Marlin fishing
They are often built to luxury standards and equipped with many technologies to ease the life of the deep sea recreational fisherman, including outriggers, flying bridges and fighting chairs, and state of the art fishfinders and navigation electronics.
A Pacific blue weighing 1,805 pounds (819 kg) caught in 1970 by a party of anglers fishing out of Oahu, Hawaii, aboard the charter boat Coreene C skippered by Capt.
Commercial fishermen have boated far larger specimens, with the largest blue marlin brought into Tsukiji market in Tokyo supposedly weighing a massive 2,438 pounds (1,106 kg).
The earliest marlin lures were carved from wood, cast in drink glasses, or made from chrome bath towel pipes and skirted with rubber inner tubes or vinyl upholstery material cut into strips.
Today, marlin lures are produced in a huge variety of shapes, sizes, and colours, mass-produced by large manufacturers and individually crafted by small-scale, custom makers.
[citation needed] Areas where bottom structure (islands, seamounts, banks, and the edge of the continental shelf) creates upwelling, which brings deep nutrient-rich water close to the surface, are particularly favoured by blue marlin.
[citation needed] In the western Atlantic, blue marlin may be found as far north as George's Bank and the continental shelf canyons off Cape Cod, influenced by the warm current of the Gulf Stream, and as far south as southern Brazil.
A 1,352 pounds (613 kg) giant boated aboard the Mako IV, skippered by Captain Allen DeSilva, in 1995, stands as the largest blue marlin caught in Bermudian waters.
Blue marlin have been encountered as far south as São Paulo, and are regularly hooked and caught in annual tournaments held offshore of Rio de Janeiro.
However, the majority of international attention has thus far focused on Canavieiras, the gateway to the Royal Charlotte Bank, an extensive area of bottom structure that holds billfish, tuna, and other pelagics in great numbers; and on Cabo Frio, where an annual tournament has produced several fish weighing in excess of 1,000 pounds (450 kg).
Fishing is a popular activity in Vitória, attracting fishermen from other states and countries due to the large population of marlin and sailfish off the coast of Espírito Santo.
[citation needed] Although blue marlin can be found close to Faial, boats seeking them often select three banks that serve as productive feeding locations for these fish.
[citation needed] Between 1997 and 2000, blue marlin fishing in Madeira, along with the other Atlantic islands, underwent a severe downturn, blamed by many on the strong El Niño event of 1996–1997.
Since the early 1950s when Ernal Foster on the Albatross I made the first charter fishing trips for blue marlin, Cape Hatteras has been known as an important destination for the sport fisherman.
Other important fishing centers include Morehead City, home to the famous Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament, and Oregon Inlet.
Trolling with ballyhoo baits using relatively light tackle, often in the 30-pound (14 kg) class, is popular for the variety of billfish species that can make an appearance in these waters.
[citation needed] Black marlin (Makaira indica) are found in the Indian and Pacific Oceans with some vagrant individuals having been reported from the south Atlantic.
The use of live bait is also popular for targeting both large and small black marlin, and under the right circumstances, is extremely effective, although sharks and other nontargeted gamefish can often be a problem with this method.
Small live baits such as slimy mackerel and yellowtail scad are highly effective for juvenile black marlin, and are fished both by slow trolling and drifting.
Few but good professional operations (mainly from Indigo Bay Island Resort) fish the area for black marlin from September to January, and international anglers are finding the war years left the resource virtually untouched.
[6] At present, the offshore structures such as Corbetana Rock and "El Banco" off Puerto Vallarta appear to offer the best fishing for black marlin in Mexican waters.
On 11 June 1949, pioneering Panamanian angler Louis Schmidt boated a black marlin that after being cut in half and weighed, tipped the scales at 1,006 pounds (456 kg).
In Mexican hot spots such as Cabo San Lucas and in Southern California, anglers cast live baits such as mackerel and caballito (scad) to striped marlin that may be sighted feeding or finning on the surface.
The country's largest interclub tournament is held at the Port Stephens area of New South Wales, and has produced several striped marlin records on ultralight and fly tackle.
The warmer "wet" season between December and June is best for higher numbers, but larger striped marlin (200-pound or 91-kilogram-plus range) are caught during the colder late summer months.
Kenya has the most well-developed sport fishery in this region, and every year, boats from Malindi, Lamu, and Watamu in the north, as well as Shimoni in the south, have excellent striped marlin fishing.
White marlin feed on a variety of schooling baitfish, including sardine, herring, and other clupeoids; squid; mackerel; scad; saury; and smaller tuna-like fishes, such as frigate and bullet tuna.
From around mid-July onwards, white marlin, as well as the other species of Gulf Stream gamefish such as dolphinfish, yellowfin, and bigeye tuna, start showing up in the continental shelf canyons offshore of Maryland, Virginia and Delaware.
The Jack Spot, an area of bottom structure 22 miles (35 km) south of Ocean City, Maryland, was for many years the most famed white marlin location in the United States.
Awareness of the need to conserve billfish stocks worldwide has led to an increasing trend for recreational anglers and skippers to release their catches in as healthy a condition as possible.
