While the official tournament results are not in – word from boats competing in the Cairns BlueWater 6kg Tournament was that a great time was had by all. As I mentioned on Saturday, it’s great to see some little black marlin featuring in the results.

The tournament was won on countback by Rohan Cross and his team on board Nickers. A great effort – scoring one for the little guys who were in the under 7.5 metre class!  Second place was taken out by Captain Chris “Sharky” Miles and team on board Kanahoee followed in third place by Steve and the team on board Hellraiser all with one tag.  Photos of Rohan with his black marlin and later, his trophy on Nickers above.  And also a big congrats to Emily Poulter on board Think Big who took out the Heaviest Other Gamefish on Day 1 as well as Champion Junior Overall with her 11.5kg tuna.  Thank you Paul for the report!

And how’s this for an unseasonal report. Dave Tucker fishing on Climax out of Port Stephens yesterday caught this stripey which was 2.3 metres short length trolling on the Carpark. Dave says the water was 20 degrees and another boat scored a nice dolly – thanks Dave!

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Final Results

A total of 564 sails were raised for 224 tags as well as 71 marlin for 13 tags.  (Points are allocated 1000pts for marlin and 500pts for sailfish.)  Fish Broome came home champions with a massive 19,500 points – 39 sailfish tags (no martians) – four sailfish clear of Game On with 17,500 points. In the 6-7.5 metre category Cluster Ducks were champions with 11,500 points and in the under 6m class, Shags won with 4,000 points.  Steve Ring on Fish Broome was Champion Angler (8,000 points / 16 sails) and Champion Female, Danielle Cox with 3,000 points.  Champion Junior went to Eric Locke with 5,000 points which included his first ever marlin.

It’s interesting to note that the number of marlin raised each year is increasing (I put this table together from previous tournament reports on the blog).  We saw something similar at Cape Bowling Green when it transitioned from a sailfish fishery, to a juvenile black marlin playground.  (Although recent year trends indicate in might be swinging back the other way?)

No rich fish were recaptured unfortunately!

Photo share: Adam sent me one of Rhino’s photos from Iona’s stripey the other day speeding across the surface above.  And Eddie’s put a pic up on the BMFB Facebook page of his solo marlin at Ningaloo Reef (WA). Thanks guys!

Unrelated, Capt. Laurie shared this video with us and I laughed so hard I had to share it here:

[video type="snotr" id="5987" width="400" height="330"]

I’m not sure if it’s a set up or not, but if you can survive the first few scenes of the more ‘obvious’ bloopers and the terrible soundtrack, it has us in stitches!  Bill Dance needs a helmet with face mask and full body suit!

Thanks to Barabara for the results:

Champion angler went to Capt. Kim Andersen’s wife Natalie on New Moon on a count back, for her sailfish on 10kg. The runner up was Nicky Gilbert from Townsville on Bill Collector (with the same points for her sailfish tag). The Champion team went to Bill Collector with added points from weighed game fish. Look Sharp‘s sailfish was caught on heavier line but still came third overall in the Calcutta.

Barbara’s boat (5.2m Kevlacat The Edge) was lucky to get champion team under 7m despite having to return to port at 12.30 due to Sharon’s illness with a hot mackerel bite in the morning (6) and came overall 4th.

Kelly Barnes fishing with us on KEKOA won heaviest gamefish with her 25.2 kg yellowfin on 10kg.  Congrats Kelly!

There were 37 boats entered in the tournament a great result. As I mentioned yesterday, Chloe Albert on New Moon fought a 200lb black marlin on 10kg line for two hours before the line broke. Bad luck, Chloe! Some more great game fish were weighed including a 22.7kg wahoo for Kasey Koy fishing on Cool Runnings.

Rob “Smithy” Smith reports from the weekend’s Hervey Bay Game Fishing Classic where he was fishing with his Sunshine Coast Club team on Matt Wallace’s 36′ Riviera Fish Whisperer with David Granville on the sticks.  Rob reports that only one of each species of marlin were caught amongst the fleet of 19 competing boats.  The first fish of the tournament was a blue marlin for Wayne Finlay’s 40′ White Cap Keneka, followed by a stripey for the team on Fish Whisperer (photo). Stubbie Holder, a 680 Haines got a juvenile black marlin and the eventual winner, White Horse II, a 20′ Pride got a sailfish plus associated field goals to win from Fish Whisperer on count back. Rob says that conditions were tough for the Saturday and Sunday of the tournament but good on the Friday.

Thanks Smithy for the report and to John Dwyer for the beautiful pics!

Kim has also uploaded some more video from on board Askari. Its a second highlight clip from the 14 day charter, showing the five marlin tagged and released on a single day between Sea Baby IV, Dreamin’ On and Askari.

KEKOA is fishing this week with guests Mark, John, Breezy, Paul and Jen from the United States on the mothership Emerald Lady and I’m told everyone is having a wonderful time so far despite the weather.

I am spending the next four days in Cairns and rejoining the boys on board on Friday – hopefully reports will be as per usual in the meantime although I’m hearing that it has been a fair bit quieter the last couple of days. Hopefully the fishing will pick up again as we get further away from the moon.

I will have more to put up here later today.