Fiji fishing for tuna - the ‘tax man’ ruined the party

[FishingFables]

Hi Raiders,

I took the family for a half day fishing charter in Fiji yesterday chasing yellowfin tuna. Being on a boat is foreign territory for me as I do all of my fishing in Sydney land based or from my canoe, so it was an interesting experience.

We trolled a selection of lures with a few deep divers and others that skipped along the surface. No action for the first hour until we spotted birds diving into the water and headed over. A few minutes later one of the rods bent double and the drag sung a beautiful tune for thirty seconds as the tuna took off.

I fought the fish for fifteen minutes, clawing back a couple hundred meters of line, until the fish was within sight of the boat. Then it took off at speed because of a shark. A minute later we saw a decent sized reef shark hit the surface with my tuna in its mouth. The line was severed shortly afterwards.

The same scenario played out with my wife and daughters over the following hour.  Great hook ups, great battles, disappointment when the sharks took the tuna.

The skipper referred to the sharks as the ‘tax man’ because they turn up to claim part of your take home pay. I would have been happy for the taxman to claim 30% of our catch but 100% was excessive.

Fair pull of the dunny roll tax man! 🤬

It was still a great experience and the skipper worked hard for us, so no complaints there. As we all know, some days the fishing gods shine down on you, and other days they don’t. That’s fishing.
 

One of my fishing buddies back home who goes deep sea reckons the sharks are smart operators and would have been following our boat, perhaps even underneath it, waiting for us to reel their free lunch right to them. We effectively created our own Maccas Swim Through 😂

Just wondering whether any of you boaties have experienced this and what your theories are?

Cheers

Jason

 

[Yowie]

Sharks are a bloody nuisance at times, either taking all or most of the fish. The thrill of hooking a nice fish, then disappointment at losing most of it to an angry piece of sandpaper with teeth. 

Could at least make a fish head soup with that tuna head. 🤣

[Green Hornet]

Sharks can be an absolute pain in the bum at times. I remember one day at Lord Howe the wahoo were that thick we were getting triple hook ups and even on 80lb gear we never got a “clean” fish to the boat. The only answer was to move further offshore, away from where the Galapagos whalers like to hunt.

Still good to hear you had a good time, they look like nice size tuna you were hooking.

 

[Blackfish]

Dam sharks, spoil a good day out and that would have been a nice capture.

I really believe that this is learned behaviour from the Sharks as what I’ve experienced in over 25 years fishing remote Kimberley where some spots especially for Pelagic fish it’s not worth fishing now as the “Tax man” takes more than giving back and these pelagic fish were destined for release but not in a sharks mouth.

Sharks certainly frequent the same areas as Pelagics but they were never like this and I’ve seen change first hand.

I also don’t believe it’s an explosion of the shark population where fish populations have dwindled I can’t see Sharks booming.

I’m lead to believe that spots around K,gari (Fraser Island) and Hervey Bay has similar problems with trying to land a fish.

Well that’s my thoughts anyway …. BF over and out.

 

Hope you had a great holiday anyway.

Edited December 8, 2023 by Blackfish

[FishingFables]

33 minutes ago, Green Hornet said:

Sharks can be an absolute pain in the bum at times. I remember one day at Lord Howe the wahoo were that thick we were getting triple hook ups and even on 80lb gear we never got a “clean” fish to the boat. The only answer was to move further offshore, away from where the Galapagos whalers like to hunt.

Still good to hear you had a good time, they look like nice size tuna you were hooking.

 

Yes it was good to give the family an experience of some big fish pulling drag, that’s for sure. They were decent sized tuna which made it difficult to pull them in quick enough to avoid the sharks.

[FishingFables]

36 minutes ago, Blackfish said:

Dam sharks, spoil a good day out and that would have been a nice capture.

I really believe that this is learned behaviour from the Sharks as what I’ve experienced in over 25 years fishing remote Kimberley where some spots especially for Pelagic fish it’s not worth fishing now as the “Tax man” takes more than giving back and these pelagic fish were destined for release but not in a sharks mouth.

Sharks certainly frequent the same areas as Pelagics but they were never like this and I’ve seen change first hand.

I also don’t believe it’s an explosion of the shark population where fish populations have dwindled I can’t see Sharks booming.

I’m lead to believe that spots around K,gari (Fraser Island) and Hervey Bay has similar problems with trying to land a fish.

Well that’s my thoughts anyway …. BF over and out.

 

Hope you had a great holiday anyway.

Thanks for your thoughts BF you’ve clearly had more experience than me with the dreaded ‘tax man’. The charter we went on fishes the same area so the sharks must have learned to hang around for a feed.

Cheers

Jason

[Larkin]

Looks like you had a great time out there! 

Sharks and seals - ain’t stupid are they - always hanging around known fishing spots ready for an easy meal.

[LuckyFil]

I've been going to Weipa for many years and we often cast or troll for the long tail bluefin tuna up there, although they are much smaller than the yellowfin you encountered, averaging maybe 5-8 kg. The tuna are often 'busting up' feeding on schools of baitfish. We might get one or two before the sharks moved in and took our caught fish often just as we were getting ready to bring them aboard so it was a close encounter. Sometimes too close for comfort!

The sharks had definitely learned to hang near the boats and we'd often see the shadows under us even before we'd hooked a fish - that was time to move on.

Everyone up there says the shark problem has got a lot worse in recent years, various theories why some say the pro shark fishing is much reduced and the shark numbers have rocketed. Who knows!

Fil

[Little_Flatty]

Shame about the tax man @FishingFables. I did hear recently on a podcast that there has been research on how quickly sharks learn to associate boats with food in remote waters. Apparently it’s very quick!

 

[big Neil]

My main experiences of losing fish have been with the other part of the tax department....seals. They definitely follow boats around and even become cheeky as they take your catch, sometimes teasing you in the process.

On one charter from Narooma we went out to Montague Island and there is a seal colony there. We were hooking into decent Snapper but the seals were taking them as we retrieved back to the charter boat. The seal would often surface with the Snapper in its mouth and look at you, almost cheekily, sort of saying "what you gunna do now, ya punk?" Occasionally they would let go and you would reel as fast as possible only to have them take it again boatside. 

The charter skipper had seen all this before, of course, so he said "Bring your lines up". We took off towards another charter boat and the skipper had some chit chat with the other captain. Suddenly he took off at a great rate of knots and left the seals there with the other boat. Later on we went back towards the island and a rather large seal jumped up on the back of the boat trying to take the pilchard baits from the bait board. Thankfully sharks don't mimic that particular behaviour.

So these creatures of the deep are more than capable of working out the best way to get an easy meal, with little respect for the fact that it's your hard earned they are working with. A bit like the TAX MAN does anyway!

A good post and pictures Jason.

Cheers, bn

[FishingFables]

On 12/9/2023 at 9:33 AM, LuckyFil said:

I've been going to Weipa for many years and we often cast or troll for the long tail bluefin tuna up there, although they are much smaller than the yellowfin you encountered, averaging maybe 5-8 kg. The tuna are often 'busting up' feeding on schools of baitfish. We might get one or two before the sharks moved in and took our caught fish often just as we were getting ready to bring them aboard so it was a close encounter. Sometimes too close for comfort!

The sharks had definitely learned to hang near the boats and we'd often see the shadows under us even before we'd hooked a fish - that was time to move on.

Everyone up there says the shark problem has got a lot worse in recent years, various theories why some say the pro shark fishing is much reduced and the shark numbers have rocketed. Who knows!

Fil

Thanks for your reply and insights Fil. From the sound of it the sharks that hassled you in Weipa by hanging under your boat must have some Fijian relatives 🎉

[FishingFables]

12 hours ago, big Neil said:

My main experiences of losing fish have been with the other part of the tax department....seals. They definitely follow boats around and even become cheeky as they take your catch, sometimes teasing you in the process.

On one charter from Narooma we went out to Montague Island and there is a seal colony there. We were hooking into decent Snapper but the seals were taking them as we retrieved back to the charter boat. The seal would often surface with the Snapper in its mouth and look at you, almost cheekily, sort of saying "what you gunna do now, ya punk?" Occasionally they would let go and you would reel as fast as possible only to have them take it again boatside. 

The charter skipper had seen all this before, of course, so he said "Bring your lines up". We took off towards another charter boat and the skipper had some chit chat with the other captain. Suddenly he took off at a great rate of knots and left the seals there with the other boat. Later on we went back towards the island and a rather large seal jumped up on the back of the boat trying to take the pilchard baits from the bait board. Thankfully sharks don't mimic that particular behaviour.

So these creatures of the deep are more than capable of working out the best way to get an easy meal, with little respect for the fact that it's your hard earned they are working with. A bit like the TAX MAN does anyway!

A good post and pictures Jason.

Cheers, bn

Thanks for your response Bn. So the seals work in another department of the tax office and are just as cunning, maybe more?

I think I’ll return to the safety of fly fishing for trout and bass 😂

[nutsaboutfishing]

18 hours ago, FishingFables said:

Thanks for your response Bn. So the seals work in another department of the tax office and are just as cunning, maybe more?

I think I’ll return to the safety of fly fishing for trout and bass 😂

All I can say is

https://news.orvis.com/fly-fishing/video-bald-eagle-steals-fish-right-off-fly-fishermans-hook

[kantong]

The taxman strikes again! I remember being on charter and we hooked a really good wahoo (captain said it would have been in excess of 35kg) and then the tax man came. Only got a quarter of the fish back. Still plenty of fillets to go around for everyone on the boat though! 

Well done on getting out there, looked like great weather!

[FishingFables]

31 minutes ago, kantong said:

The taxman strikes again! I remember being on charter and we hooked a really good wahoo (captain said it would have been in excess of 35kg) and then the tax man came. Only got a quarter of the fish back. Still plenty of fillets to go around for everyone on the boat though! 

Well done on getting out there, looked like great weather!

Thanks mate it is good to know I’m not the only angler to get robbed by the Taxman 😂