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Flight of the Yellowfin

Anglers ply mid-Atlantic waters for schools of yellowfin tuna
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Ric Burnley

Of all the fish that swim off the mid-Atlantic, yellowfin tuna can be the most fun to catch. These fish feed in packs, and encounters usually result in chaotic action with multiple hookups. Rigger clips pop, lines come tight, rods bend over, drags smoke — there’s nothing like a tuna whammy.

Last spring, big schools of small yellowfin appeared off Virginia Beach, Virginia, and then through the summer, the bite spread up the coast to South Jersey. But it was all a preamble to the real show last fall, when yellowfin tuna converged off Oregon Inlet, North Carolina.

Tuna-Fish Sandwich
Last October, schools of yellowfin tuna hit the waters off Oregon Inlet like an invading horde. Almost overnight, boats went from fishing for white marlin to filling the box with yellowfin.

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“The tuna bite is on,” Capt. Jeff Ross told me over the phone. “Come on down.”

The next day, I was standing beside Ross on the flybridge of Obsession, his 55-foot Sheldon Midgett, as we watched almost a dozen Sea Witch lures skitter along the surface behind the boat.

Just after the water temperature gauge on the console hit 75 degrees, there was an explosion on one of the flat lines. Then another blew up behind the right long-rigger bait. Ross and mate Walt Ogden started jigging. “They’re here!” Ross announced to the crew, laughing. “Let’s not screw this up!” With four lines going in four different directions, there was potential for a major mess.

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Ross choreographed Ogden’s moves as he danced around the cockpit uncrossing lines. When they couldn’t figure out how the lines were twisted, Ogden would instruct the anglers to hold their rod tips together so he could get a better angle on the lines.

“I got color,” one of the anglers said as his fish came to the surface. Ogden put the anglers in a holding pattern while he gaffed and landed one tuna after another. After all fish were in the boat, Ogden went back to work resetting the baits and Ross put the boat in a circle to make another pass over the same spot.

We were fishing a small finger of slightly warmer water that seemed to be holding the bait and the fish. With no color change or current edge to guide his search, Ross constantly kept an eye on the water temperature. He also worked in conjunction with other boats to make a mental map of the temperature breaks, noting where the warmer water was and what direction it was moving.

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Ross explained that the key to catching yellowfin is finding the right temperature over the structure. Yellowfin will congregate wherever 68- to 76-degree water crosses the continental shelf. But sometimes the fish will favor 75.4-degree water over 74.5-degree — the slightest variance can make all the difference. Once he finds the right water, he looks for drops, ridges and plateaus to hold fish.

Then he trolls at 6 to 7 knots, running as many lines as possible, pulling Ilanders on one flat line and one short rigger, and Sea Witches everywhere else.

When the fish are holding deep, he replaces one flat line with a heavy rod spooled with braided line pulling a No. 12 planer and a Sea Witch. Ross doesn’t slow the boat until he’s fooled several fish. After one line’s down, everyone springs into action, jigging lines to encourage more bites.

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Which is exactly what we did. While the bite was off slightly, after a few more singles and whammies, we had a nice catch in the box. “We got a mess of fish, and you guys had a great time,” Ross said at the end of the day. “What more could you ask for?”

What more could any angler ask for?

Kite Fliers
The first signs of yellowfin in early spring came when boats returned to Virginia Beach Fishing Center with holds full of tuna. As soon as water temperatures hit the upper 60s, the tuna bite was on. Leading the charge was Capt. Steve Richardson on Backlash, a 53-foot custom Jim Smith hull that is as remarkable as its skipper.

Richardson looks for the fish in any finger or eddy of warm water surrounded by significantly cooler temperatures. “That concentrates the fish and the bait,” he explains, “making them easy to find.”

Just like Ross and the rest of the tuna fleet, Richardson relies on Sea Witch lures and Ilanders to catch yellowfin. But when the bite gets tough, he switches it up.

“I love to fly a kite,” he says. “The tuna really come to it.” Late in the season, when the water is hot and clear and the tuna are focused on flying fish, Richardson uses a kite to dangle two rubber flying fish. “With no leader in the water, I get more bites,” he says.

He’ll fly his baits along a temperature break or over structure, and especially around breaking fish.

The conditions have to be right for a kite bite. “The bait should spend only 30 percent of the time in the water,” Richardson says. The rest of the time, the rubber flying fish is in the air. Richardson tells stories of yellowfin rocketing out of the water to attack the rubber flier. “That’s about as much excitement as you can take!” he says.

Jiggin’ and Chunkin’
Capt. Joe Riley, of the Ocean City, Maryland-based Muff Diver, is perfectly located to hit the tuna all along their range in the canyons and on the seamounts as far north as New Jersey. Most days he starts by trolling spreader bars in the short riggers and split-bill ballyhoo on the flats and long riggers. When he gets whammied by a pack of yellowfin, he’ll order anyone not fighting a fish to drop a vertical jig.

If the fish are really stacked up, Riley switches to chunking with butterfish. He chunks with a five-line spread, three deep rods and two that he feeds back in the slick. The deep rods are set 75 to 150 feet below the boat by attaching a 6- to 10-ounce sinker 50 feet up the line from the bait. Chunking often requires stealthy rigging. Riley starts with a light-wire 5/0 circle hook that he completely inserts in a chunk of butterfish. He ties a 6-foot length of 30- to 80-pound fluorocarbon to the hook. The leader is crimped to a 90-pound-test barrel swivel that is tied to the line running off a 50-pound outfit. Sometimes he’ll drop a vertical jig off one of the outrigger clips. “The rocking motion of the boat gives the jig its action,” he explains.

“A lot of time, the whole school will come to the boat,” he says. “We’ll hook more fish while we fight others.

“We’ll leave one fish in the water, and more will come up to the back of the boat. We can bail them like dolphin.”

Trip Planner

Start trolling to locate fish, then switch to jigging or chunking, depending on how numerous and aggressive the tuna are. If the bite is tough, dangle a couple of Yummee Fly’n Fish, off a kite with the leader sleeve reinforced with air line tubing.

Rods: 50-pound stand-up rods for trolling, chunking and kite-fishing. For jigging, Shimano Trevala rods matched to Shimano Torium reels with 80-pound braided line.

Reels: 50-pound-class two-speed reels spooled with 80-pound mono for trolling and chunking or 100-pound braid for kite-fishing. Tie a Bimini twist in the end of the braided line and attach a 100-pound-test wind-on leader. End the rig with a 6-foot length of 50- to 100-pound fluorocarbon attached with a wind-on swivel.

Rigs: Sea Witch lures, Ilanders, cedar plugs, Green Machines, 6-inch and 8-inch squid bars, or 100- to 300-gram flutter jigs with 5/0 Mustad Ultra Point Offshore hooks and 30- to 100-pound fluorocarbon leader.

Anglers start targeting yellowfin off Oregon Inlet, North Carolina, as early as April and follow the fish through Virginia Beach, Virginia; Ocean City, Maryland; and Cape May, New Jersey, into the summer. Reverse the course, ending off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, in October and November. That’s seven months of tuna fishing, never enough of a good thing.

What: Yellowfin tuna.

Where: Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, to Cape May, New Jersey.
**
When:** April to November.
**
Who:**
Oregon Inlet, N.C.
Capt. Jeff Ross
Obsession Sportfishing Charters
252-480-0094
www.obsession-charters.com

Virginia Beach, Va.
Capt. Steve Richardson
Backlash Sportfishing
757-286-0711
www.backlashsportfishing.com

Ocean City, Md.
Capt. Joe Riley
Muff Diver Charter Fishing
800-243-0324
www.muffdiver.net

yellowfin-gaff.jpg
Ric Burnley
yellowfin-diagram.jpg

Highflier

Kite-fishing has become a deadly, effective tactic for targeting yellowfin in the mid-Atlantic. Capt. Steve Richardson creates a spread combining rubber flying fish (1) flown from the kite with trolled Sea Witch lures (2). Both baits work well on the tuna. Joe Mahler / www.markerjockey.com
yellowfin-grab.jpg
Ric Burnley
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