670 kg blue in Tahiti (warning, dead fish)

[nico_p]

Hi all,

I came across this link on facebook. That's a HUGE fish, unfortunately dead now, caught by comercial fisherman with live bait close to a FAD in Tahiti. No sportfishing, but that's an impressive fish so I thought I'd share.
670 kilos au bout du fil ! - La Dépêche de Tahiti

Stan, you can delete this thread if you feel it's inapropriate.

[Ramblin]

Wow. That is a 1,477 lbs.!

Whatever form of take, that still is an impressive beast.

IMHO Keith

[dustin]

What a fish. What an incredible fish. I'm just glad to see that giants like that are still around. I mean, when was the last time a sportfisherman caught a 1,300 or bigger blue marlin? The last one was in Ascension in 2002 and that was an Atlantic blue. When was the last 1,300 lb Pacific blue marlin caught?

A few months back I read through an old copy of Zane Grey's "Tales of Fishing Tahitian Waters". Imagine what it must have been like to fish those waters in their pristine state, before there was any real industrial commercial fishing. Sailfish reaching 12 feet in length, marlin hovering around 22 foot bonito canoes that were longer than the canoes, acres of 200 lb Allisons ... OK, Mr Grey was a professional storyteller, BUT!!!!

It really struck me how Grey and his buddy Capt. Mitchell would consistently raise fish on their wooden teasers that would refuse the baits. Yes, bait and switch in the 1930s! I truly hate to imagine how many fish they would have had if they had trolled even the wooden headed ancestors of today's marlin lures.

I just hope that now everyone has a digital camera or a mobile capable of recording digital images, we'll see more images of more of those super-granders taken by commercial fishermen. So our grandchildren can look back at them like we do the cave paintings of the giant big game animals of the Pleistocene!

[nico_p]

Tahiti does not get as much coverage as Hawaii, but it seems to produce equally big fish. There are other monster fish on this facebook page, quite impressive!

Zane Grey must have seen things we can barely dream about!! I never read what he wrote about Tahiti, but his "Tales of the Angler's El Dorado, New Zealand" can be read online here:
Tales of the Angler's El Dorado, New Zealand

It's a great book!

Cheers,
Nico

[Blue_Asparagus]

wow thats awesome, one day people one day.

[Mikey Mike]

Hi Dustin

Take a look at the old fishing pics on this site. It's one of the best collections of old fishing pics I have come across.

Old Fishing Photos Gallery

[Denis]

Iaorana,
I haven't posted here for a while, so I take this oportunity to come back with a few words and pics about the "angler", Miss Tetuaura Ti-Paon, and her catches.
She fish on a small 22 feet boat powered by a 140Ch OB, around FADs located on the south coast of Tahiti, often alone, sometimes with her father or friends.
She caught her first "Big Mama" while she was alone on the boat, december 30th, 2006 when she was only 18, and the scale shew 513Kg !!!. No sport fishing here, but what a courageous girl ! My hat off !

Like you Dustin I'm just glad to see that giants like that are still around.

[dustin]

Glad to hear from you again Denis. Thanks for putting up those photos: just look how FAT that 513kg fish is!!!!

Reading the catch report really makes you wonder just how difficult it would be to fight a fish like that on sportfishing tackle. The fish dragged a buoy around for 2 hours and was handlined for another two hours. How much drag would a buoy like the type used for artisanal tuna fishing put on a fish? 100 lbs? Probably a lot more if you were trying to drag it beneath the surface - and the buoy would float the fish to the surface whenever it tried to dive. Even with 130 lb tackle how many charter clients can sustain drag pressure anywhere close to 100 lbs for two hours, never mind four? It's really quite amazing that marlins of over 1,300 lb have actually been caught on rod and reel - although not too many of them.

[mangre]

This wahine would teach us a trick or two I think.

Welldone,

Fantastic Catch.

Paul

[Keith Poe]

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