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After several half day trips of snorkeling, dolphin watching and 1 hour jigging sessions with a slew of clients this past month, I finally got out for a full day on the water with my crew of hard cores.
The plan was to head 30 miles out in search of some blue water action. With the recent rain and building currents we were confident we could find some dorado, but were really hoping to come across of school of big YFT or a marlin or two.
After an hour or so of search trolling we found a bait school of small bonitas and YFT. I only have 4 larger conventional trolling rods, so I decided to put my 400 gram OTI jig rod paired with a Saragosa and Diawa Boat braid PE8 up in the rocket launcher to run in the shotgun position. For a lure I put a Heru Ulua 150 swimbait rigged with 9/0 jigging master assist hooks on assist cord. I had used this set-up once before in the trolling spread and was impressed with the wide "S" curved action the lure would make while trolling.
10 minutes into trolling around the bait school it happens...Saragosa is singing, blue marlin is jumping, and the captain has the throttle down to ensure a good hookset.
After putting on a brief but spirited display of jumping and splashing up top he went deep on me and dug down hard a few times. The 400 gram rod was a real pleasure to use with this fish. I had plenty of lifting power, and quite honestly, using a lighter, shorter set-up was much more comfortable than cranking down on a broomstick and 50 wide. The Saragosa didn't do so well however. The drag was fine, but something in the gearing quickly went bust...felt like the gears were stripped. By the end of the fight the spool was only engaging and gaining line about 15 percent of the time that it should've been. The reel is currently on it's way back to shimano...once I get it back I'll sell it and pony up for the Stella that is long overdue.
I had the leader on the rod in the first couple of minutes, but didn't have it ready for wiring until a half hour later. Unfortunately the 130 Varivas shock leader parted as we were wiring the fish so we weren't able to bill it and get the victory shot with the swimbait and jig rod in hand...will probably upgrade to 200 lb. next time. It was a shame to lose the lure as well...hopefully Kil has a few more in stock as I'll be placing another order soon. We estimated the fish at around 200#.
We finished the day casting small swim baits, dropping jigs, and slow trolling live tunas around a giant palm frond that was holding lots of bait and a bunch of bull dorado. Despite being everywhere the dorado were only biting sparingly. We finished off the day going 3 for 8 on bulls and also pulling the hook on another small blue that ate a slow trolled tuna. We also had two wahoo cut-offs on the jigs, and caught a 5 lb. yellowfin or bonito on just about every other single drop.
We also performed a good ocean Samaritan task by freeing a turtle caught up in some long line gear.
All in all a pretty good day in Costa Rica!
- Cassidy
www.sierpedelpacifico.com
"River and Mountain View Homesites with Boat Slips From $40K"
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Originally Posted by Sea Draggin
