chronicle Fishing Report 2024

Saturday, June 16th, 2012

Hi friends. Well, the day finally arrived and instead of "to-do" lists and parts lists and repair and restoration work, we have our eyes solely focused on stars, a peaceful ocean and visions of tomorrow that has some unable to sleep properly. I'm thankful to say that we have set sail on our first voyage of the 2012 season with Billy Stephen's and his crew of merry lads - young and old alike. Everyone is excited to see what tomorrow brings as we will be targeting Bluefin and Yellowfin tuna and any other offshore foe that wishes to test our hunting skills. We're ready. The blood is pumping and after a hearty feast of prime rib, we're sending everybody down to the rooms to rest up for a long day tomorrow. We'll be up at 0530 and when the sun finally sets at around 2030 hours (summer days seem to never quit), we'll report back to you on our scores and accomplishments and hopefully, they are as bountiful and endless as our fantastic traveling weather that we enjoyed today.

We're back. We've got some old salts on here that know a thing or two about fishing, a crew with hands that are far too gunked up with grease, paint dust and other souvenirs of a lengthy boatwork and some young guns to boot. First trip of the year is an exciting one indeed and we'll see how things play out tomorrow and we'll report back to you at the completion of our day.

-Richie & Team Supreme-

P.S. To all of our lovely ladies back on land who are so gracious to let us go fishing for days and days on end. First of all, hello. How are all of you this fine evening? Good, we miss you too. Now, to all the mothers; the kids are all tucked away in bed and to say they are pumped is an understatement. Everyone is in good spirits and the men are doing a noble job of teaching them to harnessing that energy, get some rest and hit the deck early tomorrow morning. It's all good. Good night now.

The first annual Ocean Tackle Research trip aboard Polaris Supreme returned with skipper Tom Rothery and chartermaster Lon Mikkelsen November 19. The ten-day trip had 20 anglers. "We caught a lot of variety and had good fishing," said Mikkelsen, from Hood River, OR. "We also caught a lot of 40-pound Humboldt squid. The best fishing was on kelp paddies in the warmer water. "We're testing some new OTR jigs," he continued, "and they got bit." Rothery weighed the contenders on the Fisherman's landing certified scales. Clint Campbell of Bozeman, MT won first place for a 65.95-pound wahoo he caught ona silver and pink Raider jig. He said he used 40-pound P-Line, a Daiwa Saltist 30 reel and a Seeker Black Steel 6470 rod. Jon Collins of Menifee won second place for a 52.6-pound skin that bit a pink Catchy Tackle bomb. Collins brought his son into the photo to show off a big dorado. Randy Walker of Huntington Beach was third, for a 48-pound wahoo that snapped up a gold Raider.

~~Sep. 16
 It was raining wahoo around the Polaris Supreme today.  It wasn't raining wahoo on the Polaris Supreme, just around it.  We scratched out a good day though.  I told myself if we caught 40 wahoo today, it would be worth the run down here.  We caught 46.  It felt like we should of had 200, and with all the fish we lost today, that might not be an exaggeration.  We're just 5 shy of 100 for the trip.  If you add up all the halves and heads we wound in today, we might have a hundred.  The sharks were really bad out here today.  You wouldn't have wanted to go for a swim.  I say it was raining wahoo today because they were flying out of the water most everywhere you looked chasing flying fish and such.  It was an awesome sight to see.  I have never seen anything like it in my 15 years of long ranging. 

 We've really put together a very nice trip so far.  I wouldn't mind a little more tuna and some yellowtail.  We've left the stones and we're now headed up for the remainder of the trip.  We're going to check out the baja coast tomorrow in search of all the species and get in position for the rest of the trip as well.
     

We our ending our trip with a scratch day of yellowtail and dorado. Our weather continues to be good and we will hit the dock tomorrow at 7am. Thanks,

Aug 13
 Oh how quick game plans can change out here.  Hello all and welcome back.  Or welcome me back.  Or... What was the question?  Never mind.  I'm back.  I had a wonderful trip off.  Spent a lot of time with my daughter.  She got much cuter in the last month and also became much more of a terror.  All joy though.

 When we left the dock this afternoon I felt pretty good about my game plan.  Go fish yellows for a day or two, then come catch tuna for the last couple of days.  We caught over a hundred tuna today on our departure day.  Good ones too.  20-40 pounders minus one 20 fish stop on small yellowfin.  Well that just threw a wrench in my whole plans.  I'm not whining though.  We're very grateful for what we caught today.  Not every boat in this ocean caught fish today.  So we're going to take it one day at a time now.  Hopefully we can do this again tomorrow.
      

Capt Mike Pritchard called in last night from the Tribute last night with an update, they were on day 2 of a 4.5 day trip. They arrived Colonet around 10 am, very good Yellowtail fishing from 18 - 28 lbs. We did have a lot of casualties and ended the day with 53 Yellowtail and probably lost just as many. The Yoyo fishing was the most fun, but we had a hard time getting them off the bottom with 50 lb rigs. So far today we have 25 Yellowtail, as the weather gets nicer we are going to head offshore. We will check back in again later.

Today was filled with a lot of action and success. We had a lot of bites but also many shark casualties as well. Our solution pull until the line breaks or the fish is on the boat. In the process we were able to rule out certain 1/0 hooks that were not strong enough for the tuna we are catching and learn how hard we could truly pull on these fish.

From the hustle we were able to boat enough fish to make this our best day thus far, and stream line our gear selection.

Pictured here is Sophie and Windy with two big tuna that were successfully hustled from the sharks on the right gear.

Hopefully tomorrow has similar results!

 

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