whakatane Fishing Report 2025

10 bluefin tuna 2 yellowfin tuna. We are seeing fish from 10 lbs to over 200 pounds. A 25 lb bait rod, a 40 lb bait rod and a 50,60 or 80 lb rod is recommended. If you do not own the proper tackle. Seaforth is renting 50 lb rods with a 2 speed reel. These rental rods have already conquered a lot of our fish.

13 bluefin 10 yellowtail. Few shots at both species in not so ideal conditions. Hoping for things to straighten back out tomorrow.

Polaris Supreme Trip Update

After yesterday's tough day the pressure was on to find a school. Upon entering the warm water pocket it wasn't but a few minutes until Tommy came across a school and the lines went out. The bite started out slow then became consistent on those larger yellowfin. After a while the bluefin filled in and the bite matured into a plunker lasting through lunch. Several dorado added color to the mix and then it was trolling lines out as we went searching for another school. Single strikes on tuna and dorado was all we could produce for the rest of the day. These tuna are coming up gorged on small squid, so they must be feeding down deep and occasionally popping up to the surface. Tomorrow it looks like the weather will be on our side, and perhaps the fish gods will smile on us as well.

Patrick and Team Supreme

40+ bluefin onboard so far for Capt. Matt and the boys. These bluefin are averaging 40 pounds and are very catchable on 30 lb. come prepared with different line sizes from 20-40 lb. hooks from #4-2/0. Match your Flourocarbon size to your mainline size. Listen to the crew, even if you have been fishing since before they were born.

On the second of May we hauled the boat out of the water and started boat work and today on the 10th of June we are still hard at it. Our main goal this year is cosmetics we have painted the whole exterior of the hull above and below the water line the inside boat works the house bait tank storage racks and the wraparound and the decks. We're now starting on interior cosmetics carpeting all the floors ceilings and walls of the whole boat. Quite the extensive maintenance definitely the most boat work we have ever done at one time.
Captain Tommy Rothery

The San Diego out of Seaforth Landing in San Diego,CA checked in with us today:

Nicer weather= nicer fishing ! The underwater binoculars had us stopping regularly on 12-20 lb yellowtail. Yo-yo jigs on 40 & 50 lb was the hot setup.

SUMMERTIME CONDITIONS ! Hey guys. Two days ago the water at the Coronado Islands was hovering right around 60 degrees and the fishing was slow. Conditions started improving rapidly yesterday afternoon and subsequently so did the fishing. Today we went out with 43 anglers and captured 25 calico bass 58 barracuda and full Mexican limits of sandbass. While we did not manage to catch any yellowtail today, we did however enjoy steady action from start to finish. I took a photo of our temp gauge for all you yellowtail hunters out there. With water temperatures like this. It won't be long before the yellows get back on the bite. Be here the day it happens, not the day after !

~~Sept. 4
 About mid morning today I was pretty bummed. I felt we should've been here yesterday. I was thinking we were going to have to run in tonight to catch our tuna for the trip. I was wrong. Before lunch we had our best stop of the year on yellowfin. Not just number wise but size wise too. 20-30 pounders with a few 18's and a few 35's. That's right, feeling pretty good now. It didn't take very many of them to fill up a fish hold. We pretty much have 2 full fish holds and fortunately/unfortunately, we have to prepare another fish hold for tomorrow. I only say unfortunately because we'll be forced to use the beautiful sardine we've been saving. Out here we've been catching our own bait so we wouldn't have to use our stock but we have no room to put the bait we catch now.

 The bluefin weren't in the biting mode today. We still saw the schools as we have everyday since we've been fishing in this zone, but some days are bite days and some aren't. Obviously we're hoping tomorrow is a bite day. Some bluefin would be the cherry on top of this wonderful sundae.

 The weather sure was nice today and to top it all off, it looks like we'll have the same tomorrow. Sweet dreams. Life is good.