Kona Hawaii fishing report - Archive -

Kona Hawaii fishing report - April 2004

Big blue marlin (500+) were here in the middle of April. Many of us were expecting this years first "grander" (1000+) marlin to be caught but, all the granders hooked up (there were a few) were able to win their fights. Just for the record, most big marlin with the fight. I only hooked into one big one about 600 lbs. during the run and broke line on it about an hour into the fight. The big mama's are no longer around and only a few small ones are being caught. The trolling bite overall is still pretty good though. Lots of mahi mahi, ono and spearfish were caught this month. The ono run has stopped but there's still plenty of mahi mahi and spearfish to go around. Both are excellent eating and can be a lot of fun to catch if your captain is running light tackle.

The bottom fishing bite is back in full swing. The bite is still mostly amberjack, almaco jacks and sharks but the snapper have been biting too. Gray snapper is pretty abundant right now if you know where the holes are. Last week we got a big amberjack and though we tried to release it, the fish just wouldn't swim down and soon died so we took it to the scales. It weighed in at 85 lbs. and has now taken its place as Kona's biggest amberjack of the year. Just a few days ago we caught another fish that made Kona's "Big Fish List". While dropping bait toward the bottom, a barracuda swimming mid-water grabbed it. The fight was short but what an impressive looking fish. This big toothed critter topped the scales at 43.5 lbs. edging out a 41.5 pounder caught just the week before. Barracuda are generally not an abundant fish here but this year I've already heard of several being caught. Both amberjack and barracuda are not consumed in Hawaii due to the high risk of contracting ciguatera poisoning. There's a good web site about this at www.cigua.com

See 'ya on the water,
Capt. Jeff Rogers
http://FISHinKONA.com