Any fish will bite if you've got good bait
-- Singer Taj Mahal
This week's amazing fishing news comes from North Carolina's Outer Banks, where skipper Arch Bracher took live-bait fishing to a new level and wound up with a huge blue marlin to show for it.
Bracher was enjoying a late June, blue-sky day in the Gulf Stream off Hatteras, surveying the action from the flying bridge of his 53-footer, Pelican, as a party of charter anglers led by Jesse Waltz of Virginia Beach caught yellowfin tuna and dolphins (mahi-mahi). Suddenly, from the depths of the cobalt sea arose a monster.
"I could see black in the water," said Bracher, perennially one of the top-producing skippers at Oregon Inlet Fishing Center. "I told my mate, Jordan Blount, 'That's either a pilot whale or a big blue marlin.' "
The big fish was chasing a smaller fish and the smaller one was scared. "We had hooked a yellowfin tuna about 30 pounds and the big one was following it in. The tuna ran under the boat to get away. He must have tucked himself right up under the propeller because we lost sight of him."
Bracher said once or twice a summer, he sees a big blue marlin try to eat a tuna or dolphin that's been hooked. Usually, he's ready to try to exploit the situation with a "pitching rig," a big, size 12/0 hook on heavy tackle suitable for fighting a giant fish. The idea is to get the tuna or dolphin in the boat quickly, hook it on the heavier tackle and pitch it back out to the billfish before it loses interest. It's a long shot, but it can be done.
But it's still early in the season, and Bracher didn't have a pitching rig organized. So he did the unthinkable and scrambled down from the control tower to put one together on the fly. He dug a hook and leader from a drawer and grabbed a heavy rod with 80-pound-test line from an overhead rack. He hastily assembled the rig and was ready. The tuna was still hiding.
Bracher nudged the boat in gear and out popped the tuna with a hungry blue marlin still in hot pursuit. Before the marlin could make a move, Blount gaffed the tuna and hauled it aboard. The two veterans ran the 12/0 hook into the live fish and pitched it back over, but the tuna ran back under the boat. What now?
"I sent Jordan up to the bridge and had him nudge the boat forward a little. When he did, the tuna popped out again and the marlin was still there waiting, and that's when he ate it."
Waltz, the charterer, was strapped into the fighting chair. Bracher was pleased to have a strong, 240-pounder in the seat of honor. He set the hook on the big fish, popped the rod into the gimbaled rod-holder and Waltz bent to the task. The battle was on.
Here the story gets complicated. When the marlin struck, it apparently missed. As the big fish ran astern, Bracher said he could see the tuna. It wasn't in the marlin's mouth, but dragging alongside. The marlin evidently was foul-hooked and had become entangled in the leader, a length of thick, 500-pound-test monofilament that connects the running line to the hook.
