Seeing Blue

Ever since I could walk the bank of a pond, fishing pole in hand, I’ve had a particular appetite for sight fishing. Sure, you could catch a number of bluegill waiting for that little red and white bobber to go under but, there was always something special about seeing fish swim along the shore, picking a target, dropping bait directly to it and watching it eat. Landing the fish at that point is just the cherry on top of the whole experience. I guess as they say, some things never change. It’s been many years since I first walked the banks of that pond, and I still feel very strongly that this is the most exciting way to catch fish. I’ll go as far to say having a near miss experience with a large fish in a sight-fishing application is more memorable than landing that same caliber of fish blind-casting. Let me explain.

I’m not sure how many of you have caught a blue marlin before, but it’s essentially the pinnacle of sportfishing. Over the years I have dabbled in the sport of billfishing and I’m still very much a student of the game. Shortly after the destruction of Hurricane Harvey was over, I was invited to go on a 3-day trip on a sportfishing boat out of Port O’ Connor. I will never forget the timeline of that trip because when we got to the SPAR rig Boomvang, there was a crew boat on standby named Harvey Gladiator, almost too coincidental. The next morning the professional captain, only having one deckhand on board and some unexperienced anglers (i.e. me), was prepared with a very simple and yet effective spread. Four cup-faced lures pulled from the riggers, two squid chains for bridge teasers, and nothing in the shotgun position. We quickly landed a Yellowfin tuna over 100lbs. Then the real bite. There’s nothing like a screaming Shimano Tiagra clicker to wake you up from a post nightwatch cat nap. Never seeing the bite, I went for the rod as it was my turn. As I get to the chair and settle in, the marlin makes a short greyhounding run one way and then back the other. Increasing the drag, I start to crank, and the captain clicks the boat into reverse. Ten short minutes and it was a done deal. The mate bills the fish and gets the hook out in short order. A few kicks of the tail and the marlin fades into the abyss. Obviously memorable, it was my first marlin after all, but not as memorable as the next marlin tale.

Fast forward a few years; while fishing in Costa Rica I was exposed to a particular style of billfishing that intrigued the hell out of me. Call it dredge fishing, teaser fishing, dink baiting, whatever; it’s sight fishing for billfish. Coming back to Texas, I couldn’t wait to try it out. At that time, I was regularly fishing on a sport boat out of Galveston. Without having all the fancy electric dredge reels, I had to figure out a way to deploy a dredge. After some studying on the web, I suspected I could pull a single tier dredge with an 80-wide reel if rigged on a pulley system. For those wondering what a dredge is, it’s basically a giant Alabama rig like the bass guys use, but full of hookless teaser baits. The idea is the cluster of teaser baits mimic a bait ball underneath the boat and piques the interest of a nearby billfish, drawing them into the spread. They are typically ran with a 10lb fish-shaped weight to hold the dredge 20 feet or so under the boat while trolling. After some testing I concluded this system would definitely work as I intended, and I was ready to give it a try.

 Next trip out we reached a hard bottom spot in about 750ft of water. In goes the dredge and then the bridge teasers. The hook-bait starts to go into the rigger clip and snap! The line gets pulled right out of my buddy’s hand. A sailfish was all over the hooked bait. Before we could even react, the ballyhoo was off the hook, Sancocho! Well… I guess these dredges do work. Bumping out a bit further offshore we turn toward a platform rig that sits on the ledge. The sun was hitting the spread perfectly and I was perched on the shaded side of the gunnel, just like I saw the mates do in Costa Rica. All of a sudden a glowing purple shape appears under my hooked-bait. It was the man. Rushing to the rod all I could think of is how amazing this marlin was about to look jumping on the horizon. But I had no clue what I was doing, and I sensed the marlin knew that. The fish beat me to the rod and snatched the ballyhoo right off the hook. Staring blankly in awe and still trying to figure out what went wrong, I watched the marlin quickly zip to the right rigger and do the same thing. The vision of the marlins electric blue pectoral fins haunts me to this day.

Not too long after that trip the boat was sold. I have since gone on a few overnight trips in the Gulf of Mexico without much success. I feel cursed in a way. Maybe it’s because I wasn’t pushed off the dock after catching my first blue marlin in traditional fashion. I try not to be too superstitious, but after multiple trips without being able to redeem myself, I must wonder. It’s been a couple years since I’ve tried my luck against the man in the blue suit, but telling you this story has me wanting to walk the docks and see if I can’t catch a ride to the marlin grounds.