A report from Eric and SteveL for mikescatchreport.com
ERIC
I arrived at the beach park in the morniing and there were already some people fishing, including at least one fly rod guy, so I walked to the point and began casting around.
The weather was pretty decent with not too much wind. I was using the Abel reel and a 7 weight rod with the Cortland clear line. For awhile I fished a Mantis shrimp pattern I tied but wasn't getting any hits so I switched to a version of the Steve Fly and in a couple casts I had a big one on.
W-T-F
I could tell this fish was big. It kept running and running and running. I looked down into the reel and I could see the backing pile get smaller and smaller and smaller. Luckily the fish stopped and I could start fighting it back in to me. But the real problem was loosing the tip of the rod when the backing knot hit the tip-top and pulled the sections apart. I fought the fish with the remainder of the rod and after awhile I managed to grab the top section and shove it back onto the rod.
The fish ran a couple times then started circling around as it got close. Smaller fish usually come straight in at this point but the big ones always circle. I got a look at it and it was a big boy. Wide and dark across the top. One of the biggest I've seen.
I finally got my hands on the fish, looked like an eight pounder, awkwardly took some pictures before letting it go.
STEVEL
So the weather here has been cool* and lousy (rain) but that didn’t stop your brother from going out this past Sunday morning to fish. I got a call from him around 9am and he said he had hooked and landed a “kind of big one.” He estimates it must have been around 8 pounds.
I went with Ed at mid-day to fish the rising tide at Hickam and all we did was stand in the water and wind for several hours feeding fish getting chilled. In fact, I am sick now with a cold. And I just got over the Norovirus a couple of weeks ago – that was no fun.
FISHING, FOOTBALL AND BEYONCE
The previous week I went out to one of our spots and pounded the flats as a wintery blast of north wind swept in and was able to catch a large weke (goatfish) and a small o'io (bonefish).
After that I sat in the parking lot with another fly fisher, Greg, to talk story and thaw out. I couldn’t feel my fingertips and he said he couldn’t feel his toes. I should just stayed home to drink hot cocoa and watch TV. Nahhh, then I would have complained how I wasted my time sitting at home. BUT I got home in time to watch the Super Bowl. Now that was a waste of time. I even dozed through the half-time show and missed the steamy Beyonce performance. Couldn’t believe I did that. I got up in time to watch the second half kick off and the stupid blackout.
HOWEVER...
The fishing was better the last couple of months. In between the wet weather --hooked six bones on the south shore and one at Hickam. SteveT was able to hook a small one at Hickam but had an ulua (jack crevalle) charge in to grab it, snapping his tippet.
And I was able to break in my Lamson Litespeed and my custom Sage 6 weight Z-Axis on a six pounder. I have been fishing with much lighter gear lately but I don’t think I want to go much lighter than six weight. I don't want to break any of my 5 weights. I'm saving those for the lunker rainbows that I will catch someday on one of your streams. Is that wishful thinking? I also used my Redington CPX 6 weight one weekend and my G. Loomis on another. I figure I either use them or sell them. I have a redington CPX switch rod somewhere in that pile that is still virgin.
EXPERIMENTS
Lately I have been experimenting with Stroft line to construct my tippets. Super strong and much like the thinnest of Stren Ultra-thin. It’s kind of expensive having to mail order it but I am always game to try other brands of line. The other brand I have played with is Sunline out of Japan. They make one of the few monofilaments that float. Used that to construct some floating furled leaders for Stan Wright, who used it trout fishing on the Missouri River in Montana, flipping hoppers with his Tenkara rod. He really likes it. But we can’t find more line. This was a sample spool that I was able to get from Glenn Ebusuzaki last year. Runs around $18 per spool of 1.5 kilo--around 250 meters.
*The Hawaii definition of 'cool' or 'cold' means the temperature was somewhere between 70 to 78 degrees.