Jim Bowers - 27.2kilo 60lb Northern Bluefin Tuna - Ballina 2009

jewgaffer · June 30, 2009

Jim Bowers - 27.2Kilo 60LB Northern Bluefin Tuna - Ballina 2009

Video Courtesy of Jim's close friend, Jeff Frankham, who is the Pastor of The River City Church in Ballina. Jim was fishing the Ballina Mackeral grounds with Jeff in Jeff's boat at the time.

Hi Raiders.

For those interested in fishing the Ballina area, here is a video and a short report of a 60LB Northern Bluefin Tuna (Longtail) that my mate Jim Bowers caught while fishing for mackerel off Ballina before his arrival in Sydney recently. This particular Northern Bluefin was caught during a session Jim had with his good friend Jeff Frankham.

The video was made by Jeff, who is the Pastor of the River City Church in Ballina, and is well known in the Lennox Head and Ballina area as being a capable off shore fisherman and all round angler .

Report:

On this particular day, Jim and Jeff crossed the Ballina Bar at first light to get their live bait supply and had their usual flick for Snapper with sp's before heading off for the Mackeral grounds to target Spotted and Spanish Mackeral.

Satisfied with a few snapper in the esky and a good supply of live bait such as slimys, pike, yellowtail and big eyed pilchards, they had high expections due to their previous good catches of Mackerel and other game fish such as Marlin, Yellowfin, Cobia, Sharks and the occasional Bluefin.

During a previous session on the bait grounds a 15kilo (35LB) Northern Bluefin Tuna took a liking to Jim's 3" nuclear chicken minnow and was boated after a 45 minute battle on Jim's 4kilo soft plastics rod.

They had reached the bag limit on Mackeral in similar conditions so everything was looking good .

With Mackerel fishing, double and tripple hook ups become the norm, often gaffing a Mackeral with one hand whilst playing a fish with the other hand. It's common to have other rods buckling and drags howling in protest as the fastest fish in the ocean heads for the horizon.

Anyway, after the action had quietened down, Jim sent the last Slimy out on a lighter mackeral outfit, his 30 year old hand made Butterworth 8-10 kilo rod coupled with a Tld 15, spooled with 20lb mono. Jim's rig was made up of a 2 metre 20lb double, plaited to the main and a 2 metre length of 60lb shock leader plus half metre of 40lb mono wire. Hook was a single 7/0 Black Magic in the live bait hook pattern.

Jeff was getting ready to up anchor and leave before the tide dropped too far and there was an expected northerly also due. This combination makes the bar crossing back into the Richmond River extremely dangerous - Jim noticed the balloon start to dance erratically for a few moments, so Jim grabbed the rod as 400 hundred metres of line peeled off the Tld 15 at a blistering pace.

Jeff quickly loosened off and untied the anchor rope, clipped on the danbouy, and started the motor and gave chase to what was first thought to be a big Spanish Mackerel.

Jim began the hard task of gaining line back as Jeff continued to chase the fish with the boat.... After fifteen minutes or so Jim regained around 300 metres of line. This allowed Jeff enough time to get the video ready to record sufficient footage of the action.

Hope you enjoy

- The YouTube video is courtesy of Stevie/Roosterman, a big thank you once again Steve for all the time you spend helping out, from Jim and myself