What is your WAHOO spread?

**Patudo** · 09-25-2008 08:40 AM

James,

That's an incredible catch. Congratulations!

I was going to ask you what factors make you choose between trolling lures and live baiting. Is there any particular time of season, or current direction/strength, intensity of fishing pressure from the fleet, depth of water or structure over which the fish are found, or anything else that suits one technique better than the other?

Regards

P

**Captain Fred Archer** · 09-25-2008 11:53 PM

Wound up James,

As one who really loves his wahoo, all I can say is "Gulp!" What a massive pile of wahoo!

Best we ever did on them was down in Cabo, when we caught 28. I thought that was a pretty big deal until I saw your numbers. Wow!

We actually released a lot of wahoo on the really good days, something that can get pretty dicey and slicey if you don't know your stuff. Fortunately for me and them and our clients, my guys were really good at it.

Why did we release a lot of wahoo? First and foremost I guess was the fact that it was illegal to sell them and if you got caught, it could cost you your boat. I'd have taken 'em all if it were legal. I strongly believe that rod and reel commercial fishing is a good form of commercial fishing.

I had a two ton, refrigerated, slushed hold that could handle all that we could catch, but only a few fish would go in it, again because of the restrictions. And some were real horses that would have fetched a pile of pesos, but since the law forbade it, we released many of those big ones. On the 28 fish day three of the fish were over a buck, but because of the rules we let two of the big ones go and kept one and three other "regulation" sized ones. It just didn't seem right to kill those big breeders for a couple of tourists who would be more than happy with just part of the yield of one of those smaller models.

Once again, congrats on that awesome catch.

**Wound Up James** · 09-26-2008 11:28 AM

Just saw the recent questions guys....and the wind is blowing...i'll try to get answers and photos up this weekend....

**One Ton Tomato** · 10-20-2008 03:30 PM

Originally Posted by Captain Fred Archer

I ran wahoo-specific charters down in Cabo and I'm pretty sure that we were the only boat to do that. And we caught 'em, too. And some were real horses. This is the home of the former, 153# and current 184# world records. Lots of wahoo down there year-round and just like anywhere else in the world, there are a lot of different ways to catch them, depending on where they are, time of year, what they are feeding on, etc. We had to learn about and master them all in order to consistently catch plenty of 'hoo, and we did, including some techniques that I see mentioned here and a lot of others that I see that aren't.

Which is why I have written and am just about to publish "Secrets of the Wahoo Fishing Pros", a book dedicated solely to catching wahoo the many different ways that work. Everything is covered, from regular trolling speeds, to fast speeds, to high speed trolling with and without sinkers (I am not a big, heavy sinker fan), to downrigger fishing, to planers using artificial lures, natural, and even live baits.

There is way, way too much in the book to even start posting here, so all I''m going to do is show you what turned out to be my absolute best, all-around wahoo catcher of them all, the WahooBar and show you how we bridle most of our live and many of our dead baits. These WahooBars turn surface and near-surface wahoos inside out, and they catch everything else, too. There's a little, pocket rocket of a WahooBar in the first picture, along with some victims. The second picture shows how the chasebaits on these bars are rigged - all-pro and bulletproof. I am also showing a wahoo-chawed and retired Marauder plug. I used to fish them a lot, but quit using them completely because there are lots of better lures for catching wahoos, ones that don't get out of tune and run all weird and wild on you all of a sudden. Man, I hated trying to re-tune one of those suckers standing in the rear of the cockpit in the hot tropics, bending loops and dropping the plugs back in to see if I'd fixed them and then having to repeat that over and over and often never getting them runing right again. The one that you are looking at is one of the last ones that I fished with and retired after it started running bad and I couldn't fix it.

I would like to get this book as well as your earlier wahoo book... how do i do that?