lake burton Fishing Report 2025

Aug 11

I'm not sure how i feel about today. I know at 3:30 I felt real bad. Extremely frustrated to say the least. 2 of the boats we were fishing with found schools early in the morning and drifted with it most of the day scratching away at the bluefin the whole time while we drove around seeing nothing. The other 2 boats we were with connected around 1:00 in the afternoon and were gettin um, so I was feeling sad and mad. I told Mark to switch gens and broke out the volt meter to see if we had a short somewhere. I figured there had to be a reason we were the only boat not drifting. We were looking in the same water with the same machines trolling the same jigs but just not seeing it. The truth of the matter is there was nothing wrong with the boat, her captain or the crew. Sometimes your just that guy. Sometimes your front row and sometimes your nose bleed.

OK, enough wining. The day turned out just fine. At 3:30 we found a boomer school and drifted on the 25-45 pound bluefin almost till dark. Everyone caught at least one with top dog Phil boating 6 of those beauts. The weather was great in the morning but increased wind velocity throughout the day and it was pretty choppy at dark. So with the weather coming up and our bait situation worsening, we're heading down to fish for yellows and try for some macks.

We were on bluefin and yellowfin all day but they were difficult to hook. 8 bluefin tuna from 25-80 lbs and 2 yellowfin. Most of our fish were hooked on flylined sardines on 30 or 40 lb.

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July 30
 Arrive/Depart today. I feel that I've written this report before. We added a few things, like crew members, food, new passengers... We took a few things away, like crew members, old passengers with there fish... Anyways, We left again mid morning on Mr. Chaparro's 18th consecutive charter. A limited load of 20 passengers. We got our bait... We'll see... and are underway. We'll be fishing first thing tomorrow for tuna/yellowtail/dorado all day long and most likely working our way back down to Cedros Island. There looks to be some wind on the way so we like to be at Islands fishing when that happens. More comfty that way.

The weigh in happened. Just a 5 day progress report. Mark actually gained weight while Justin lost some. And Mark was the better eater. Unless he's secretly stuffing his face during his watch or something. Maybe he doesn't remember doing it.

Wednesday, September 19th, 2012

Hi friends. I bronzed today...again. I'm practically glowing, it's madness! I look like Oprah. Everyday of this trip has been stellar weather, and I've been bronzin' ever since the bait receivers, and I can only hope that we're not going to pay for it in a couple of days when we start making our way back to San Diego. We'll see. Anyhow, the fishing today was fair. It wasn't bad, it's just that we had high hopes for wahoo and they're still eluding us to this point. Matt Herrington, Paul Briscoe, Eric Kinnicutt, and Polaris Supreme first-timer Dean Harthorn were the lucky anglers to land a "hooter" today. Dean set the standard of size to this point. Dean probably runs about five feet tall (I mean no disrespect. Dean is one of the nicest dudes around) but the wahoo he caught today dwarfs him. Wait until you guys see the photos on the website when we get in. It's a great picture and Dean was pumped. Good things happen to good people.

Our day also saw lots of releasing yellowfin tuna, tagging a couple of nice yellowtail, and Glenn Briscoe landed a true bull dorado in the thirty plus pound category. G-Man, you're truly the man, G. After landing Glenn's fish, we made the decision to make a run to the inside to see if we can't locate some wahoo elsewhere. We'll check back with you tomorrow.

Oh yeah! Before I forget, Chef Schooler and Jamie are my heroes. For dinner, they prepared a perfectly cooked tri-tip (my favorite), pepper-roasted potatoes, and corn on the cob. On any normal night, I'd be pumped but then they finished it off with a warm brownie, vanilla ice cream, caramel syrup, and pralines. Now I'm super pumped. Between my bronze and my level of pump, I look like a plump Arnold Schwarzenegger. Life is good. See ya.

-Richie "Call Me Katniss" and the Supreme Team

~~9-9-2014

 Good evening from the bridge.  Today was yet another great day out on the water in the yellowfin tuna zone. We were blessed again with some awesome weather. The crew always loves it when we can go up into the mast from 6 am till the sun drops to look for fish and only have to wear some light long sleeves at the most, even driving straight into the wind.   The fishing was pretty good for most of the day today. We were getting on some descent schools this morning and scratching away. The grade was mixed again, some spots had the smaller 15-19 lbers and other brought in the same with some tuna up wards of 30 lbs so you can't complain about that.  The entire afternoon was bird schools galore, but a lot of them were just not the right kind. A lot of birds on kelp paddy's and spots of Skipjack. Instead of hitting every little school and throwing a bunch of bait, we just kept her rolling till we found the right sundowner school.  Rob was sure stoked we found that one since he was able to come in in the bottom of the 9th with his daily jackpot yellowfin of just about 30 lbs. Congrats to you Rob!! All and all we were please to add today into our books as a successful day out to sea.
 Right about the time we called it a day, Chef David rang the dinner bell and sat us down for the evenings cuisine. As he was dishing out the sesame seed crusted seared Ahi (yes, only 24 hours old, as fresh as it comes, so eat your heart out tuna lovers), forikake seasoned steamed rice and snow peas, Robin bust busy popping corks on the wine of the evening. 2013 Justin Sauvignon Blanc was the flavor and it smelled really good! I believe he told me it was a New Zealand white wine, but it really went great with the "catch of the day".  Dessert was a warm fresh peach cobbler with vanilla ice cream sending everyone to bed with nice full bellies once again.
 And  for Robins personal note of the day, he wants to let all of his friends know to make some room in the freezer for some amazing already packaged yellowfin tuna fillets. "I miss you all and want you to know this has been a truly amazing trip in all respects: a bit of heaven. 5 days and nights with the coolest people on the planet. The crew is off the chart and has been very accommodating".
 Thanks so much again Robin and friends for making this trip just fun working for you guys!
 So till this time tomorrow everyone, this is Jed signing off.
 
 Team Supreme

The skinnys got some speed! Today was definitely a grind, but it eventually did ignite! We were able to catch some large Wahoo today. Wahoo fishing was a first for many people on this charter. Today they got to see first hand how crazy and fast pace it could be. However through the chaos they realized truly how exhilarating these fish are to catch. Will report tomorrow, Team Supreme

~~Sep.23
 Arrive/depart.  A quick one too.  We were out before 9:30.  We got our bait and we were gone.  We started fishing after lunch.  We had one little area that was loaded up with 5 pound skipjack.  We stopped a few times to let everyone pull and jerk on something and practice following there fish around the boat and stuff.  We had a couple kelps with a few small yellows we caught.  We unfortunately made it to our destination before dark.  I say unfortunately because we were hoping to bump into something sooner.  We saw only a few little dabs of tuna while we had light.  I mean just a few fish, and they didn't bite.  We're currently anchored in the cove here and we're enjoying a nice prime rib dinner and I think we'll sleep well tonight.

 It sounded like it was a better day around here.  Not just catching wise but fishing too.  Never thought I'd say that but what I mean is there was a bigger spread of fish seen today.  They weren't all seen in the same honey hole like most of last week.  We have high hopes for tomorrow.  Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going on break.
      

Aug. 21
    Judging by how our trip has been so far, if you would have told me we would have 6 bluefin as of 1:00 this afternoon I wouldn't have believed you.  But sure enough, those darn bluefins were laughing at us.  We saw plenty of them but they didn't give two you know whats about us.  Our buddy Brian on the Spirit Of Adventure called us and told us he was seeing the 30-50 pound grade around where he was so we took a little ride down there.  It wasn't really biting that well until we got there.  Again our timing is on.  For the next few hours it was game on.  It actually took a while to get them to bite but during the best of it I couldn't get the balloon rigs out fast enough.  They were snapping!!  We ended up with a couple rounds of the 30-50 pounders with one going around 90 pounds and we also got a handful of 30-35 pound yellowfin there as well.  

    After it dried up we went looking for another.  We found several schools but none that would hang around and bite our baits.  Around 6:30 we bumped into another school that stuck and we picked up 21 more of those beauts.  And now we drift and do it again tomorrow.  

    The chefs are getting better and better at there sushi spread.  This afternoon it was terrific and I'm pretty sure I heard it's veal chops for dinner tonight.  Sweet dreams.