[spottymac]

We headed out of the creek mouth at 6am with just enough light to see a big swell pounding the reef out in front. Steven [couta] lost his live bait tank as we hit the first few waves so that was a good start.

Things were not going our way with the only bait we could catch being bloody butter bream l must have hooked 50 or more.
30 min later we headed off to our favorit spot with 4 yakkas.

Steven dropped anchor and l headed out about 2km to a spot called the Pinnacle trolling a Halco lazer pro,l was hopeing to catch the one that done me the weekend before on 50lb brade with a 80lb leader but it wasn't my day l didn't even get so much as a bump.

l decided to head back and see how Steven was going when the wind moved arround to the south.
But do you think l could find him he was gone so l head back in to find him at the boat ramp.

He said it was a bit rough out there in the 2m plus swell with the anchor out so decided to pull it in and drift with the two live baits out,but before he could get it in one of the reels went off and started stripping line fast so he had to cut the anchor free to fight the fish.

Then the other reel went off Double hook up What a battle, his GPS said he was doing 6kmph and he had traveled 2km out to sea.
By this time he was getting a bit worryed with no boats about and having trouble spotting land in the big swell so he decided to cut the line and check what was on the other rod.
To his surprise it was still there a nice yellow fin tuna

 

[aquajoe]

Nice fish. I bet those put up one heck of a fight. I don't know that I would have cut a line just to see what was on the other rod.

 

[Shoey]

Nice one Steven. Should be back out there again in 3-4 weeks.

 

[beefs]

Thats some nice fishing there, congrats. As aquajoe said though, not sure i would have cut the line! Hard to know unless you're in the situation.

Would have to think that with the baits being hit around the same time in the same spot that its probably a good chance he cut off another Yellowfin from the same pack of fish?

 

[PoddyMullet]

That'd be a hoot of a surprise, nicley done gents

 

[Peril]

What a hoot! Dunno what I would have done, losing sight of land in a reasonable swell. Still gotta be happy with the outcome. Great work.

 

[Dodge]

Good one fellas have great respect for you offshore blokes after my taste of surf

 

[YakAtak]

Very nice little yellowfin m8

 

[calm water]

Great report as usual spotty mac, you guys up at Noosa seem to have all the luck (and maybe a bit of skill ).
That must have been one hell of a difficult decision, which line to cut, but a sensible one none the less; maybe they were both school Yellowfin :?:
What set-up (rig) do you use for live-baiting and trolling, it seems to catch you guys alot of nice fish. Do you think something similar would work on Kingfish here in Sydney?

 

[couta1]

what i normally do is put a livie out on the surface and one down deep on a bottom bashing rig with about 60 kg breakining strain!!.i upgraded as i have been picked up on the bottom rig and not even been able to hold the fish some time and just get busted of.it could have been a yellowfin on the bottom rig as well,but with a strong offshore blowing and an increasing swell of 2m,and your already over 3km offshore on a yak and the wind is picking up to already over 20knots i wasnt going to hang around on the drift and try and fight another fish.i reckon no fish is worth risking a dangerous situation if you start to feel uncomfortable.there is always another day to try when the weather and swell is better.but a good time was had

 

[NiCKOLAI]

Fair decision mate. Nice catch!!

 

[Freak]

that sounds like a bloody scary trip. hair raising and gut churning. 3-5 kms from shore in a 2 meter swell blowing 20 knots? the fish is a ripper though Couta. With all the fish pics that you have posted im surprised that anything ever goes wrong for you out there given your obvious experience. The live bait tank loss must have been a FREAK occurance...

 

[couta1]

no problem about the live bait tank.it was a cheap plastic bucket from crazy clarks that i bought for $5.00,that i strap on with a bit of plumbers tape a wave came over me and ripped it off,as i obviosly didnt strap it on well enough.but does the job though as it keeps those slimeys alive