So Lets Talk Prep

[Deep C]

I figure since the sand box has been raked and repainted I ought to get back to blabberin about what it is we come here for. Fishing info... Again not the Bible of how to. Not the only way. Probably not the best way. But, its for the most part how "I" do it.

With OCWMO comming in a few weeks I'm already full speed ahead doing what I can to prep for it. As with any tournament down the road on my calendar I start off by some simple maintainence of the tackle. In tournies it makes no sense to skip the basics. I don't care wether its a gillion dollar monster or a friendly dock thing... When I say basic I mean just that. No brainer stuff. Fresh line, fresh knots, fresh wind ons, fresh swivels. A good solid clean and lube of all the moving pieces falls into this category too. Loosening the rolers on the guides or the bail rolers on spin reels is something simple but often over looked. Tightening reel clamps and seats is something to do also. No matter how tight it was the vibrations of travel has a way of shakin stuff loose.
Now that easy stuff is done and we can move on. OC for me is tough. Brutal even. I work it freelance and never know what I'm gonna have in the way of a boat or crew. The way I have come to deal with this best is to cover all possible bases... Needless to say I'll carry the standard white marlin goodies to this one. Tld 25's, the dredges, the daisy chains, the circle dink rigs tied on light leader...
But.................
Its become clear to me that despite best efforts explaining what to do and how to do it to anglers not familiar with the fine points of this often demanding sport, they some times don't get it. Another scenario is some don't want to play the white marlin exclusive game. So, its time to broaden the bag of tricks. A set of tuna toys gets packed along. A "hero or zero" blue marlin set gets added. A "Mixed" set fills yet more space in the bag of death.

Then those sets need to be fine tuned to different spreads for differing conditions. Rough water, calm water... Heavy, light... Early light, mid day, afternoon... Even "shallow water" or off the edge sets. Now with as many baits as we run its easy to get confused. My mate can understand my mumblings and usually has some idea of what will be used where and when. The piece together crews though through no failt of their own will find that reading my mind isn't always that easy. So for them I make up a "playbook". I diagram each spread we will likely use. Each bait position, what the bait will be, what rod it will go on, and even which holder it will be fished from are right on paper to help them understand...

Before and during all this "physical prep" is "the other stuff". Now I know youre probably sayin what the hell does Deep mean by that? Well its simple. Start tracking fish and water well in advance. For makos I start straining my eyes on the temp charts fully a month before game time. For other tournies up north that month rule also applies... When I say track water. Go to the temp charts and not only see where it is but mark down where it was too. This allows you to... lets say it together... know where its going to be.
Water in of itself is important but follow the catches. Go to local reporting sites. Hell, right here you can get an outstanding view of whats cooking through reports. Bad reports are just as helpful as the good ones cause you can also figure where they're not going to be and save your time and fuel...
Other stuff can and for me does mean"Knowing how your competition fishes". So if you know boat "a" is catchin and you know how he fishes you'll know not only what hes caught but likely how and where he did it.
Other stuff also means mapping out where you can cover the most lucrative ground in the most efficient way. It allows you to know in advance which spread you'll start with and where and when to switch up to the next fine tune of it... This gets back to what boat youre gonna have under you in a given tourney. Say I have a slow one... I know I'll be short of "target" at lines in time. What I may do to counter that and not waste fishing time still running is to deploy a "mud spread" designed more for the shallow water fish than the ones we're likely to find once we get to the deep. Ita a spread that will allow you to fish straight line quicker than you might once you want to start "working" an area. As a side note this "mud spread" has coughed up some fine "surprise" fish for me through the years so always expect the un expected...

Enough of "me" and how "I" do the leg work before the game. Lets hear from you what I'm leaving out of the discussion. Either by mistake or by design...

[Deep C]

Nobody? Come on guys I'm tryin to engage a little conversation here. Get the ol think tank goin... Plenty of stuff not covered at all. Other stuff covered could use your hints and improvements or thought provoking questions...

[Robja]

Since no one else will chime in I guess I will. First off Deep I am not fishing the types of tournaments that you are as the only one's I fish are King Mackerel Tournaments. All of what you said is good information. When we fished 5 or 6 tournaments a year our prep time was minimal on all but one tournament. Other than checking with friends in the area as to where bait was and where they had been catching fish we did not do much else. The reason is we don't fish a go fast boat that can leave Wrightsville or Southport and run up to fish off Morehead or south to fish off Georgetown and get back for checkin.

We spend more prep time on the US Open KMT since it has guaranteed money and that time of year most of the big kings are close to the beach chasing blues so the playing field is a little more level. The weekend before we replace all the lines and wind on Floro. I always make live bait rigs but I go ahead and make up more as well as 10 or so blue fish rigs with double trailing hooks in case we catch a blue to put down on the downrigger. I go ahead and make up several ribbonfish rigs in the event I can find some fresh caught ribbons. To me one of the most important things we do is only use the rigs one time. I notice alot of guys keep rigs on their reels from the first day and reuse but I don't want to lose a money fish because of a broken rig. The day before the tournament we make sure everything is good to go with the boat and head out late in the day to catch pogies to pen up so we don't have to look for them after checkout.

[teddyp]

I'll bite.

Couple things we do. Label each rod with a number for where it will go 1-6. We also label to larger reels with how much drag based on where the lever is. Good to know when you're on the rod.

Do you use a mullet or Ballyhoo dredge? are you putting anything in front of the Hoo's like a sea witch. Are you using all natural baits of a combo of plastics and natural?

Do you use 2 dredges and 2 squid teasers? What color squid pink or green?

What teasers do you put out if you're BM fishing? Do you do bait and switch or pull all plugs? What’s your favorite plug in which position?

What’s more important to you - seas temp map or info about where the fish have been caught or both?

That should keep you busy for a little. Looking forward to your answers.

[Deep C]

Ted: Good questions...
Our "labeling" is done on the play book drawings. The reels themselves we use fine "lure neck tape" to mark at different poundages of drag...

Our dredges are usually ballyhoo. Some naked and sometimes go with hoo machines or islanders over them. When fishing whites we usually fish two dredges and two chains. You asked about squids. I have opetd to go with a lure I used to make as opposed to squids as such. I make them in pointed and concave versions to offer a change up for various conditions... Up north our colors usually lean toward green mackerel but will go bright chartreuse with pink strip for contrast in low light. In the islands our chains go more to the blues and purples to mimic the more prevalent flying fish there.

When switching over to blues, we usually thin the spread down to seven from nine or even ten in other spreads. We pull the dredges out of the spread and drop down to two teasers which may be larger daisy chains, bowling pins or mud flaps...

Though bait and switch is highly effective it takes experienced crew to work it properly. Unfortunately especially when north I get crews made up mostly of guys who have never marlin fished. With only three days to play it makes it tough to bring em to speed. Most of my marlin spread will be plastic. I do however keep a couple combo meat/plastics in the mix. They can be used if all works well for the bait and switch if the fish requires that type of presentation.
A draw back to combo in association with circle hook is they are a royal pain to bow up wiith. This year we stumbled on one circle though that has made it easier to hook up with at least to some degree. As a matter of fact I will be dragging that hook tomorrow with small lures over top through bonito schools and maybe some mahi to see if I can fine tune dial in their placement in a bait a little more than what I have achieved so far.

The bulk of our blue marlin spreads focus more on sound production rather than just visual. The idea being to beat on that body length lateral line bundle of nerves. Fish can pick up vibrations farther off with it than they can just see. We then place an "odd duck" lure in there that may be different color and often a straight swimmer imparting no "noise". That trick has accounted for a few key fish over the years.

"Favorite" is a tough one... Position wise my inside riggers produce most of the bigger fish we see. I have three that stand out as "favorites" to run in those positions. One is a cavitator (concave face) one is the masher (slant based on Murray brothers LNG 1 or 2) and one is Bazooka (similar to a Bart Brazilliano). Making sound is one thing. Making the right sound is harder by far. Like a harmonica out of tune you can hurt yourself and actually spook fish if the baits aren't working together...

Water.. As mentioned above its not just temp. Its a combination of temp and which parts of that temp are actually producing fish. Ideally it would be nice to go where the fish have been consistent but if I draw a slow boat, I may be forced to hit closer to home areas where good water meets structure and "make my own fish".

So, Ted good questions but we're still missing a lot of what needs to get done before we ever get to the boat...

[teddyp]

One thing that I see jam up a lot fo crews is not being prepair and well rehersed on what to do when a fish enters the pattern and after the hookup.

I really like to have 1 person desiganted to be on the rod whther its a pitchbait rod or on the one that is called out. Then have a secondary person for multiples.

I also like everyone else to know their job. who brings in the teasers, who directs the chair, who leaders the fish (please tell everyone else to stay the **** out of that persons way), who's on the gaff.

Make sure the bucket harness is adjusted to the persons size.

Am I on the right track.

[Agitated88]

One thing that I see jam up a lot fo crews is not being prepair and well rehersed on what to do when a fish enters the pattern and after the hookup.
I really like to have 1 person desiganted to be on the rod whther its a pitchbait rod or on the one that is called out. Then have a secondary person for multiples.
I also like everyone else to know their job. who brings in the teasers, who directs the chair, who leaders the fish (please tell everyone else to stay the **** out of that persons way), who's on the gaff.
Make sure the bucket harness is adjusted to the persons size.
Am I on the right track.

Designate one person to verify everyone has the correct and appropriate fishing license and/or permits, and then designate another person to check that the person you designated to check aforementioned license and/or permits has indeed checked said license and /or permits. Then, before anyone boards the vessel, they must show said license and/or permit, along with at least 2 state issued photo ID's to Capt and mate, before entering vessel.

[Deep C]

Again Ted ... Good to go on your thoughts.
We do what we can to "rehearse". Like I said , more often than not I get "green" crews. They have never marlin fished for the most part and some have never been past the sight of land. To get the "hang" of things though jist doesn't come together quick enough when tournies are short. They see their first fish comming in the spread or take to the air and all too often what they just got taught gets forgotten and they freeze.
I try to see who amongst the crew might have "game" in certain areas and work with that. A problem that crops up frequently in these put together crew trips is rotation order on bites... People forget who's "up" all too often and that slows the program. In the islands the issue isn't so bad. Usually its the boss and one guest and lines are limited to six... My mate and I simplify things by clearing it ourselves in a well orchestrated way that we have dialed in over the last eight or so years.
Funny... Sharking it seems everyone gets their jobs the first time around no matter what experience they might have. That for years has been a well oiled machine and rarely does somebody miss their cue to do their job. So why the issues while marlin fishing? Perhaps its that the boats moving and stuff happens so fast in marlin fishing that they more often than not lock up and forget. Part of it might be engine noise getting in the way of commands... I really don't like to yell and do what I can to talk out commands in an even calm tone... Perhaps I'm not enunciating over the engines clearly enough but "yelling" can cause all kinds of other problems.
So some of the things that can help some are outlined as follows...
One of the things I do like about a heavier blue marlin spread is that there is less confusion. The fish blows up and bows up. If its a small fish or a white (yes they eat blue marlin baits now and then) we can usually leave the boat in gear for a while and calmly get the spread clear... 80Wide holds plenty of string and strong string at that so the pace can be a little more relaxed. Of course if godzilla eats, even that 80w is gonna get small quick but for the most part its a little easier pace and not as much room for rookie human error trying to drop back for the very first time...

Ocean City for me sets up an additional challenge in trying to communicate. A lot of the anglers we get aren't there for the fishing. That comes second. A lot of em are there to party. I try to gather them all together so we can discuss tactics and jobs but all too frequently they are already scupper deep in Orange Crushes or locked in on some thong clad cutie... Another problem is we often have anglers comming and going and some don't show til its go time...
This is where my mate comes in... He's good about staying out of that unfocused fray. I'll go over plans with him then on the run out he can get some one on one time with each angler and explain it to them in turn... Not perfect but better than nothing...

[Deep C]

Aggitated great points in your post too. Today thats more important than ever... I'll tell you what I have already encountered in the last couple years that set me on tilt was a boats owner saying "yes I got it" when he didn't. Luckily we were able to get it the night before. That didn't excuse the "I got it" though... I let him know in no uncertain terms that if he failed to produce it to where I or my mate could see it, at least he would be keeping the pilings company or perhaps the whole boat.

[Deep C]

Come on gang... Whats ol deep leaving out of the prep talk thats gotta get covered... I'll give you a clue... A lot of things...

One we really can't do without... Been glossed past a few times but not dealt with yet... A basic essential. Come on?