To those of us unfamiliar with the controls and handling characteristics of big-game fishing boats, captains perform unbelievable feats of maneuvering just getting the boat into the slip without taking out a few pilings along the way. Watching a captain coolly wedge a 50-foot sport-fisher between boats that cost 10 times more than your house with just a foot or two to spare on each side definitely increases the pucker factor tenfold - at least for those of us on the dock.
Throw in the antics of one or more hot, ticked-off billfish streaking back and forth in the wake and the skills required to outthink, outrun and outmaneuver a fish that can change direction with a flick of its tail reach mind-boggling proportions - or so I thought.
Capt. Roddy Hays spent seven years honing his boat-handling skills on the big blue marlin of Madeira, and he learned quite a bit about how a big girl behaves once attached to the other end of your line.
Through trial and error, he also learned what he could do as the captain to help speed up fight times and limit the wear and tear on both angler and fish. Much of what he found resonates with clear, common sense, and can be picked up quite easily by anyone with a modicum of boat-handling skills.
Hays would like everyone to know that the information given here deals with blue marlin fishing with lures, and that you would probably employ different tactics when fishing with live baits or with other giants like black marlin or bluefin tuna. Hays relayed these tips as he plied the waters off La Gomera in the Canary Islands, in search of another big lady to take to the dance.
ON THE BITE
From their vantage point on the bridge, captains have a leg up, as it were, over the folks down in the pit when it comes to seeing fish and how they act before and after the strike. Unless there's a blind hookup where the fish just materializes out of nowhere and attacks your offering in a mad rush, the captain can do a few things to prepare the crew and angler for an impending strike. Obviously the first thing you want to do when you see a fish trailing a bait is to let the crew know where the fish is, how it is acting and how big you think the fish might be, says Hays.
If the fish seems to be in a following mode, Hays adjusts his speed to try to trigger a strike. If the fish is just following, I'll slow down or speed up a bit. I find that if the fish is just looking at the carrot and really doesn't want to eat it, if you stick it in her mouth she's going to eat.
If she's behind the lure with her mouth open wagging back and forth, I'll drop the engine on the same side as the fish back into idle. Instead of dropping back with the rod, I can do it with the boat. No one has to touch the rod, the angler doesn't have to get involved, the crew doesn't have to get involved - I'm doing it all from up in the bridge where I can see everything happen, he says.
Once the fish takes the lure and the line comes out of the pin, Hays just straightens the boat and carries on for three or four seconds. The first thing I tell people to do when the fish is hooked up is to leave the ratchet alone, Hays says. A lot of people like to turn the ratchet off, but if you do that, I can't hear how fast line is coming off the reel. I don't like to have to keep yelling down and asking if line is coming on or off the reel.
Once the fish is on, Hays gives the OK to bring in the lure that wasn't taken on the same side as the fish - leaving the other two lines on the opposite side in the water for several more seconds in case there are more fish tailing the spread.
THE CHASE
Once the crew helps the angler get into the chair, Hays starts his turn. ''I'll turn the boat around pretty sharply an start back down the line towards the fish -- pointy end first,'' says Hays. ''It's so much quieter and nicer and easier. I do this on any-sized fish, unless it's a spindly little spearfish or something that's jumping around right behind the boat.
''As a general rule of thumb, even if the fish pulls off 200 yards of line it's just much easier to spin around on the dot and ease back down to where she's flapping around on the surface than backing down the whole time,'' says Hays. ''In that respect, I'm just like Peter Wright or Barkey Garnsey, who do exactly the same thing.'' Since the boat is still moving forward, this method allows the crew to get the remaining lines in without having to worry about chopping them off in the props or getting tangled.
Once the dust has settled after the bite, the crew can turn the chair and get the angler pointed at the fish. If your boat has a small cockpit, you might have to have one of the mates stand there and lift your halyards up out of the way to let the line pass through untouched. ''If your cockpit's really small and you can't shoot straight over the shoulder of the fish, then you've got to move away from the line a little bit and make a small-belly so it goes astern first. Then you'll have a bit of line - 10 to 20 feet in length - going off to the side and then off towards the fish. Now you can start bending the boat into the fish, back and forth a little bit, picking up line as you go. If it's a really big fish, the only thing you'll do differently is chunk along with a little bit more haste,'' says Hays.
''Line's coming off the reel when you make the turn. ''As you make the turn, you'll sometimes find - especially if it's a really big fish and has a couple hundred yards of line off the reel - that it's a good idea to tell the angler to back down to six or eight pounds of drag,'' he says. Hays marks the drag settings on all his reels with tape so that the angler knows exactly where to position the drag lever. ''I'll ask him to leave it there until I start running up to the fish. What you'll see is the line start coming off the reel slower or even stop. That tells the angler he can start picking up the line again.''
''What you've done is tightened the circle of line in the water to such an extent that the drag of line in the water has been reduced significantly. You've doubled the line back on itself, eliminating the belly and the angler can just wind up slack line as fast he can. Your job now is to keep pace with the angler and don't get too far ahead of him,'' says Hays.
Hays considers the use of high-visibility line to be essential. It allows him to see where the fish is headed and keeps him from crossing over the line when chasing down the fish.
He doesn't spin the boat back around to back down on the fish until he sees the rigger mark come up onto the reel. ''Once the rigger mark comes up I know exactly how far away the fish is. If it took a short line then I'll turn around then, but if he took a long rigger I'll go another 50 or 100 feet or so and then turn and back down on the fish,'' he says.
Normally the fish's initial run takes just three or four minutes, and Hays wants to be on top of the fish when she becomes winded from that first burst of energy. ''Once you start backing down, she might try to do something else once or twice, but if things work out the way they are supposed to you should have the leader at the end of the fish's first run,'' he says. Hay calls the time that the fish stops after its initial run the ''window.'' ''If you can get there right when the fish is on the surface catching her breath, you can get two wraps on the leader and she's done - regardless of size.''
There are two reasons that Hays likes to catch the fish quickly: a short fight is obviously better for the health of the fish, and once she's gone you can go get another one. ''If you spend three hours mucking about with a fish, by the time you release her the bite's probably long gone. You want to catch as many fish as you can while the bite is on. The more time you spend with baits in the water the better. You can catch three fish in a row - bang, bang, bang - just like that, while some other guy's fighting a fish dead in the water with 500 yards of line out.''
FINDING THE ANGLE
While it would be nice if every fish behaved in the same way, unfortunately we all know that some fish won't make a long run on the surface. When a fish goes down, the fight changes dramatically. ''When a fish goes down deep, it's usually doing the same thing it does at the surface - it's just making its run under the water. They rarely, if ever, go straight down.''
In order to determine which diection the fish is going down deep, Hays says you must turn the boat around the line to ''find the angle.''
''When the angler's hunched over in the chair, line's peeling off the reel and the rod's bent over and you can't do anything, you turn the boat until you see the rod lift just a bit. That's the direction the fish is heading and you just back down or move forward at 5 or 6 knots on that heading and start to pick up line. That's probably one of the most important things you can do when you have a big fish down deep. If you don't turn the boat, you can back down on a 45-degree angle of line for hours without making any progress.''
The lifting of the rod tip when searching for the direction of the fish's travel can be almost imperceptible at times, and it's the deckies' responsibility to keep a close eye on the rod. Once you move down the line in the same direction as the fish, it will relieve some of the pressure. Sometimes that's enough to make her come back up to the surface.
''I try to catch all my fish within 15 to 20 minutes. You should at least have your hands on the leader in the first 10 minutes or so - unless they are absolutely huge, gi-normous monsters. If I find myself still fighting a fish that I don't think is tail-wrapped after a half-hour, then I'm thinking the fish is better than 800 or 900 pounds. If it goes-45 minutes or an hour, then you know it's a really nice fish. But you can catch a grander in 10 minutes - even quicker sometimes,'' says Hays, ''but a lot depends on the guy in the cockpit as well. If you get the mate the leader and if the fish is there - he takes two wraps and it's a caught fish.''
Hays says he follows pretty much the same basic routine no matter what size the fish, but he does admit that you become much more aware of all the details. ''You're much more constantly aware of everything, what's going on with the line and everything else. There isn't any rocket science involved with any of this,'' says Hays. ''If you can turn a boat in a marina, then you can turn and chase a fish quite nicely.''
