Half Day Tuna

By Nick Honachefsky

Incredibly, tuna trips in NJ have been so red hot you can score your limit of bluefin in nearly the same time you’d spend on a half day fluke trip. Here’s how to make it happen.

Tuna fishing offshore in New Jersey was so lights out last year that a typical July day unfolded like this: Wake up, grab the coffee at Wawa, meet at the boat at 4 AM. Breach the inlet, get to the grounds by 6 AM, stop on the bait schools, lines in 6:01 AM. Battle bluefin and yellowfin tuna between 6:02 and 10:30 AM. Back at the dock by noon. In the time it takes to nearly do a half day fluke trip on a party boat, boats could be offshore and back with a limit of tuna. That kind of fishing is sick. Will it happen again this year? It truly didn’t take a pro to get the job done, but you do have to come up with a tight plan to ensure success.

INTEL – SET THE PLAN

Finding tuna schools is not a crapshoot, it’s an educated guess in prediction. Establish a trusted network and talk to your crew. Look at vetted reports, weed out the online crap and listen to people you know have been out recently with legit information to guide you in the proper direction. If you don’t know people to access for up- to- the-day intel, talk to the gas dock guys or at the tackle shops to give you a general idea where the bite has been. While some times the bite will be at the same spot or area, many times it moves with the bait, current, winds, and water temps, so you need to adjust, looking into your crystal ball as you gather the latest intelligence data to make your predictions. Its no secret that spots from 40 to 70 miles off the Jersey Coast like the Texas Tower, Triple Wrecks, Resor Wreck and so on are seasonal hot spots, but there is a lot of ocean, and more than enough water to cover to locate and find schools of tuna. Charts from www.fishtrack.com or another sea temp/bathymetry provider will help you make the decision where to go.

SENSES AND SIGNS

Life attracts life – bait not only brings in tuna, but also sea turtles, whales, and dolphin, so where you see some signs of life above, you can bet the cycle of life is brimming below. Use all your senses. Keep your eyes open for gannets diving, Man-O-War birds circling above, tuna breaking the surface. Besides your visuals, use your nose and sense of smell to find that clean, cucumber like salty smell bunker herring or sand eels schools or even the pungent stink of a whale’s breath to point you in the right direction. Listen for the whooshing of whales spouting water out of their blowholes.  Water temp breaks are always prime indicators, where a break may be from 61 to 66 degrees, the upwelling of nutrients generally attracts baitfish and thus pelagic fish to feed along the ripline caused by the currents and temp changes. Tuna tend to stay in clean clear blue water with prime water quality as their eyesight is like a raptor’s and want to have a clear path to their prey. Many hot tuna bites occur during days with a little bit of chop to mix up the water surface as it seems to spark the tuna to get agitated chasing diamond sparkling rivulets and water disturbance up top.

GEAR – PREPARE AND DEPLOY

Do not cut any corners when it comes to tackling tuna with your tuna tackle. That means, all reels must have new line - not last year’s – with corresponding new leaders, new knots and so on. Reel must be greased, oiled and in prime condition and rods checked for any weaknesses or wear and tear on the guides. If trolling, all hooks on spreader bars, daisy chains and Ballyhoo rigs should be sharpened, with checks for nicks on leaders or any weak points in the bars. Switch out broken squids or replace missing ones. All lures hooks should be razor sharp and tough enough to handle stress from a massive tuna, if not, replace with proper 3X strong hooks. Two gaffs are a minimum to have on deck, I prefer a larger 8 foot Aftco 6 inch wide Gaff for the initial stick and a shorter 4 foot Bubba to use as a “Finisher” to secure a fish.

A general tuna tackle box consists of this lineup:

Popping rods: Shimano Terez 7’ 8” TZS78HBLK

Reels: Shimano Saragosa or Stella 14000 to 20000

Casting Lures: Madd Mantis Poppers, Shimano Orcas, Savage Gear Mack Sticks, Williamson Popper Pro

Jigs: Shimano Butterfly Jigs, Stingos, Savage Gear Long Cast Jigs

Line: 80-pound Power Pro braid with 10 foot topshot of 80 to 100-pound Seaguar Fluorocarbon leader

Trolling Rods: Shimano or Penn stand up 50 to 100-pound rods

Trolling reels: Shimano 50 wide, Penn International 50/80

Trolling Lures: Chatter Lures Sidetrackers, (Black/Purple, Cucumber, Rainbow) Cedar Plugs, Green Machines, Williamson feathers

KEEP YOUR COOL AT CRUNCH TIME

When tuna are blasting around the boat, people seem to lose all sense of reality and composure. The key to success is to slow down, but move fast, and that means slow down your excitement so you can make fast, cogent decisions. Pay attention to how tuna are feeding in order to choose the proper lure. Have separate rods rigged up already with jigs, plugs and poppers. When its time to cast, know what lure to throw, make the pinpoint cast and work the lure properly. Slow down and do it right, if you rush through the process you will make mistakes. When hooked up, the crew needs to work together to fight the fish effectively, meaning the captain along with the angler needs to keep the fish alongside without going under the boat, while the rest of the crew is preparing to gaff the fish, gloves on, and leader the fish. Every crew member must have their duties delineated before the big moment otherwise the chaos will result in a lost fish at boatside. Know beforehand and communicate who has what responsibility and initiate the plan immediately.

Everybody has their own general plan that suits their specific crew when heading out for tuna, but the key is to have a plan, not just wing it. When you put all the factors together regarding preparation, intelligence, equipment, communication and patience, it can all come together nicely to literally complete a half day tuna trip with a kill box full of steaks.