My first Warsaw Grouper

[Petoven]

Hello all: My friend Sea Draggin invited me to join this forum to share our Jigging and Popping experiences,by far the most exhilarating methods to catch fish. To begin with, following is the last remarkable narration ouf our last catch in our waters:
We were exploring the deeper ledge of a bank in the central coast of Venezuela when my jig got snagged in the bottom in about 350 ft of water. After a while trying to save the lure, i decided to brake the line, losing about 300 ft of it and of course, the jig. I was dissapointed, but at least we knew we were in rocky bottom, a magnet for big fish down there. I have always a second weapon ready, a Jigging Master 250 grs rod with 600 yds of PE 5. I normally use this rod for shalower waters, but this was my only option ,so i imediately went down again, this time with a shimano flatside 280 grs jig. The slow drift in a calm day had moved us a little deeper, we were now in the 440 ft range. My jig got down to bottom and as soon i felt the rocks, i suspended it about ten ft above, not wanting to lose a second lure. In a fraction of time i felt a violent strike and my rod bent at full. Knowing i was very near the bottom i tried to stop the fish applying more drag in my old Torium reel, a veteran of thousand wars. But the fish was strong enough to run, and i heard a bad sound from the gears of the reel. I was lucky to have the drift in may favor since i looked again to our sounder and we were now in 480 ft, leaving the fish far from its liar. Two or three more short runs, with the reel mantaining its integrity and i was able to control the animal, it would be shaking its head from now all the way up to the boat. It was a heavy slow retrieval with us not knowing what kind of bottom dweller it was. But when it begun to white several feets away from the boat i knew it was a big grouper.
I'm glad nothing failed this time, these animals are known to destroy equipment, brake lines, knots and bend hooks.
It resulted to be a Warsaw Grouper,not common in our waters, weighted 35 Kg (77#), the first one for our boat and the trophy fish of the weekend!!!!




Regards and wait for more!!!

[Joey Herring]

NICE FISH!!! Welcome to the forum!!

[shoefish]

Those pictures are so great- that is an absolute hog. Have you been back to the same spot since then?

[paul708]

welcome to the site.
fish pics are great.
we went to venezuela for marlin and sails, the bottom fishing looks very nice.

[Sea Draggin]

Welcome Petoven!!! Glad you joined the forum.

I can gaurantee if I go to venezuela that I will be jigging some. Although the trolling bite might be awesome, catching groupers like that on the jig would be hard to resist.

If you get a chance, share the other picture of your really BIG grouper, for those that might not have seen it.

[clt_capt]

Welcome aboard. That's one nice grouper.

[JuniorJigs]

Welcome aboard man, some awesome pictures and a really nice fish. The flat side live squid glow jig is my money jig. I have had a lot of tuna action off of that jig and even a couple mahi mahi

[Petoven]

Thanks for your comments. Shoefish, we tried to return to the site last week,but couldn't get there due high winds and seas.
Here is the other grouper Sea Draggin mentioned. Coincidentially, it was caught in August last year, the second day after the new moon, same moon day as was caught the Warsaw. You can see it is another area near shore, it was at 205 ft deep.It weigthed 48 Kg (105.8 #) very near from world record for the species, any tackle.
You bet where i'm going to be that day in August next year!!!

[Nauti Natured]

Awesome!!!! I look forward to your future reports. Welcome!!!