for lake hartwell Fishing Report 2024

~~July 31
 Good evening folks and welcome to the last July 31 of 2015 ever aboard the Polaris Supreme.  The water we fished today just didn't have that right feel to it if you know what I mean.  The whole set up changed since we were there 2 days ago.  It was 2 degrees cooler for one thing.  Maybe we weren't in the right zone , but I don't think so.  I think things were off as far as the tuna and Dorado goes.  We were finding bull kelp areas instead of nice bushy kelps and catching only dinker tuna.  I only saw one tuna over 10 pounds today and 10 pounds was a lunker.  Needless to say we let every single one of them go.  So at 7:00 pm, it was looking like we were going to chalk this one up as a travel day.  I was just about ready to shower.  I mean I literally had all my clothes on the floor with the shower water running when I heard the call.  "We have a real nice kelp up ahead".  I thought about it and decided I better suit up again just in case and it was the right move.  Easily the best kelp of the year.  Until well after sunset things were busy and exciting aboard the Polaris Supreme.  The whole boat was bit.  Every single person.  Wide open 14-25 pound yellowtails.  It was good.  4 fish per rod that stop.  Uh huh.  Dinner was much more satisfying than it was flling like it was going to be.

 Another reason dinner was so lovely would be a fella, my friend Herb Yamanaka.  Very possibly the nicest man in the world.  At least tied for the nicest man in the world.  Every year he spends I don't even know how much time behind the lathe machine, making everyone on board an original wooden bowl or things like it, and they're wonderful.  He works for the Oregon Ducks origination so go Ducks!!!

 Tomorrow we'll be arriving to Cedros at about 7 in the am.  We're going to plan on wind, and we're going to plan on some good tailing to go along with a good time.
      

July 8
    We started this morning off with a bang.  We were up at 0400 hours and loaded up on mackerel, then we went and found a nice school of 20-25 pound fish that bit for us for a little while.  They were biting the surface iron great and I decided this morning that my favorite kind of fishing is surface iron for big yellows.  Big tuna and wahoo are really cool too but man o man is it fun.  My passenger and bud Dennis wasn't hooking any.  He usually does but he had a straight rod the whole drift.  When it slowed down he noticed that his jig had no hook on it.  Through all the excitement he ever noticed until it was done.  I thought that was kind of funny.  Bummer though.  The bite was rather short lived as was expected and after that we did some scouting.  We found a nice school of those 20-25 pounders but it was tough to get them to bite.   Throughout the rest of the day we did some scouting and caught fish and did some scouting and didn't.  We ended up with about a hundred and we're satisfied.

    We're going to stay the night and try this again in the morning.  I'm thinking about fishing offshore for tuna in the afternoon.  We'll see how tomorrow goes.
                                    

After a couple of slow days for the fleet we decided to go out on a search mission. Our morning was spent chasing 30 lb bluefin that we’re very difficult to hook. Around 12:30 our sonar lit up with the sweet sound of shallow, spread out yellowfin tuna. After 3 1/2 hours and ten short stops. Our 30 anglers were able to drop 123 yellowfin and 1 bluefin into the refrigerated Sea Water. Best success came on flyline bait on 25-40 lb, colt snipers and poppers. We will continue to fish offshore and target whatever we see.

Plenty of bites and opportunity today as we landed 4 nice bluefin.

Tip from the crew: make sure your spectra is put on your reel properly with a line winding machine.

Polaris Supreme update 08-15-2012

              Our day started off today in flat calm weather and high hopes that we were going to score big.  We worked our water break way out to the north west away from where we have been catching most of our fish.  About 20 miles away I thought "What the heck am I doing?  What if they start getting them?"  We made a sweeping turn out to the west and immediately found our first small paddy of the day.  We were immediately rewarded with a frenzied bite of mixed yellowfin, bluefin, dorado and small yellowtail which were released.  When the dust had cleared we had about 35 mixed fish.  And back up to the wheelhouse and mast we all went to find another one.  After about a half hour of searching and lunch time approaching , we hadn't found another one.  And then of course, my worst nightmare occurred.  Signs of the fish starting to bite 20 miles back where I left from.  This is one of those times you wish you had a button you could push just once a trip to put you somewhere instantly.  
Of course you'd probably want to push it again and go back where you
just were once you got there.   That's probably why they don't make such
a devise.  That and the lack of technology to do so.  Anyway, off we went two hours south.  Back to where we started our morning.  As we arrived it turns out that only one boat had really caught much of anything and he was definitely one of those lucky guys.  He had had a phenomenal day on that small grade yellowfin and bluefin.  As the passengers began to break down their gear and we headed north, our day went from slow to the insane.  We spent the rest of the hours until heading for home late, in a wide open bite for small yellowfin and bluefin.  With the odd big yellowtail, 18 pounds or more and dorado, 15 pounds thrown in.  Talk about carrying around a horseshoe and waiting until the last minute to use it.  It was a fantastic topper to Eric Rogger's 28th ? or 30th long range charter with me.  And also a befitting ending to Alex Crandall's last hurrah before he heads off to Afghanistan.  Alex it was awesome to have you and your dad on board to spend time together. Thanks for sharing that time with us on board the
Polaris Supreme.  Thanks Paula for letting them go.    We will be
heading up the line and into San Diego a couple hours late tomorrow.  
Somewhere around 8:00 am or so.  We will report tomorrow on the jackpot fish and give you a trip wrap up.
Thanks for tuning in,
Tommy and the awesome crew of the Polaris Supreme