Just sitting there reading this is not going to put any fresh fish in your larder, nor is it taking you anywhere close to the thrill of hearing a reel scream off. A sad situation made even more sad by the fact that many an angler will find themselves ashore this weekend as it seems most of them have mothers of some description. And looking even further ahead, the traditional start to the summer season and its requisite picnicking can also put a dent in piscatorial matters.

So just what is being missed? Well, truth to tell, just about everything. The offshore action has been pretty good with almost all the summer migratory species having been accounted for. The exceptions thus far seem to be the billfish species but that is probably because no right-minded angler is looking for a marlin at this stage of the season where some fresh wahoo or tuna is the order of the day.

Some boats have even been lucky enough to catch mahi mahi, which are normally most common in tropical or near tropical waters. Given that the offshore is only starting to take warming up seriously this is an encouraging aspect of the overall situation and what the future holds.

In a similar vein, the waters around the Banks seem to be teeming with bait species. Schools of robins and what appear to be mackerel or other smaller tuna-like fish are obviously important food sources for the great pelagic hunters. There is no way a school of wahoo, tuna or other game fish are simply going to swim by these sort of bait concentrations and carry on out into what is often an oceanic desert surrounding this island.

Even more exciting and, hopefully, indicative of great things to come, has been the sighting of schools (for want of a better word) of flying squid. This has often been referred to as “candy for tuna” but remain something of an enigma themselves. What has taken people a while to realise is that the sheets of rainbow-hued creatures that come shooting out of the briny’s surface are in fact juvenile squid using their speed and the jet-like ability to soar out of the water to escape would-be predators. As they become larger, they tend to stay deeper in the ocean where, no doubt, the predators have a means of exploiting them as well. So, what is seen on the surface may only be the tip of the iceberg, as it were, but very much a good harbinger of more to come.

Last Sunday saw the two IGFA-recognised angling clubs on Island pit themselves against each other in the Bermuda Fishing Clubs Annual Tournament. A one-of-a-kind event, this tournament relies on the aggregate number of points scored on each line test by each club. Each club was allowed four teams which meant that there were a total of eight boats involved. While this meant that a wide variety of techniques and tactics could be employed and a lot of ocean covered, by unfortunate circumstance due to an injury one of the Blue Waters Club’s boats was forced to withdraw from the competition.

The weigh-in featured a rather remarkable, both in terms of quality and quantity, variety of fish, all recognised as game species. Some boats had concentrated on trolling and had been rewarded by wahoo, the majority of which were in the 30 to 40-pound bracket with one notable specimen clocking in at over 51 pounds.

Chumming effort was productive of good numbers of yellowfin tuna, most of which were school-sized as might have been expected but there was a larger fish weighed in at 48 pounds. One boat had a remarkable collection of Almaco jacks (bonitas) all taken on very light line and contributing copious points to Sea Horse’s total. Rounding out the overall variety were some stunning yellowtail snappers, an often-overlooked species that can also be taken in numbers significant enough to affect the light line scores.

As it turned out, the Blue Waters Anglers received a thumping by the Sea Horse Anglers, a feat not usually seen in this event where the honours of each of the line classes are usually split. Overall Sea Horse had a total of 6,334.75 points to Blue Waters’ 1,376.91 points, taking all five line test categories and winning the BFCAT Shield. One ray of sunshine for the Blue Waters group was the Neil Jones Award for the high point fish on 12lb test line which was won by Roddy Nesbitt, senior with a nice 26.6-pound yellowfin which amassed 491.36 points.

Despite the results, the camaraderie between the clubs was palpable and the stories ranged from the hard luck to the fanciful. Most notable were the usual "one that got away", in this case a hundred pounder (maybe….), and then the assertion that the fish that rolled on the kite bait was a big yellowfin, well over a hundred pounds, rapidly growing to over 200 pounds in another account and then being a suspected bluefin tuna. Sadly, no evidence to show of such creatures was available at the weigh station.

It is this sort of recollection that provides the basis for more anglers to go in search of that ultimate quest – the so-called uncatchable fish. Day after day, year after year, myriad anglers ply their trade on the briny with raised hopes and knowing that their satisfaction lies in Tight Lines!!!