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The Art of Tackle Storage

June 10, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

tackle storage

A pantry has been converted to rod storage on the 68-foot Viking, Whirlwind.

By Dale Wills

Adequate rod and reel tackle storage on a modern sportfishing boat is generally not the highest priority. Naturally, most soon-to-be boat owners look at other attributes such as engines, number of staterooms, salon layout, bridge configuration and cockpit space when deciding if a boat is right for them. But once a boat is delivered and a captain and/or crew is hired then all kinds of stuff begins to get loaded and stowed, including the all-important tackle.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle Tagged With: boat design, boat storage, rods and reels, tackle, tackle storage

Expert Insight To Blue Marlin Fishing Hook Sets

June 7, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

blue marlin

Photo: Joe Byrum

By Joe Byrum

When it comes to fishing for blue marlin with lures, the hook set can often be an overlooked part of the equation when things are going right and a heavily scrutinized element when they’re not going so well. Typically, when the latter comes into play a fish has just come off or you had a bite that didn’t translate into a hookup. The deliberation gets even heavier when these things occur in multiple instances during a short period of time. The truth is that some marlin aren’t going to be hooked no matter what we do.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle, Techniques Tagged With: billfishing, Blue Marlin, Heavy Tackle, marlin, Marlin Fishing

O-Ring Stop

May 18, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

o-ring hooks

O-Rings can be used on various hook types.

Captain Dickie Dickinson
Jupiter Fishing Charters
Skill Level: Easy

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle Tagged With: Ballyhoo, ballyhoo bait, jupiter fishing charters, o-ring, offshorefishing

Superlines

May 13, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

lines

Modern dredge fishing has evolved tremendously, with multi-tiered teasers complementing intricate pulley systems mounted to towering outriggers. Mono has been a reliable choice for dredge line and outrigger halyards for years and is still popular today, but woven superlines comprising ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene fibers provide significant benefits including high strength, low tretch and resistance to flex-fatigue and abrasion. Here’s how superlines are in use for outrigger halyards, dredge leashes and bridge teasers on the 90-
foot Jarrett Bay, Jaruco.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle Tagged With: dredges, halyard, outrigger, teaser

I Always Like A Red Head—Is Lure Color Important?

May 13, 2022 By InTheBite Editor

rod hayes lure colors

Rod Hayes Lures

By Peter B Wright

How important is the color of a lure to a billfish, a tuna or any other large pelagic game fish?

For many fish, including everything from small bait fish to giant marlin and tuna, color vision can be hugely important.

Consider mahi-mahi. Almost certainly, they would never have developed their outstanding coloration if they were not also gifted with color vision. This is a part of what makes them, and other tropical fish often found in tanks and aquariums, so special.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle Tagged With: lure color, lure size, Marlin Fishing, Offshore Fishing, peter wright, red head lure

Tackle Tips: Quick Loader and D.R. Blue Marlin

February 21, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

targeting blue marlin

Eight Eights — D.R. Blue Marlin

Based out of Singer Island, Florida, though rarely at her homeport, the 72-foot Viking Eight Eights is on a constant quest for billfish releases. “Our normal schedule is with the boat 21 days. Then we take 10 off and come back for another 21. Out of the 21 days we’ll probably fish anywhere from 15 to 18 days depending on weather and what’s going on,” says first mate Kyle O’Conner.

In 2020, captains fishing out of Cap Cana reported 91 days where they released five or more blue marlin and 15 days with 10 or more releases. “Last year we got to the Dominican Republic July 1 and in two and a half months we caught 100 blues. We had close to 500 billfish releases and 300 tags for the 2020 season,” O’Conner says.

Man-made FADs highlight this world-class Caribbean fishery, with plastic jugs and styrofoam insulation banded together with scrap seine netting and palm fronds, then strategically tethered to the seafloor in efforts to attract forage and predator fish. Targeted with 30-pound outfits, juvenile blue marlin swarming the warm waters of the D.R. are intelligent and accurate feeders, at times displaying finicky tendencies. Here’s how they are fooled on the Eight Eights:

Rod Blank: BlackFin
Rod Builder: Bill Buckland
Guides: FUJI SiC
Thread Wrap: Green/Orange diamond
Butt: AFTCO #1 unibutt
Reel: Shimano Tyrnos 30
Main Line: Berkley ProSpec 30 lb.
Leader: 100 lb. pink fluorocarbon
Hook: 9/0 circle hook
Bait: Baitmasters medium ballyhoo
Skirt: MoldCraft Junior Hooker
Rigging: EZ Swivel

ballyhoo for the quick reloader

Ricardo Núñez — Quick Loader

Whether it’s washing the boat or rigging ballyhoo, the best deckhands are fast and efficient in everything they do. Dredge fishing for billfish typically entails naked swimming ballyhoo pulled from the transom corners, but outrigger baits are often outfitted with a small lure head like a MoldCraft Junior Hooker or Squidnation Slammer to create a larger profile and also help ballyhoo track better in rough seas.

When fishing a chugger/ballyhoo combination, the use of Ringer Swivels to firmly mount and expose circle hooks is a widely popular method. Some mates use an open-eye rigging needle as a makeshift puller to bring the chugger head into place over the O-ring, but a more streamlined approach utilizes a quick reloader fashioned from a length of #19 wire leftover from dredge teaser pin rigs.

With a tiny clasp bent into the end, mates can hook the O-ring and force it out of the lure head to accommodate a circle hook. The simple device not only allows for easy storage and organization of multiple chugger heads, but more importantly enables mates to simplify the process of adding skirts to rigged ballyhoo.

Steve Kenealy was first mate on the 86-foot Merritt Reel Tight and spent countless hours rigging ballyhoo on the docks of Isla Mujeres, Mexico. “We first started using the quick reloader down there about two or three years ago. We can go through a pile of baits when the sails are snapping and this simple tip helps automate the rigging process. It’s a great little device that was introduced to us by a local mate named Ricardo Núñez.”

The best mates know that the more systematic they become in their daily tasks, the less energy is required. Like poking out the eyeballs of a ballyhoo, where you could do it one fish at a time or line up multiple fish on an arrow shaft, this quick loader makes performing a repetitive task easier than ever.

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle, Techniques Tagged With: Ballyhoo, Dredge Fishing, fads, fishing tackle, Offshore Fishing

Useful Treasures: Vintage Lure Collectors Connect with Sportfishing’s Past

February 14, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

lures

Photo: Joe Byrum

By Dave Ferrell

There’s no one triggering event that turns a big-game fisherman into a lure collector. That is, everyone gets into it in their own way. Certainly, just participating in the sport of big game marlin fishing makes you somewhat of a lure collector right from the get-go. Although the lures you seek may be more for catching than collecting, before long you’ll find all of your onboard storage filled to the brim with skirted lures and un-skirted heads that you’ve acquired from here and there.

You’ll develop favorites and soon have a stash that’s so important to you in one way or another that you’d never put them back in the spread…or only just during tournament time. Lures conjure memories of good times and can seemingly bring friends and experiences back to life. They connect us with each other, and with the most amazing fish in the sea; they are magical to most, and mythical to others.  

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle Tagged With: Black Bart Lures, fishing lures, Lures, sportfishing

How to Tie a Better Snell Knot

January 28, 2022 By InTheBite Digital Editor

snell knot

The earliest known inhabitants of the Pacific crafted eyeless hooks from bone and shell with impressive elegance and ingenuity. A variation of the primitive methods employed in lashing hooks to line, the snell knot is widely favored across global fisheries. Creative anglers keen on advancing their collection of skills continue to perfect the craft with the latest iterations preventing tackle failure at traditional breaking points.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle, Tackle Tips Tagged With: Cabo San Lucas, jaruco, Marlin Fishing, snell knot

Swordfishing: Paco’s Caribbean Squid

December 17, 2021 By InTheBite Digital Editor

swordfishing bait

Staff Report

If you’ve tried your luck daytime swordfishing, then you know exactly what it is about this crazy fishery that intrigues the imagination when pursuing a genuine sea monster more than 1,500 feet below the surface. In efforts to increase our bite to catch ratio, daytime tactics across the East Coast, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean have evolved tremendously to suit the specific conditions encountered offshore. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle Tagged With: caribbean fishing, squid bait, swordfish tackle, swordfishing

The Best Billfish Lure

November 16, 2021 By InTheBite Editor

The moment we live for

The moment we live for

By Nick Smith

It occurred to me that this billfishing-with-lures thing we do is a lot like what I’ve done most of my life in the automobile business. It’s about attracting customers and eventually closing the deal. The oldest marketing adage in the book is AIDA. It was coined by some marketing genius way back in the late 1800s. It stands for: Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.

Isn’t that exactly what we’re trying to do with our spread of teasers or lures? These hunks of plastic and rubber have to accomplish AIDA and do it consistently for us to have success with the billfish that we pursue so fervently.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Featured Stories, Fishing, Tackle, Techniques Tagged With: billfishing, fishing lures, fly fishing, Nick Smith, Tackle Tips

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News

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    Elizabeth Arn To Achieve Junior Blue Marlin Record

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  • It Just Takes Time Three-Peats as 2022 MGCBC Champion

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  • 2022 Georgetown Blue Marlin Tournament Results

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