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BMFB: Weekly Sked July 20

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A story from Towcam’s John Faulkner that he’d like to call–”Shut up and listen!” John took his boat Five Star out from the Gold Coast seaway with just him and a mate on board for their usual Sunday, to get some towcam vision. John reports “Calm crisp weather, the SST charts showing good water temp at 80m we arrived to find good bait mid-water. After a quick drop and just one huge slimy, we decided to pull lures. (After listening to GCGFC guest speaker Capt. Ross McCubbin recently on striped marlin techniques.) We scanned with the 360deg sonar for bigger schools, found a good patch of bait stacked up high in the water and marked a few large fish so we pulled up and let the lures sink and pulled them into the bait. Double hook up striped marlin!
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On the West Coast: The Broome Billfish Classic is over and Broome GFC president Jeff Cooper reports that they had their challenges with the weather. Over 106mm of rain fell during the week’s competition and on one day the temperature barely reached 18 degrees (not quite the warm sunshine competitors are used to!) As for the fishing, sailfish numbers were down a third but they raised twice as many marlin. Significant catches include a 180kg range black marlin on 10kg for a junior angler which was tagged and released. Full report to come.
On the East Coast: the upcoming Townsville Billfish Bonanza and Yorkey’s Knob Light Tackle Tournament (members only) should finally give us some indication if the little black marlin have arrived in the north. Read more about these tournaments on the new Tournament Calendar page.

Another year, another Blue Marlin World Cup over! And congrats to the first (although still unofficial) repeat winner, Happy Hooker in Cape Verde who boated a blue marlin at 1097lb! For those not familiar with how the BMWC works, boats from all over the globe, fishing on July 4 (their timezone) compete for the biggest blue marlin above the qualifying weight of 500lbs. It’s interesting to watch the different timezones come into play. Once again in 2010 our part of the Pacific was represented by the team on Ultimate Lady fishing out of Vanuatu—fishing in the same time zone as Kona and were some of the last to compete. But fortunately for the team on Happy Hooker, they set the bar pretty high! Congrats to Capt. Berno Niebuhr and angler Chris Brand who I understand was the same angler to reel in the winning fish on Happy Hooker in 2006. Thanks to @BlueMarlinWC.
Steve Tatham reports there are good numbers of billfish around on the bait balls at the moment at Dampier promising another cracker tournament (if the WIND would quit as its been blowing!) 2009 produced 297 sails and 56 black marlin. Tournament runs at the end of the month.

Capt. Darren “Biggles” Haydon has up-sized for the 2010 season and will be at the helm of the new Allure, a 48 Riviera, this year.
Also scaling up in 2010, Capt. “Too Nice” Tim Ryan joins the team on MV Joe Joe in 2010. No doubt Capt. Tim and his guest will also be enjoying the bigger and better, read spacious and luxurious accommodations of the 65 foot Precision.
In case it’s not been glaringly obvious, Capt. Luke Fallon, is also at the wheel of a bigger machine in 2010, with the launch of the new 56 foot O’Brien, KEKOA. You can read the boat test in the upcoming Issue 80 of BlueWater Boats and Sportsfishing Magazine.
Likewise, Capt. Corey Hard’s new charge from 2009, the 55 foot Assegai Askari was reviewed in the last issue, Issue 79, and if you haven’t read it already, grab a copy before it leaves newstands.

News from Brendan in Tassie that the Jumbo southern bluefin are here! Catches the last week include, 125kg, 122, 117, 110, 93, 85, 78 plus others hooked and lost! Game on!
Likewise by the sounds of it on the NSW south coast. Neil Rowlands from Culburra caught this 111kg tub on Highlander on his own out at the Drum Canyons on 24 kg tackle. He called over the guys on Moontan to give him a hand getting it in the boat. Thanks Craig for sending this along.
Capt. Tim Richardson reports his 2 and a half month refit is over and the Tradition is looking all sparkly and new. Check out the website for pictures of the project.