing 2,500 pound black marlin on a 197! :D I will be keeping mine because I don't think I could, in good conscience pass it off for a decent price to anyone else and be able to sleep at night. However, it is going to be relegated strictly to nearshore rig fishing for smaller critters.

For now, any conventional jigging I do is going to be with the ATD 12 (41 brutal ounces) on a Calstar OR the SR30 on a Smith Nirai.

In the meantime, if Accurate does come out with that line of 30 and 50 sized lighter "big game" reels that look so much like the Boss line, ain't no way I would buy one until one of the smarter folks on this board like Alantani digs into it and says grace over the insides.

As to the banana curse again, on the July 3 trip, I watched either Drifter or gimmedeal chowing down on bowl after bowl of banana pudding and I think both of them were constipated the entire trip--and we had a pretty good trip.

Russ
 
#17 ·
thats very respectable of the Big E for paying for the stella 20k!! Hats off to them! I know it was thier grill, but they coulda threw up thier ands and said "not responsible for personal gear"... so KUDOS to Big E!!!

Sounds like a fun trip, even if the G(&^^@#DAMN bannanas got onboard! Someone needs to make a bannana detector like the metal detectors you have to walk through!
 
#19 ·
Bananas make people do strange things like moving other folks tackle in front of grill. And equipment failure - Accurate, Newell?? c'mon, Accurates don't fail. "DA BANANA" made it do it!!! Ha ha, just saying just saying, hehehe.

Everyone should have limit out on big YFT but "BANANA" made sure it wasn't going to happen. Just saying....just saying, hehehe.
 
#25 ·
A friend of mine came out from downstairs wearing this after we released a Blue last year, he said it could not be bad luck because we just caught one...

After that we lost 1 Blue, 1 Sail, and a Mahi the same day.

hahaha nice, should of thrown him overboard after that
 
#26 ·
Purevl: I understand that a huge majority of fishermen believe in the banana curse, however, I do not. That having been said, I would never take a banana on board a fishing boat. This is not so much because I respect the opinions of my fellow fishermen but rather because I would not want to be thrown overboard. I am a little alarmed that a google search of “banana curse” turns up over 300 entries. I am even more amazed at how many of those hits have Kil’s name associated with them in one way or another! :)

The ideal, from a scientific point of view would be a controlled experiment in which two boats would go out at the same time, to the same locations, with the same number of fishermen of roughly the same experience level—one with a banana prominently displayed on the bow sprit, and the other boat carefully searched at boarding to ensure that no bananas were aboard. Then you would switch groups between trips and change which boat carried the hypothetical curse each time. The numbers and poundage of fish could then be weighed and a determination made over time as to whether there was a statistically significant difference between the relevant harvests.

Assuming, for the sake of argument, that, over a long enough elapsed time, the curse were validated, then subsequent experiments could be set up to test the effect of such variables as the following:

1. Whether the quantity of bananas on board were a factor. For example, could the experimenter expect an inverse relationship, either linear or geometric, between the number of bananas on board and the number and/or size of fish harvested?
2. Whether the having the banana(s) in view of the fishermen or out of their view mattered.
3. Whether, if no bananas were prominently displayed, the presence of bananas in the hold, unknown to the fishermen, invoked the curse as well.
4. Whether, instead of a quantity of bananas, the presence of processed products including banana as an ingredient, were a factor in invoking the curse (For example, Hoppes gun solvent.)
5. Assuming the mere presence of bananas or banana products were verified to make no difference in the success, vel. non. of fishing trips, then experiments could be designed to test whether such factors as the odor of bananas on the hands or in the water, made a difference. During an all-out tuna bite, massive amounts of mashed bananas could be thrown over the rail to test whether it had an effect on the bite. During subsequent bites, the busting fish could be cast to or jigged for without the banana chum.
6. In place of the bananas, large numbers of the poisonous spiders which typically inhabit banana plants could be turned loose on board the ship to see if this may have been an early factor in mistakenly blaming the fruit for the actions of the arachnids dwelling among the stalks.

These are just a few of the design factors that come to mind for experimentation in the area of the so-called “banana curse.” But it won’t affect me one way or another.

I am more concerned with making sure that any boat I fish on does not have any red pubic hairs anywhere on board.

Russ
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top