Innholdsfortegnelse for December 1985 i Hawaii Fishing News

■ Weather in Hawaiian waters will play a more important role in any marine activity during winter. Mariners are advised that the change from good to bad weather can be fast. The severe weather events that can occur. in decreasing order of frequency, are: gusty trade winds, high northwest swell and surf, cold front with Kona winds, and Kona The strongest trade winds are the winter-type trades that can occur in December. The number ot trade wind day will be low—only about half of the days of the month but gust trades can occur on about a fourth to a third of the days in December High northwest sewll and surf will be frequent along the exposed northern shores Expect about 20 days with surf greater than 6 feef high,…

The Green Stick adapts to sport fishing For most of the year, the attitude of Kona fishermen toward the “green stick” and the “bird” has been curiosity and skepticism. Early reports of green stick use in the calm Kona lee were unconvincing. Few fish were caught by the pioneers, but interest and experimentation continued. ‘Ahi rolled on the surface everywhere along the coastline, but no one was catching them by any method—neither trolling nor live-baiting nor green sticking seemed to turn over any of the robust tuna, fatly content on filefish. Then, in early September, a few boats began hitting the strike zone, in plain view of charter boats catching no fish, a few green stick boars hooked 1C to 15 ‘ahi within a few hours of trying. Multiple strikes…

■ The colors of parrot fish range from bright green with lavender to reddish-brown and from turquoise blue with light pink to black. In our waters the most commonly caught uhu are the reddish-brown and the blue parrot fish, which average 2 to 5 lbs. But there’s more difference to parrot fish than their colors. In fact, Hawaiian names for these fish give us clues to some of the differences in their temperaments. For example, the uhu halahala is “dissatisfied” and the uhu ‘a’a is “daring” and likes to fight. Caught year-round, uhu are coral grazers (they actually bite off bits of coral as they go along), and as such they are more easily speared than caught on hook and line. They’re especially easy targets at night when they secrete…

■ What a month for fishing! The first half of October saw the water dropping at a consistent rate of about 6 inches a day. With the water dropping the way it was, the bass went on a feeding rampage like we haven’t seen for a while. It wasn’t unusual to sit in one spot and catch one on every cast. Alan Jeffries and I did just that using plastic worms within sight of Kemoo Farm Restaurant. We lost track of how many we caught, but it must have been an amusing show for the diners. Several times we both had fish jumping around the boat at the same time. Then the rains came, and practically overnight the water rose 15 feet. That put a damper on the fishing for…

■ Interest in bicycling has exploded recently thanks to the introduction of the modern “all-terrain bicycle,” better known to many as the mountain bike. These fat, knobby-tired machines with wide handle bars are equipped with five to as many as 18 gears and allow a much greater range than those skinny-tired racing bikes that limit riders to hard, flat surfaces. These off-road bicycles feature big, shock-absorbing tires and allow riders to sit in a more natural position than racing-type bikes. They allow bicycle access to mountain trails, cane haul roads and other less traversed by-ways, and this means safer transportation for the fitness buff. Even street riders seem to enjoy not having to jar sharply over manhole covers, storm drain grates and potholes. With all their assets, mountain bikes have…

SEND A PHOTO ANO LETTER ABOUT SOUR CATCH, ANO WE WILL MAIL SOU A FREE GIFT…OUR WAS OF SASING THANKS FOR SHARING SOUR CATCH! …CHUCK SEND TO: P.O. BOX 25413, HONOLULU, HAWAII 96825 Howzit Chuck, This natagi was caught by John Damon (holding the head) from aboard my Sears Gamefisher (12) on August 8. We launched at Wai‘anae and trolled directly to R-buoy outside of Makaha. The fish struck at 8 a.m., and we had it in the boat by 8:30. We never did weigh this one, but the steaks were “ono.” In the near future, I’ll send a picture of a head of a big mahi that was bitten clearly off with one bite behind the gills by a “tax collector.” Aloha, Keawe Dowsett Honolulu, O‘ahu P.S. Mahalo for…

Big Game Pacific blue marlin, fair. The winter usually sees marlin of a larger average size than in the summer, but last December’s Kona catch generally consisted of 150- to 250-pounders. The “big fish day” for Kona last December was the day before the full moon when the SHADY LADY brought in a 629-pounder, the HAPPY TIMES a 540-pounder and the HANA GAY a 362-pounder. That was also the day with the most fish seven. Winter is often Lahaina’s best season, and three of the whaling town’s 10 largest marlin of the year were caught in December. The largest was a 495-pounder brought in on the HALCYON. Black marlin, poor. Our catch report for last December shows not a one. Then again, even at the best of times we only…

■ With the recent shark attack stories in the news, I thought I would jump on the bandwagon and say a few things about sharks this month. While I am certainly no authority on the subject of shark, I spend a lot of time in their home and, therefore, have tried to read as much as I can about them. Sort of a “know your enemy”. philosophy, I guess. Two months ago, Chris Takahashi, a friend and fellow diver, wrote an article about some of his experiences with these denizens of the deep. Chris has been diving the local waters for a long time and has had several “close encounters.” To try and put the matter in perspective, I want to start by saying that in over 170 dives in…

■ Capi. Steve Roney, skipper of the Kona-based charter boat HOLIDAY, grappled with the problem of bulky double line knots hanging up in roller guide frames until he came up with a solution. He calls it “Not AKnot,” because it is not actually a knot. The new double line splice has been thoroughly proven on a number of fish over 500 lbs taken on the HOLIDAY this past summer. No one testing the new connector has been able to break it either, so it is likely a 100 percent not-a-knol that is equally as strong as. it not stronger than, the line it is made with. The splice is actually quite easy to produce, It requires a short length of hollow dacron braid of the same or larger test rating…

Forty-two teams of pint-sized fishermen combed Kona’s deep-sea grounds this fall. They were competitors in the 6th Annual Keiki Fishing Tournament, an event which is held at the end of each season by Western Sports Tournaments. This year the kids accounted for a total; catch of 987 lbs. With the support of West Hawaii’s fishing community and generous merchants, 114 youngsters 1½ to 14 years old shared a unique experience. They spent seven hours learning the basics of proper boat handling, radio operation and fishing techniques in the well-stocked waters of their own back yard. On the start at 8 a.m. the boats dispersed from Kailua Bay toward different targets. In no other tournament will you see as many boats trolling the ono lane from the harbor on their way…

■ “We can custom weave any logo, any pattern, any name and any design into your rod wraps,” Rod Nierenhausen enthused over the phone, “If it can be drawn out, it can be done in thread. You oughta’ come up and see what we’re doing!” Having been in some of the top custom shops in this country and Australia, and having watched some real old-time pros wrap rods, I was skeptical. Could it be that someone was doing first-class custom rod wrapping on Maui? If so, it could be worth the trip to find out. It was worth the trip! Picture if you will a scene including a shore caster hooked up to an ulua. His pole is bent over, and his rollbar equipped jeep sits on the lava behind…

Teroro, grabbins his personal god-carved paddle, gave the canoe a mighty shove that sent it far into the lagoon, with him trailing his feet aft in the green waters. “Hoist sail!” he cried. “We’ll test the wind.” And when a noonday breeze dropped down from the cliff, it caught the sail and began to move the great double hulled canoe, and men paddled briskly, and soon with lightning speed WAIT-FOR-THE-WEST-WIND hurtled across its home lagoon. And it flashed across the lagoon like what it was: a miraculous, slim, double-hulled craft seventy-nine feet long, with a tiered stern twenty-two feet high and a solid platform slung across the hulls on which forty men or the statues of forty gods could ride, with pigs and pandanus and water stowed safely in the…

■ If the day is calm, a swim outside the reef’s edge at Hanauma Bay can be rewarding. There hasn’t been a time when I haven’t seen uhu (parrot fish) over 20 pounds bumping and crushing coral with their strong beaks. Sometimes, if you lie quietly suspended, you can hear this strange feeding. Giant unicorn kala can be closely observed because, like other fish, they have overcome their fear of man. Some palani (surgeon fish) have cruised along for over 100 yards allowing me to see how the bright yellow pectoral fins fit neatly into the shallow depressions on their cadmium-blue bodies. This way they present the smoothest surface to water. Occasionally the fins flip out and down. They act as ailerons and allow the fish to maintain a vertical…

■ If I had to pick one state out of the 50 that seems to cause excitment among all angling groups everytime it’s mentioned, I’d have to say Alaska. Ironically, though, Alaska is also the state with the shortest fishing season—a mere three or four months beginning when the snow and ice disappear from the shorelines. I’ve fished Alaska in early June, the beginning of the season, July and August, the midseason, and also September, the tail of the season. I’ve vowed to mysetf never to go early or late season again. Although salmon seem to be the most sought after prize of anglers venturing to Alaska, there are so many varieties and types of fish and fishing, one could return year after year and still look forward to new…

■ The year will be remembered as a very slow year for tournament fishing. Desultory radio roundups and short weigh-ins were the norm, not the exception, as anglers from all over the state and all over the world trolled and live baited endlessly, praying for one fish that would surely make a difference. Too often that one fish did not come. Too often even the spell-breaking strike did not come. The good news is that there were many large fish caught, including world-record fish and fish with weights topping previous tournament records, in some of Hawaii’s tournaments this year. And that made many tournament anglers and tournament directors happy. The premier catch of the 1985 tournament season was Nancy Fann’s women’s world-record fish taken in the first Chuck Machado’s Light…

FOR LETTERS RECEIVED DURING DECEMBER 1985 WE WILL SEND you A MINI (3½-INCH) PENCIL POPPER BY HAWAIIAN TACKLE CO. Dear Chuck, This is a picture of the first big kaku I ever caught. It weighed 50 lbs and was 61 inches iong. I was fishing alone when it hit a small puhi at 8:30 p.m. one night. Twenty minutes later I had it landed in a small pond, but when I went to grab the leader, the knot slipped off the stop ring. I could hear waves coming, so I grabbed the kaku by the gills. When it was on the rocks, I couldn’t believe it’s size! It was caught on a extended 6/0 high speed, with 80-lb Maxima line… Mahalo,Robert Nakai and familyPapa’aloa, Hawaii P.S. I caught it down…