ONLY someone totally oblivious to the happenings on the angling front can fail to realise that a momentous summer season is in full swing. With game fishing giving the big headlines to big boats and giant fish and fishing gossip not far behind, what often goes unsaid is that the fishing just does not get much better than it is at the moment. Now is the time to take advantage of warm, sunny calm days that scream out to anglers to come on out and revel in these happy circumstances.There has finally been an easing up of the nothing short of fantastic wahoo run. Fish are still being caught but nothing like the amazing hauls made in recent weeks. The small game is providing plenty of varied action which certainly keeps even the greenest amateur gainfully occupied. Even beginners putting in any blue water effort are having some positive results. Nearer shore, small boaters are finding snappers and other small game in good numbers. Shore fishermen have plenty of opportunities for bonefish and palometa while the die-hard bridge or dock fisherman finds the grey snappers offering plenty of challenge.

Just about the only disappointment stems from the relative lack of yellowfin tuna activity. This may well be a bit of a time and place thing. There are tuna out there and, on some days, they do please. As the summer settles down and the Bermuda-Azores high pressure cell starts to dominate the weather scene, bringing calm, consistent conditions, the yellowfins will start to please in the usual fashion. Largely ignored but nonetheless willing to please, blackfin tuna are available in good numbers, offering great light tackle thrills.

As has been expected for the last decade or so, the billfish action is heating right up. This probably has a lot more to do with the combined effort of local and visiting boats than it has to do with anything different that the fish are doing. The fact of the matter is that it was not that long ago that local boats used to drag heavy gear across the Churn on their way to the Banks and back. Otherwise it was stick to the edge of the drop off where wahoo and tuna were to be found. Of course, every so often a blue invaded the so-called shallow water and provided unsuspecting anglers with a surprise.

We have now reached a situation where there a number of local boats that have caught their full of wahoo and are ignoring the chumming possibilities, opting instead to spend all day trolling the open blue briny in search of blue marlin. Perhaps almost too obviously those boats are here for the sole purpose of establishing new marks for large blue marlin and their respective season tallies. No question about it, Bermuda boasts big blues and they are accessible, in a comfortable, safe and friendly location. The latter part of that can not be said of a lot of other venues that produce good quality marlin.

Looking ahead, the first of the near month-long marlin events gets under way early in week with the Bermuda Blast tournament convening and getting ready to fish the Blue Marlin World Cup as part of the event. Although the Blast is a release tournament, there are provisions for keeping a blue marlin large enough to qualify for the World Cup (500 pounds).

There have actually been a few developments in the World Cup that have improved local response to the event. Not least of these is the organisers finally recognising that the whole world is not subject to US tax laws. This now means that if a non-US boat wins the event then the payout will not include a tax withholding. Great news for the Bermuda boats participating in the festivities.

The other rule which was controversial was that each boat was only entitled to boat one fish. It seems that this is no longer the case as it is not mentioned in the rules which are available on line at http://www.bluemarlinworldcup.com/rules.html. While it was an attempt at billfish conservation, some anglers felt disenfranchised if, say, they caught a qualifying fish early in the day. Once boated they could not boat a second or third fish. Now if after catching a qualifying fish, they latch onto a sea monster, the latter fish was not eligible for entry. The current rules say that the minimum size effectively increases as catches are reported. So, at the start of the fishing day the minimum might be 500 pounds, as fish are caught and reported that weight may move upward. Tournament rules now require that fish smaller than the heaviest reported catch be released.

While the change to the rules limiting each boat to a maximum of one fish per day was a laudable conservation effort, it really does not work and failed to take into consideration the remoteness of a large number of boats not only catching at least one fish over 500 pounds but also being able to improve on this feat. With something like the 100 plus boats entered this year (that is a lot of cash at stake in this winner take all event with a basic $3000 entry fee), probably only a small percentage will catch a fish with an even smaller fraction catching at least one fish over the minimum weight. The bottom line is that there probably will not be more than a handful of fish brought to the weigh-scales.

Again, this year, Bermuda has to be in with a good chance of posting the winner. Despite the competition being offered by some of the other hot-spot locales, right now the Bermuda bite is about as good as it ever gets and there have been plenty of nice fish, raised, hooked or caught. In the last few days at least three fish estimated at between 500 and 750 pounds have been caught and a large number of other big fish seen. The effort next week will almost doubtlessly see a potential winner boated.

Not to be forgotten is the Bermuda Blast which might play second fiddle internationally to the World Cup but is a premier local event which favours the team that can accrue the most points; so a bunch of ineligible World Cup fish could spell victory in the Blast. Exciting days ahead! Something which is a little different but perhaps attributable to the late trend being experienced this year is the number of white marlin offshore. Many boats have reported action from this species and this, of itself, is kind of strange. The more usual pattern is for the whites to show up along with the spring wahoo run and then to thin out, gradually giving way to the blue marlin with that species becoming the dominant one. At the moment, there simply seem to be more of these about than one might expect. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with this, it is unfortunate that most of the whites being hooked are falling to heavy tackle meant for bigger things. This means that one of the truly great light tackle fish is being denied an opportunity to put on one of its stellar aerial performances that make it a sought-after species in other jurisdictions. Sadly, boats interested in big blues consider whitey to be a bit of a nuisance. Worse yet, local anglers eschew light tackle even when pursuing smaller game such as wahoo or tuna.

Departing slightly from the strict billfishing scene, although Capt. “Bounce” Barnes Shakedown had its fair share of blue marlin action, the excitement came from trolling for wahoo. To paint the picture, a wahoo strike resulted in a wahoo coming to the boat having been speared right through — the only candidate for such an affliction had to be a marlin. A while later, another wahoo strike resulted in only a small portion of the fish making it to the boat as a mako lurking in the area decided to exercise its tax rights. Taken together, it certainly was not a good time to slip over the side for a bit of swimming and, given past history, the mako is likely to put a dent into the wahoo and tuna fishing in the vicinity for the next little while — after all, why leave a nice source of food with people contributing to the mayhem by slowing down fish so that they can be easily stolen. That puts a bit of a new twist into Tight lines!!!