missoula Fishing Report 2025

PLUN•KER (Adjective) A stop that takes up most or all of your day. Not wide open, however 1-10 fish are always hooked. *A PLUN•KER would be impossible without the best live bait operation in the world. **Anglers that succeed in a PLUN•KER usually listen and take advice well. ***A PLUN•KER is also impossible without an amazing crew. Today’s PLUN•KER produced 123 yellowfin 18 bluefin.

Today we had fantastic fishing on 15- 25 lb Yellowtail. We were able to get on a couple really nice schools that made for some great action! Both the kids and the fathers did a great job putting the wood to these fish! There was definably a lot of sore arms when it was all said and done. Here we have Colt and Kingston with some nice Yellowtail. Hopefully they will be rested up for offshore tomorrow. We will be looking for Tuna and Dorado.

Fishing was excellent today. Most of the tuna were 70-125 lbs. they started biting in the gray and continued just until dark. We released all of them except Al kept a 197 lb. tuna and Craig kept one that was 187 lbs. We also had a few wahoo mixed in. Weather is gorgeous. We are going to give it a try again tomorrow. Lunch was Chili Colorado, hors d'oeuvres were shrimp, crab claws and sashimi. Dinner was tuna Baja (that's a tuna fillet split and stuffed with avocado and crab meat with a sweet teriyaki ginger sauce to top it off).

~~Nov. 13
 All I can say is we tried.  The baiting went well last night and we arrived to cow town before sunrise.  Until 3:30 in the afternoon we didn't see much.  We fished hard though once again.  Most stayed at the rail.  We tried 4 anchor jobs, and a bunch of drifts but like I said, until 3:50 we didn't see much.  At 3:50 though things woke up but unfortunately it was short lived and we have nothing to show for it.  It gets dark so early now.  We saw 3 good spots of 200-300 pound tuna blowing out of the water and 1 really good sonar school of 50 pounders but we could get no reaction from them.  At least we got to see them.  It's better than never seeing them at all.

 I felt the vibe on board and I know the passengers want some action so we're going to try and deliver.  We'll be running up tonight and we're going to give "The Ridge" another try tomorrow.  We'll go for action and then we still have wahoo to catch.
        

Friday, August 19th, 2011

Hi friends. Just finishing up our day here on the Supreme. Gear is broken down, tackle is stowed top-side, and the boat is scrubbed from bow to butt. We began our day with a blind Bluefin jig strike and managed to land a few bait fish when we started to meter them pretty solid under the boat. After losing the majority of the fish we hooked, the school bailed and we soon followed. The Yellowfin weren't far behind and we managed to put together a really nice day on fish in the 12-25 lb. range with one standout landed by Henry "Blue" Maine. Henry's Yellowfin looks to go about 55 lbs. and no, it was not a Big Eye. Blue's our boy and we're very proud of him. Anyhow, most of our fish came on blind jig strikes and every now and then we'd see a nice sonar school of them and have on-the-corner type fishing. With all the action and chaos, and I do mean chaos, we have a very healthy load of tuna in our holds to compliment our Yellowtail catch from yesterday and our five Albacore from Wednesday. Everyday, things are looking more promising and more promising with Bluefin, Yellowfin, and more reported Albacore being caught, this offshore tuna thing might just be getting started. We'll see but with two straight solid tuna trips in the books, we'll be looking for a third tomorrow when we take off for five days. The weather is a bit rolly but without too much wind to jack things up and as of now (1700), our traveling weather is just fine.

So that's all. We're shooting for a 0630 ETA tomorrow morning. There will be eight long-range boats from all three landings arriving and departing tomorrow so we'll be on the hustle. We'll be dropping off Ryan and friends and picking up Joe Beck and the Bob Vance crew for a five day ocean-going party and we shall welcome them with open arms. We'll chat with you tomorrow. Take care and happy Friday.

-Team Supreme-

Thursday, August 18th, 2011

Hi friends. We arrived to the southern Yellowtail grounds this morning to find that things were not right. We managed a few OK drifts but we didn't see the life that the boats saw in the days prior. No shortage of fish, that's for sure, they were just too scattered out and weren't in the right mode. In the afternoon, we made a run to the northern grounds to find a little bit better sign of fish and we ended our day having a couple decent drifts on some 15-22 lb. 'tails with an occasional cow mixed in. We also caught/released some dandy Calico Bass and tagged one nice Grouper. A little bit better surface iron action today than we've seen all year and our master of ceremonies, Ryan, had himself a good day until Barry broke his favorite surface iron. All in all, it was a fine day of Yellowtail fishing. Our weather was prime all day, excellent bronzing conditions as it was hot and sunny.

So we're currently making way back up to finish our trip up with some tuna. A couple boats started located some actual schools of those Yellowfin tuna and we're hoping to do that tomorrow as well. Our weather is a mild chop with some breeze but we're just fine with it, as long as it doesn't freshen up. We'll chat with you tomorrow.

-Team Supreme-

Wednesday, August 17th, 2011

Good evening everyone. Like I began last trips report, I just wanted to reiterate just how quickly things can change out here on the ocean. The prior Bluefin zone that yielded us and the entire fleet a spectacular catch just a couple days before was absolutely starving for life and we never saw nor caught a Bluefin tuna today. Also, the gorgeous weather that we had been blessed with for the better part of a week was now windy, cold, and a bit choppy. The day was looking very bleak to say the least as it took us hours to land our first fish of the day, a Yellowfin tuna in the 15 lb. class. It was very slow for the morning time and all the way through lunch time. Single jig fish here, single jig fish there and with that, the announcement was made to get the Yellowtail gear ready as we would be traveling southerly for the remainder of the day to be in a position to do some Yellowtail fishing tomorrow morning.

It wasn't too long after we pointed the Supreme on our coastal course that we started getting blind jig strikes on the Yellowfins. We would consistently start jigging up double and triple jig strikes and when we finally hung a few bait fish, things got a little interesting. One of our best stops of the day was for nine Yellowfin and five Watermelons. Watermelons: a little Tommy Rothery terminology for you. These fish have been eluding the fleet for quite some time now and in traditional years, we catch these Watermelons later in the season in August/September. Not the traditional setup to find these fish in, with a Yellowfin school in warm water but for whatever reason, they were there and we managed to land five of these beauties. What is a Watermelon you ask? Albacore tuna in the 30-40 lb. class. That's right, we caught some slug Albacore today. What an awesome surprise and not only caught some, we also metered a few on the fathometer. Could this be the start of something or were they just lost souls hitch-hiking with their Yellowfin counterparts? Who knows but this next week in long-range fishing will be very interesting. Will it tell the tale if it will be the epic, super tardy Albacore season of 2011 or just a nice surprise here or there for the fleet? We'll see. Nonetheless, our first Albacore of the season were a welcome sight. We missed those beautiful specimens and we definitely took a few minutes to stare down the fish on the deck and appreciate what beautiful creatures they are. Hopefully, there are more to come.

Although we scored a decent day jigging up Yellowfin in the 12-18 lb. class, we maintained our course and our gameplan remains the same to fish Yellowtail tomorrow. It's not like we saw school after school after school. All of our jig fish were blind jig strikes and we never saw anything to get us really excited. We did have a couple stops where they rushed the boat and we had chaos on the corner but like I said, it was mostly a troll-fest today. All in all, we had a fine day and we're looking to had some 'tails to go along with our 'fins and we'll try the tuna fishing thing the day after tomorrow. Take care and wish us luck.

-Team Supreme-

Tuesday, August 16th, 2011

Hi friends. We awoke not-so bright but very early this morning to start our day. Being the 0530 boat getting into the landing, we had to bust it into overdrive so that the Shogun, Searcher, and three 1.5 boats could unload their passengers and fish as well. In a timely manner, the Heil group and their bounty of Bluefin, Yellowfin, Yellowtail, Dorado, Halibut, Calico bass, and Barred Sand bass were successfully unloaded and we bid the boys farewell until next season. Just an awesome trip for those guys, hard to beat if you ask me and we all busted butt to find them some fish and find some fish we did - and then some. Big fish honors go for the top three Bluefin tuna; The one and only Mr. Joe De Marco -- 45.4 lb. BFT. Jim Chivas -- 41.4 lb. BFT. And last but not least, our very own Mark Clark's son, Chace, took third with his 40. 2 pounder. Good going to the gang and to Chase, remember the invaluable advice that you're Uncles' Richie and Drew gave to you. Anyhow, back out for another trip and we welcomed aboard the wildest charter-master known to man, Ryan "Black Cloud" Christianson and his group from Let's Talk Hook-Up.

So four days with the man, the myth, the legend, Ryan and his closest friends. After the tackle seminar, Ryan raffled out some goodies and Mr. Jimmy Houston won the big prize of a Shimano Tyrnos reel. Reports are sounding like a Yellowfin take-over from the previous Bluefin zone and we're going to go see what's shaking down that way and see if we can't locate the Bluefins that were M.I.A. today. If we can't locate the short-fins, we'll stay busy with some of those Yellowfins and decide our next move from that point on. Weather is great, got plenty of bait, and we'll be in the zone tomorrow...early, not late. Take care.

-Team Supreme-

Sept. 27
Hi Every one.
We got out with out a hitch today on our Private charter with George and the Boys. The gang includes George, Bernie, Craig, Scott,  Bryan Charlie, Jeremy, And Daniel. Our Bait is just ok  scaby and big. I am sure we will lose at least 20% before we get into 82 degree water, then who knows what will happen. Weather is Beautiful calm seas and a gorgeous sun set. We are going to go dine on prime rib stake fillets and look for squid for bait from midnight 30 till late morning wish us luck!
The Polaris Supreme Crew!
 

Captain Mike Pritchard called in this afternoon with an update on the fishing conditions for the Tribute. We now have US limits of Yellowfin Tuna a total of 325 and 6 Bluefin Tuna. The Tribute is running two trips departing Monday and Friday night. Call Seaforth Landing at (619) 224-3383 to get in on the action or BOOK ONLINE via www.tributesportfishing.com.

Hello Everyone, We just returned from our annual Steele 5 day charter. Hosted of course by the one and only Archie Steele. Two things come to mind when this trip rolls around, central valley anglers that love to put fish on the boat and a whole slew of summer produce that we don't normally get our hands on. Yellow Peaches and Asparagus aside we rolled into the yellowtail zone bright and early. There was good sign there and we began fishing. To our pleasant surprise we began landing beautiful 15-20lb yellowfin tuna! A welcome sight, especially because the average size recently was on the smaller side. As we settled in the Yellows got on us pretty good. Helping get the rust off for most of these anglers. Around late morning our current died and we went into a sort of midday lul. We were still able to hang a fish every now and then but not like before. Thankfully it did fire up again around 330, and this time it was hot and heavy. Very steady yellow tail action, had one going the whole time with flurries of 5-7 at a time. All large 20-28lb beautiful yellowtail. Couldn't ask for a better average! We spent the latter part of the trip trying to top off our yellowtail counts and also catch a few exotics. We spent the day searching high and low for Yellows and Dorado. Never got the boomer hit that we were hoping for but we were able to scratch up a handful of Dorado and some more great sized yellowtail. That concluded our five day adventure. Good fishing on great sized Yellowfin tuna, Yellowtail, and Dorado. A great variety trip that kept us on our feet the whole time. Id like to thank Archie again for putting this trip together and look forward to fishing again next year. We are headed out today for five. Will report again soon, Team Supreme