My Biggest ever Snapper - 27 April

[Epicskwid]

Today's plan was to target Kingfish and Gurnard. I had seen some being caught on the beaches so I thought a few would be hanging around still. I got on the water nice and early at 6.30 and began searching for some baitfish. After making it off the front of the flat rock. I found the bait and caught a few mackerel with no trouble.

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I quickly deployed one onto my 24kg rod and started to slow troll it. Not 2 minutes later the bait got whacked and the clicker leapt to life. Yep fish on. Not any runs and weight. No way! a bloody John Dory.

He wasn't getting off. The poor mackerel was in the stomach and the 8/0 hook had somehow been taken all the way in too. My first ever for Hawkes Bay. Incredible start.

After picking up the rest of my live mackerel i headed offshore to my Kingfish spot, No bait out here or any sign of the greenback hoodlums. Gurnard time... There were some nice fishy marks hard on the bottom so i chucked the anchor down and set up shop. 1 mackerel swimming and one ledger onto the bottom. After setting up a nice tuna chunk trail, a few fish started to turn up. First were some Kahawai, then a couple panny Snapper.

Then a nice 43cm Trevally which gave me a great scrap.

Next to the party were some big marks on the bottom.

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It took some time before my bait got smashed and i was on the tow. This fish was clearly a Snapper with huge headshakes and bulldozing runs. It would take as much as i would gain. After getting it near the kayak it fell off for whatever reason, long range release. about the 3kg mark anyway. The same thing happened on the next fish which was even bigger. Estimated over the 4kg mark and shook the hook out near the yak.

The big Snapper marks continued on the bottom , but none seemed to be interested in my baits for the time being. I put out a few chunks of tuna and this fired them up. Bang, another enormous hit and this one felt like Kahawai.

I was quickly reassured ''I'm no Kahawai'' after it dragged my kayak around and began towing me the opposite direction. This fish had no intention of making long runs. I would gain a few metres and then the fish would take it back to the bottom. After a short time i worked the fish up and got a glimpse.

Into the net it went.

A 6.2kg 70 cm Snapper. I did not think it was going to weigh that much out on the water. The true weigh became apparent on the beach. Astonishing.

Later i caught and released a beautiful 3.5kg Snapper which fought extremely hard , well deserved freedom.

Hometime with a very very packed chill pod.

Full Video of the action:

[Epicskwid]

More Photos..
A few things to note... The lack of Kingfish and Gurnard. Both of which were the target species! I fished live mackerel all day to no avail on the Kingfish. No Gurnard turned up in my chunk trail either! One funny thing was my John Dory was totally blind in one eye, and had no pupil whatsoever just a scar. On closer inspection i found that he still had an eye but it was damaged and pushed well back inside the skull. I can't believe i'm starting to get used to catching these fish !

[Al]

What an epic mission!!! Quality spot that one! That snapper would have given you a fun ride!

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[Epicskwid]

the funny thing is i've never had a run of snapper like that on this spot ! Typically i catch Kahawai and Gurnard.

[Blazer60]

Nice work!