Our first chunking/troll trip of the year was successful. We had mixed action, landed lots of fish, had many more missed opportunities, lots of angler error, and many laughs.

We left Barnegat inlet at 11:00am on Thursday. We saw a pool of green water on our chlorophyll charts inshore of the Lindy/Carteret, and that was our first planned stop of the day. We found the water around 3:00 pm and it was amazing to see this pool of ugly green water surrounded by an ocean of cobalt blue. We set out a spread of skirted ballyhoo on the riggers, jets on the flat lines, and a spreader bar down the center forming a W pattern.

We raised 9 white marlin, released 1 and broke 2 off. It was amazing, a single bird would fly above our spread, and that was the signal that a marlin was in the pattern. In seconds a rigger line would pop, we would free spool the bait, and 40% of the time the line would come tight and a white would be airborne. This learned free spool tactic would prove to be the problem later in the day when tuna crashed the spread.

We fished this pool until 3 tuna crashed the spread. Like pavlov's dogs, the guys on the charter used their new free spool technique that they learned for marlin and it resulted in 2 birds nests, one line rapped around the tip, 3 lost trolling lures and 3 lost tuna. We went through the drill minutes before that if the rod is doubled over, don't touch it, but they just reacted.

I fixed the spread, set out the pattern again, read them the riot act about not touching the rods, and began heading to the tip of the canyon. The spreader bar got whacked seconds later. I handed the rod to one of the charter and he hits the lever drag to free spool by accident. We got lucky this time and only lost the tuna and not the spreader bar. 0/4 on tuna at this point.

We got to the tip of the Lindy at 6:15 PM and saw two squid boats working. Within minutes there were yellowfin busting all around us. We hooked a triple and landed 2 80-90lb yellows, but got spooled by the third. Luckily the hook pulled when we got down to the knot. We got a 3rd fish on the troll and ended up 3/4 on 80-90 pound fish.

We set up on the chunk and had fish on immediately. We were sitting in 795 feet of water after dropping the hook in 400 feet and there was squid everywhere. We had fish on as I was setting out the third rod and went 3 for 8 on the big yellowfin. Our last bite was a awesome 44 pound mahi that was the biggest dolphin that I have ever seen. All fish including the mahi were taken on live squid. The rest of the night was dead, but the charter worked hard and loaded over 3 gallon buckets with squid to take home. They were tire and wanted to skip the morning troll and head back.

Pictures to follow

JT




Edited by James Gang (28 seconds ago)
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Capt. John Tylutki

..when asked where did you catch the fish? It's always in the same place.... in the lip

Sponsor R.F.A

Now thats a sucessful trip! Glad to hear you found the fish. Your report is one of the first positive chunking trips I have heard of this year. Congrats!

Great trip John.
Good report!!!!