Fish,Boat & Dive

NGE 21Jan14 - HUNTER ENGAGED: Supplied images from Hunter Scott's battle with a 250.8kg marlin earlier this month.

The summer offers some great fishing in the Far North. The snapper season is still going well and kingfish numbers are increasing. February is also when the Game Fishing season really starts to kick off.

The main big game fish targeted in Northland waters are Striped Marlin, Blue Marlin and Black Marlin. We are very lucky to have the largest Striped Marlin in the world, a world record, at 224kg caught from Tutukaka. Blue and Black Marlin get much larger than Striped Marlin and the New Zealand records for these are over 400kg.

Game fishing in the Bay of Islands was made famous by Zane Grey in his 1926 book "Tales of the Angler's El Dorado". By the 1980's between 30 and 40 boats would fish the season with anglers coming from all round the world chasing their first big catch.

Now most people fish for marlin from private boats and much smaller boats than the big game launches of the 80's. This has made it much more accessible and the fishers just need to wait for the right weather window to get off-shore.

If you are keen on giving game fishing a go the best way is to book a share on one of the many charter boats operating from Paihia and Russell. Information centres and booking agents operate from near the wharf in Paihia with Pete Richardson at Sportfish
specializing in game fishing bookings. During the season you can normally pick up a quarter share on a boat for around $300.00 to $400.00.

If you want the boat to yourself the sole charter rate starts at about $2000 and up to $4000 depending on the boat.

The game fishing grounds around the Bay of Islands can be as close as the outer islands but normally you have to go up to 10 nautical miles off-shore to find the fish. And catching a fish is by no means guaranteed. I know some anglers who have fished for marlin for years and never caught one. Others catch them first try and that's part of the allure of big game fishing.

If you do catch a marlin you have a choice to make. Do you land it or tag and release it? Tag and release means you insert a tag with a number on it into the back of the fish and then record all information about it on a data base. Then if the fish is caught again the data can be compared.

If you choose to land it the fish is brought into Paihia or Russell wharf and weighed and photographed and then taken to the smoker.

If you love fishing, game fishing really takes it up a level. The anticipation as you trawl the ocean, the adrenalin rush when the fish strikes, and the satisfaction of getting it alongside the boat is hard to beat.