Marlin Spear Thread

[tom@marlinstar]

Hey guys...I asked Jer to remove the thread regarding the Marlin spearing. As it was a second generation email I felt there were some good points brought up that I hadn't considered before posting them.

During this very serious time in our fishing industry, the last thing that I wanted was to have second hand pix distorted and turned into fuel against a number of industries.

Thanks ~ Tom

[Ace1st]

I can respect that.

Thanks for the glimpse!

[giantfan]

Understood.

It was a cool picture.

[Agitated88]

Smart move Tom...

[BahamaLure]

I was still trying to figure out the mechanics of how much force the marlin would have had to hit the hose with in order to drive the bill that far through it, but by the time I was casting doubt on it the visual flaws of the photos were pointed out by other eagle eyed members.

I served a few years on supertankers and have had experience with those type of hoses, they are built to withstand as much trauma as possible for obvious reasons. I would be surprised if a .45 could penetrate the walls.

[tom@marlinstar]

The angler who sent me the photos...and he would be more a kin to a real life "man vs. wild" type has always been a straight shooter with me. This guy spends more time in remote areas on water and land that he basically is able to contact the outside world every 2 months.

The fact that the email was sent to him and then forwarded to me was enough for me to trust the pix. In reality I had them yanked solely on the fact that someone could have taken the pix and used them negatively against a handful of industries. I have friends in the oil drilling industry so the debate regarding the position of the bill/hose could have been figured out quickly. I will see if I can find out the facts regarding the pictures and relay them back to SFC.

[Roddy Hays]

As an aside, I can remember years ago of a famous picture (I think in one of Goadby's books) of a bale of rubber with a marlin bill through it. When someone attempted to replicate the feat with a projectile from a fire-arm, they found they couldn't do it.

The bale of rubber was over 24" thick I would seem to recall, and the bill had gone right through it. There was some intrigue over the bio-mechanics of a marlin's head and bill that would allow it to do this.

[Asylum]

Tommy, I'm stateside again. Gimme a call this afternoon. Might have some input.

[Big Jay]

As an aside, I can remember years ago of a famous picture (I think in one of Goadby's books) of a bale of rubber with a marlin bill through it. When someone attempted to replicate the feat with a projectile from a fire-arm, they found they couldn't do it.

The bale of rubber was over 24" thick I would seem to recall, and the bill had gone right through it. There was some intrigue over the bio-mechanics of a marlin's head and bill that would allow it to do this.

I was watching a video the other day of a pack of Stripey's feeding on a bait ball of sardines. They slowed down the video at certain points. One point, a stripey punched its bill completely through a 4" sardine in the water.

Now lets think about that. Tiny sardine -> 200 lb. marlin. In the water, with nothing to back the sardine against. Now THAT is sharp.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2kQF7eWkIs

[Captain Fred Archer]

Jay,

Thanks for putting that incredible video up...it's just great! I didn't know that it was produced by an old Cabo friend, Mike McGettin, a real force in trying to fight the terrible commercial pressure on the fisheries down there until the credits at the end.

I have witnessed those types of feeding binges many times myself from up in my tuna tower and in spite of so many sightings, they still took my breath away, and so did the video. Those striped marlin a flat-out beautiful when they are excited, feeding, and lit up like that, aren't they? And seeing big bunches of them going nuts like that is truly mind-bending and I was usually a lot happier sitting up in the tower and watching the show, rather than being down in the 'pit, hanging onto a fish.

A couple of additional observations. First, that whale was a finback, a whale that is said to be the second biggest of them all (to the blue whale. Some say that that finbacks get even bigger.) Finbacks are "shy" whales that, unlike most others, won't come anywhere near a boat, in spite of being quite common down there. Those shots were the first I have ever seen of them that up close and personal. Another thing, and the video shows this, they aren't filter feeders, like most of the other whales. Instead, they feed on fin bait and squid. As a result, they are very, very fast swimmers and I have actually seen them greyhounding after fast bait up top both in Cabo and Venezuela! It's actually hard to believe that you are seeing a huge whale when you see them doing that...they can really haul ass and get air!

It's funny how the guy doing the dialog says that the whale doesn't get a single bait when the vid clearly shows him gobbling down a whole pod of them at one point.

It's clear from the vid that marlin don't spear their prey. It is an accident that happens while they are harassing bait balls and as you can see from the tape, a marlin with a bait speared on its nose can be in serious trouble because of all of the other predators grabbing single baits and there he is with one stuck on his nose. There's no way that the marlin can take that bait off its bill to eat it. It's far more likely that some other fish will go after and take it from him before he can shake it off, which is exactly what happened in that one part...was that a wahoo that did that? I'd have to look again to see for sure.

Finally, watching marlin and other fish feeding on meatballs was what got me thinking about and then building spreaderbars for marlin and using them. I'm glad I did, too, because it works great and mimics what actually goes on in those situations. The marlin almost always attack from the rear of the pod and those attacks are attempts to spook single targets out of the school that can clearly be seen and easily be taken.

I have made no secret of my love for bait & switch fishing here and have noted that it was how we fished the vast majority of the time. Just looking at the marlin and how they are attracted to and how they attack pods of bait and instantly gobble down any that are separated from the pod should say everything there is to say about why I believe that bait & switch fishing with TeaserBars is such a great way to catch marlin and everything else. And the "sight bites", right in your lap? Truly awesome.

Thanks again for putting that vid up, Jay. I'm going to get in touch with Mike and thank him for producing it.

Oh, my, then I'm going to think back to all of those times when we had whole packs of stripers all lit up and climbing all over the TeaserBars with me up top, yelling, "Pitch that *****! Yah, hoookkupp! Pitch another one! Yahhhh! Gotcha, girl!" And so on, and so on, and so on.

Oh yeah!