Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2002 i Hawaii Fishing News

■ Govind unhooked the 30-lb “GT” (giant trevally) with relative ease and quickly released it to fight another day as I prepared to sit down and take a drink of water after the hard-fought battle. “There are no breaks on this boat, Darryl!” came the voice of charter skipper Jim Siers as he stood from his seat and pointed toward another coral “bommie” that was marked on his Furuno GPS. “Chuck that piece of wood into the green water, and bring it out over the deep!” instructed Jim as I made another long cast into the green water and proceeded to retrieve the battered popper over another strike zone. Before I could even yell, I lost sight of the popper in a mass of foaming, splashing water as several GTs…

■ Puanani can catch 100 prawns in one hour. June Amasaki and Toshio Honma can catch 65 prawns per hour. Toshio is 74 years old. If he can do it, so can everyone else. June had two nephews visiting from California. They were very good at prawn catching after five minutes of instruction. Then, they decided to see who could catch the biggest prawn. They were pushing one another, trying to get the biggest prawn. These boys are “ka-tonks” (California-born), but after half an hour they sounded like local boys using those nice words local boys use. I think one starts with an “f.” Nani and Toshio went upstream. I went downstream, and poor June was left to be the referee. I could hear June saying, “Bring those nets here,…

■ As we were counting down the last few days before this year’s event, the weather got wetter and wetter and the winds started blowing like crazy. The day before the tournament, Saturday, people kept asking if the tournament were going to be canceled. “Canceled,” said the Chief Fish, “What for? The weather is going to be perfect Sunday morning.” And from 6:30 a.m. until just about 2 p.m. on Sunday the weather was just beautiful. Nineteen boats took the kids just outside the Ala Wai Harbor entrance to bottom fish in mild weather, and they had a blast. It wasn’t until the Chief Fish and the rest of the hard-working awards committee were crossing the Ala Wai on an open launch headed for the presentations at the Waikiki Yacht…

■ The most unusual thing about the new Purglas rod is the way the two-piece rod is connected. A spigot is centered in the butt side of the blank, and the tip fits over this projection. The two pieces never quite come together. For the conventional angler, it looks incomplete. The rod bends, however, as if it were still a one-piece rod. Any stiffness at the connection is barely noticeable. Joe Kimura of Kimura of Hawaii made up a 9-foot 10-inch Purglas rod for me, and I took it to Majuro. My son-in-law tried to jam the two pieces together because it didn’t look right, but they wouldn’t come together. It’s a new look. In early February, Joe invited Alan Cunningham, the president of Purglas, and William Taylor, the California…

DEPARTMENT OF LAND AND NATURAL RESOURCES DIVISION OF CONSERVATION AND RESOURCES ENFORCEMENT 1151 PUNCHBOWL STREET, HONOLULU, HAWAII 96813 February 8, 2002 Dear Chuck, As the administrator of the DLNR Division of Conservation and Resources Enforcement, I take issue with writer Carroll Cox’s article on DOCARE and problems at Ka‘ena Point. There are two distinct areas at Ka‘ena Point that are administered by the DLNR: the Natural Area Reserve including the point; and the unencumbered state lands that make up the adjacent area in the Waialua direction. Although they share a common boundary, each area has its own set of rules. The administrative rules dealing with this area are clearly posted on the DLNR website at <http://www.state.hi.us/dlnr/Welcome.html>. The rules are clear in regard to vehicles. In the NARS area, no motorized…

OFFSHORE TOURNAMENTS KBC’S PURE JACKPOT TOURNAMENT April 6, 2002 Keehi Boat Club—Oahu (808) 841-7271 4 Sand Island Access Road, Box 44, Honoiulu, Hl 96819 SENORITA’S TOURNAMENT April 20 & 21, 2002 Hawaii Yacht Club—Oahu (808) 949-4622 1739-C Ala Moana Blvd, Honolulu, HI 96815 6TH ANNUAL KONA CLASSIC TOURNAMENT June 28, 29 & 30, 2002 Tropidilla—Kona (808) 327-1440 P.O. Box 2158, Kailua-Kona, HI 96745 <info@konatournaments.com> PEARL HARBOR FISHING TOURNAMENT June 29 J.D. Okamura—O‘ahu (808) 473-8000 ext 3541 E-Mail <okamur@apJhnDsy.navy.mil WORLD CUP BLUE MARLIN CHAMPIONSHIP July 4, 2002 Jim Hardie—Miami (305) 559-8485 P.O. Box 2476, Miami, FL 33159 FIRECRACKER OPEN July 5, 6 & 7, 2002 Tropidilla—Kona (808) 327-1440 P.O. Box 2158, Kailua-Kona, HI 96745 <info@konatournamenits.com> SKINS MARLIN DERBY July 11, 12, 13 & 14, 2002 Tropidilla—Kona (808) 327-1440 P.O. Box 2158,…

■ If you looked hard, you could just barely see the darker water of the radical drop-off of the Moloka’i outer reef through the multitude of whitecaps. It was not a good day. The afternoon wind was whipping down through the channel and obliterating the surface, making spotting the target zone a challenge. Erman Tancayo and Brian Tachibana were perched on a 13½-foot Boston Whaler about 100 yards seaside of the large, rolling breakers and were having second thoughts about whipping plugs. Already soaked from the half-hour trip from Kaunakakai, Erman and Brian were glad that it was a relatively sunny afternoon. The submerged ledge that they were positioning themselves over had been found with a fathometer, which showed a steep drop-off of a couple of hundred feet. Against this…

El Niño on the Horizon ■ Scientists with the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are observing a steady evolution toward El Nino conditions and predict a localized warming of sea surface temperatures off the coasts of Ecuador and Peru over the next few weeks. Based on the latest observed oceanic and atmospheric circulation patterns, sea-surface temperature predictions and the time of year, NOAA scientists say it seems likely an El Nino will develop in the tropical Pacific in the next three months. “This warming represents an early stage of El Nino’s onset. If the warming persists, it will be several more months before mature El Nino conditions develop. The impacts will depend on the strength of the event, which we can’t determine at this time,” said NOAA…

Midway Atoll Breaks Fish Camp ■ The Midway Phoenix Corporation is ending all services to Midway, citing irreconcilable management and policy differences with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USF&WS). Beginning immediately, the Cartersville, Georgia-based company will dismantle their ecotourism resort on Midway Atoll. Midway Atoll is 1,200 miles northeast of Kaua‘i. March 2 will mark the final Aloha Airlines flight. Then the atoll will be abandoned by Midway Phoenix. The company’s 150 employees will lose their jobs, and the contract with Aloha Airlines, which has provided weekly Midway flights since 1998, will be terminated. Reservations to Midway are no longer being accepted. Midway Phoenix claims to have invested between $15 and $20 million in the operation. They plan to shut down the atoll’s airport and power plants. Tour companies,…

USCG January Activity Waterfront Facility Guidelines The U.S. Coast Guard implemented new security guidelines recently for commercial waterfront facilities in its Pacific Area. Vice Admiral Ray Riutta, commander of the Coast Guard’s Pacific Area, instructed Coast Guard Captains of the Ports west of the Rocky Mountains to apply the guidelines as an interim step while new regulations are being developed by U.S. Coast Guard headquarters, a regulatory process that may take a year or more. The U.S. Coast Guard worked closely with the maritime industry to develop the new guidelines in its continuing effort to balance national security and commerce. Fishing Vessel Salvaged The U.S. Coast Guard was on scene recently after the 87’ steel schooner SEA PEARL ran aground on the reef about 2,300 feet off Diamond Head. The…

Fishing Kiribati StyleTrolling Rigged Flying Fish From Small Boats and Canoes ■ Our 14’ boat broke through the small waves with little splash or sound. I was watching my rod tip for sailfish, because they don’t always hook themselves, when I saw a wahoo jump approximately where our baits were trailing behind our boat. My friend, a man originally from Tuvalu but now a Kiribati native, was alerted to the fact. Soon, that wahoo hit and we had a fish of over 20 lbs in the boat. I had never seen a wahoo jump just before the strike, but they occasionally do, it seems. Fishing in Kiribati means catching wahoo, especially when using flying fish bait. There are flying fish fishermen here, so one can buy them in the markets.…

■ There’s no place like the windward side for just the right amount of seasons. It’s now winter when the fish are few, but if you get lucky it’s possible to bring up a good one. Soon it will be mahimahi season, and everything will be all right at He’eia-Kea. For now, the parking lot is sparsely filled and there is lots of room at the wash rack. Peter Ahing, aboard his boat, the REEL HOPE, made the trip out to his favorite FAD (MM) and quickly hooked up to a 30-lb mahimahi. Considering it was New Year’s Day, he thought this was great and proceeded to fish some more. Soon he called it a day because dinnertime was approaching and he wanted the fish to have a good home…

■ Spring is approaching according to the calendar, but in Hawai‘i waters winter-type weather can still appear in March. But there will be more good weather days than bad weather days. There is always the possibility of the occurrence of any of the following severe weather events: cold front with strong Kona winds, upper trough with heavy rain, gusty trade winds and high northwest wave and surf. Trade winds should be present on more than half the days in March with the possibility of about eight to 14 days of gusty trades. Northwest swell activity should be noticeably less. There may be about five days of high surf greater than 10 feet along the north shores. There’s still a chance of surf greater than 25 feet high at Sunset Beach,…

Lake Ho‘omaluhia Fishing Program ■ The project of removing the pond weed Elodea is progressing, but the amount of weed is staggering. The effort might be compared to trying to scoop spaghetti with a spoon. It looks like the new wire cage on the crane is doing a good job. The piles of Elodea on the side of the pond are getting higher. The weed does not decompose very well, but sort of goes to sleep. Whatever was piled up several days before looks all brown and faded, but all you have to do is scratch the surface to find the layer beneath is green. It would immediately grow if allowed access to the water. The protected birds are creating an additional workload because they are nesting on top of…

Cradle Reels The cradle reel is the result of an interesting adventure in reel design by various big-game reel manufacturers along the way. The basic idea was to lower the spool centerline and integrate the reel frame into the rod. This, as far as I can tell, was for two reasons. The first was to center the massive weight of reels of up to 20/0 sizes on the rod. This decreased the tendency for these huge reels to twist and wobble awkwardly as an angler cranked line back in while fighting a fish. The second was to get line coming off of the reel lower or closer to the rod so it followed the rod’s profile for more of its length. This let the line bear onto the bottom of…

■ I was born and raised in a city located on a beautiful bay on the southern coast of Cuba. Our home was situated on a small peninsula that jutted into the bay. Within walking distance and in front of our home was the bay, in back was a lagoon, and all around us were beaches and beach clubs. As you can imagine, we grew up swimming and fishing from a very early age. My twin brothers and I had a little dinghy that we kept tied at a dock belonging to friends who lived right on the water. Our bay was famous for shrimp. In the early evenings you could see the shrimp boats going out to spend the nights on their quest for a good catch. All night,…

■ Japan’s Tokai University Educational System has a branch campus on Kapiolani Boulevard in Honolulu. Run by smiling local Chancellor Kiyoshi Yamada, the college sponsors Hawaiian entrants in the university’s annual postcard art contest. The contest, which draws more than 1,500 entries, is restricted to senior citizens over 60 years of age. One of the winners in Japan was 101 years old. Since I am a mere 72, I was urged to enter by my daughter. It turned out that my “fish oriented” entry tied for second place in Hawai‘i. The benefit was a trip to Japan to attend the award ceremony in Shizuoka and explore a little of this island nation. I made an effort to look into the fish scene while in Japan. This wasn’t hard to do…

I Style Koolzie and an Official HFN Sticker…our way of saying thanks for sharing your catch!…Hana pa‘a, Chuck Send to: P.O. Box 25488, Honolulu, Hawaii 96825 Dear Chuck, I thought you might be interested in this picture. Mike Shigemasa, Darren Juliano and Chris Paglinawan show off the three Samoan crabs they Caught on December 20, 2001 here on O‘ahu. The crabs weighed 6V2, 4 and 3 lbs. Happy Crabbing,The 3 Crabmen Waipahu, O‘ahu Aloha Chuck, First, I must say thank God for giving me life to enjoy the ocean. It will be a few years before I’ll be able to go fishing or diving again. I am paying society a few years for a wrongdoing of mine. So, here’s the only picture of what I wish I could be trying…