The ocean must be a rough place to make a living. I mean, by the time a yellowfin tuna grows to 50 pounds or more, there should be relatively little they need to worry about. Right?
Wrong.
On a trip to the canyons last week with OTW contributing writer, Larry Backman aboard the Skipjack, one of those 50-pound yellowfin tuna ate a rigged ballyhoo on a flatline right in the boat’s propwash. Larry was on the rod and after the initial run slowed and he gained back all the line, the fish was ready to come aboard. I reached for the leader while the third crewmember, Christian, stood ready with the gaff. The tuna, which was making slow circles at the surface, looked thoroughly beaten, when suddenly, it came back to life and bolted out of sight just as my fingers grazed the leader.
“Something’s after him,” Larry said.
I had my doubts. What on earth could make a meal of a 50-pound tuna? After all, we were fishing out of Falmouth, MA, not Hawaii or Central America. But as I listened to the reel scream louder and longer than it had on the tuna’s initial run, my doubts began to disappear as quickly as the line.
The line planed upward, and just a few seconds after we watched the tuna disappear, about 200 yards off the stern a tremendous blue marlin erupted from the sea. The billfish leapt a second time, and upon its reentry, the line went slack and the reel went quiet.
We worked quickly to send out some marlin lures as we got back onto the troll, and minutes later when another enormous hole was ripped in the ocean’s surface below a skirted lure the size of my forearm, I was thankful that as long as I had some fiberglass between me and the cobalt blue water, I’d remain at the top of the food chain.