Bazztex
TFF Guru
Registered: 01/05/02
Posts: 23453
Loc: DFW , Texas , USA
TBBEC 09 TUNA Report...
The Scat Cat Crew were fantastic again.. they never fail to impress us... a job very well done again Yall.. Hats off you guys are a hoot to fish with!
Many thanks to Willie of Texas Outdoor Organizers for doing all the leg work getting things put together for our trip.
Thanks to Ron Dougherty of Bar Bar Quality Custom Rods for bringing in his family and friends to help crew up the TBBEC. Ron, Greg, Scott & Ron of BPS came down from Indiana and Juan from Miami Fla to fish with us. If you have not checked out Bar Bar rods on Ebay you need to they are priced right, well built and fish even better!
We got to Boudreaux around sundown Friday and got into the Black fin which for what ever reason were immune to what I had tied on which I promise is a first.. the current was fairly strong. I tied on an OTI Jitter bell 14oz purple jig and got hooked up on a good line dumping fish but she pulled the hooks. Then hooked up a black fin which got hit by a toothy critter bye bye fish and jig. Tied on a 10oz Benthos jig in purple glow and got another drag burner that evidently got tail wrapped because of the tail thump on my line which wore out and broke off. Finally got the black fin dialed in and got the hands some chunk fish.
We were marking lots of bigger tuna but they just would not come up from 200ft even after tons of chum.. we jigged on thru the night and in to the rain that arrived early morning. The low sky and rain seemed to turn on the YFT for a while we had a few good fish caught on top waters, swim baits and chunks. I caught a small 30# YFT on a chunk after day break myself and had numerous blowups on soft plastic fliers (Yummies and Frenzy) but failed to get a hookup for more than a few seconds. I had one we est to go over 100# bit my Ballistic flyer 10ft from the boat busted out both eyes and pulled the wooden bead (that secures the main hook in the body) out thru the nose taking drag 3-4 seconds then just came off?? Had both wings eaten off an off brand flyer from numerous blow ups. The wind kept a big bow in the lines making it hard to get a quick hook-set. We did have a 32# Escolar Tuna.. another Scat Cat record fish caught on a jig down real deep.
I slept thru the Saturday trolling session as usual... they got 1 Wahoo and 1 small YFT watching paint dry.
Saturday evening the conditions were more favorable with calmer seas and lighter winds starting off but the current was still fairly strong. After we caught several magnum sized Rainbow Runners in the 6-10# range on chunks... I tied on a 10oz Strike Pro jig with prism tape and got after some chum BFT and kept a few since the YFT were apparently not in my cards. We had 6-7 nice 70-90# YFT caught on chunks.. I free-lined 2 live fliers that got bit off by UFO's ... one had teeth because I got back a hook-less chewed up leader. One Dorado was caught on another live flyer.. fist time I have ever seen so many live fliers on a hook without a YFT to show.. they just did not want to surface for us?
Everyone agreed it was a great trip.. you've got to pay them dues for the better WFO Bite trips and we have been spoiled many times in the past. I left my camera at home so no Pix from me