90 seconds of adrenaline...east coast tuna hook-up

This is a post about an adventure I had yesterday off the coast of NJ. The striper fishing has been crazy since Thanksgiving and the bait and fish are still here in numbers.  It's usually about 30 degrees at first light with the temps going up to the low 40's.  The wind and surf has been a factor each trip out,  but if I can get out and the acres and acres of birds are close enough,  it's non stop action.  In my last 8 trips,  I have been getting between 30-50 fish each trip.   There have been many sightings of tuna busting through the bait schools and yesterday I hooked one.

Here is the story from yesterday.


I launched this morning just at first light just a little south of the MB launch. The only bird action I saw before I launched was past the green can and I knew I was in for a long pedal.

Once I got to the green can, the birds were still almost a mile out from there! I came this far and told myself I wasn't getting skunked. I headed out to the birds that were just about even with the second green bell buoy and strted jigging. I didn't hook up with the 2+ mile trip out there, but once I was with the birds, jigging worked great. The seas were nasty at best...a 4-6 foot swell and a nice chop on top of that with a steady 15-20 wind from the south. I landed and released about 5 bass just at or about keeper size and then when I was releasing my next fish, I almost went over with the waves.

I very rarely attach myself to the kayak, but with these conditions, I tied on a 8 foot piece of rope that would keep me with the kayak in case I went over.

I was thinking about the long pedal in and the conditions were not getting any better, so I started to head back in. I didn't even troll back for the first 45 min. with the conditions and once i got about a mile from the beachm I started trolling again with no bird action.

I heard a big splash and looked behind me and saw where the noise was and just a second behind that was a tuna breaking the surface! The rod I had out was strong enough for a tuna, but I wasn't sure if the line and reel I had on it would be heavy enough to handle it.

Before I had a chance to even think about changing rods, one of the tuna grabbed my 7" zoom soft bait!! I always troll with an open spool and after 100 feet of line was stripped, I was able to thumb the spool and lock down the reel. The good news is that the fish headed straight into the wind and surf and I was able to stay straight with it and almost be in control.

There was now a 30 second stand off where I could not reel and I was doing everything I could to just hold the fish. Now the fish makes a turn and heads for the back of the kayak, He was dragging me backwards into the wind and surf and water was coming in over the back of the kayak!

With the nasty sea conditions, I had to try and turn the fish so it was in front of me, but after holding on with everything I had, line started peeling off my reel. I finally got the fish back in front of me and started to pedal to gain some line.

Again, the fish turned and I was sideways into a huge swell. I tried to turn the rudder, but I wasn't able to keep the kayak in line with the fish.

I just watched as my line was down to about 50 feet before the tuna took off again and took the rest of the line......and then SNAP!

There was actually about a five second window when I "thought" that I had a chance of landing the fish. But in reality, with the rod, reel and line set up I had for bass, it was about a 1 in 100 chance of ever getting a fish like this to the kayak.

To make it worse, I made a good landing but got turned over with the kayak once i was on shore with the waves being about 2 seconds apart and the severe drop off at the surf.

I am not sure if this is my last trip of the winter, but after seeing all the birds diving about 1/2 mile from shore when I was ready to leave with everything in the car....I might just have to make another trip!


Sorry for the long read.  Here are a couple of videos that I made in recent trips.





Danny V

I'll take a 1/100 chance to land a BIG fish any days    Thanks for the report and fish porns Danny.

Sahweet report. Keep 'em coming. You make it look so easy.
Are you from Cali? For some reason you look familiar.

Great report, Like Tote said, keep'em coming,

Tell me about those gloves, 

And I'm sure there's a few guys on here that would like to see your camera set up.

Thanks for the excitement.

Sahweet report. Keep 'em coming. You make it look so easy.
Are you from Cali? For some reason you look familiar.

Danny has been with me on at least 3 adventures, twice to Alaska and once to La Paz.  So I'm sure you've seen him in some of the pictures.  He's from NJ.

-Allen

Thanks guys!  Yes,  most of the days this past few weeks it has been pretty easy.  You can see in the video that I was upset that I didn't hook up with a fish on my first drop because the last 15 drops in a row produced a fish.

The gloves I wear are duck hunting gloves that are fleece lined.  I think they are the perfect glove for cold water kayak fishing.  They are very easy to get on and off and I can put my hands all the way in the water without getting wet hands.  Also, an extra dry warm pair inside your dry suit makes the paddle back much more comfortable.

I will past a fe pictures of my camera mount from work tomorrow.  This is the first time I used it with a video camera and I will make it much better over the winter.

Danny V