WE’D been dragging lures across a seemingly lifeless ocean for about five hours. There was not much chatter on the boat radio, and on a calm day on a smooth sea we drifted into an air of somnolence as the lures bubbled through a glass sea. Sometimes when it is like this, you start to see things that aren’t there. A fin, a shadow, a dark shape in a wave. For a second I thought I was imagining I saw a deep shadow behind the closest lure. Then a fin, a bill and a huge hit made the reel scream. The day and the mood changed in an instant. It took two hours to get that fish to the boat.
If you like catching big fish from trailer boats, blue marlin are the ultimate challenge. Where I live, on Queensland’s Gold Coast, there are quite a few boats of 6.5 metres or less that regularly target and catch blue marlin in the months between November and June. In recent years we’ve caught them in the other months as well, giving a potential 12-month season. I’ve spent a lot of time chasing these great fish from my 6-metre plate aluminium centre cabin, Gemma 3. They are quite fickle creatures, turning up in numbers one day and being absent the next. The biggest challenge of all is catching blue marlin from a small boat with only two anglers on board. When the hookup comes, one angler takes the rod while the skipper drives, clears all the gear and then hopefully leaders the fish and removes the hooks. The boat gets a bit busy! I’ve caught 54 blues from my boat so far, but it does get harder as I get older!
From a relatively small boat the distances are large, and require good weather and relatively calm conditions. Blue marlin rarely stray inside the continental shelf. They tend to feed in water over 150 metres in depth and the sloping edge of the continental shelf where the depth rapidly drops from 80 to 200 metres is a good place to put the lures out. Where I fish this is roughly 50 kilometres offshore, a long run in a small boat. There can be a lot of water between fish on the wider grounds, and it is not uncommon to troll all day without a bite. When the bite comes it is usually sudden, with a big boil and hopefully a screaming reel. Blue marlin are quite different to blacks or stripes when it comes to how they attack a lure. Most strikes are instant and unseen and very aggressive in comparison to stripies and blacks that often follow the lure for a while before striking.
Blue marlin are the only fish species I chase where I hope to only encounter smaller fish. The average blue in our waters is around 140 kilos, but fish over 200 kilos are relatively common, and they are a lot harder to land on standup tackle. While you will catch blue marlin on stand up 24 kilo tackle the fight times can be very long. A standup 37 kilo outfit is a much better weapon but you need a lot of line capacity. 5 stand up 37 kilo outfits represents a serious investment in tackle. Harnesses are mandatory to fish this gear properly and we generally run the reels at 8 kilos of drag pressure on the strike button, but pull the lever a bit back from that spot when we troll. Once the fish has run, jumped and then settled into the fight we push the lever forward to the strike setting. On the reel I like to have about 900 metres of 80 pound Dacron on the 80W size reels with a top shot of about a hundred metres of mono. This gives you extra line capacity and less stretch when the fish is deep, and the mono top shot gives you a bit of elasticity when the fish is close to the boat.
One of the biggest problems when chasing blue marlin from a small boat with only two on board is getting spooled by big fast fish. It is quite amazing how much line these fish remove from a reel in a few seconds, and if you get caught trying to clear the gear the fish may have you down to the
bottom of your line load before you’ve got the teaser in. I always find it hard to put less lines in the water, but three lines and a teaser is the ideal spread when fishing two up. This lets you clear the gear quickly and minimises tangles when the fish runs.
Most blue marlin fight in a similar pattern. The take off is generally spectacular, one of the most exciting things you can see in gamefishing. They run fast, greyhound across the surface and often change direction quickly. Last year we hooked an absolute monster blue that took the best part of a kilometre of line in about a minute, and then came back to the boat jumping dragging all that line behind it.
It is common on 15 and 24 kilo gear to be busted up by the fish dragging a loop of mono through the water at a speed so fast the water pressure breaks the line. If you survive the “blast off”, the fish will generally go deep, and the fight settles down a bit. At this point I like to drive the boat into the current as this tends to plane the fish upwards and can greatly shorten the fight. On a two-speed reel this is often a good time to drop to a lower gear and work the fish hard to regain some of the line lost on the first run.
Blue marlin fight until they are totally cooked, and they rarely give you an easy fight. In general blues are a lot easier to handle at the boat than blacks or striped marlin. I always remove the hooks carefully (single hook rigs are a lot safer for this than 2 hook rigs) and swim the fish for a while before setting it free. While catching blue marlin from a 6 metre tinny isn’t for everyone, I’ve found it actually not too hard once you get a few fish under your belt, and I find my captures from Gemma 3 a lot more satisfying than the fish I’ve caught or helped catch from bigger fly bridge gameboats.
