La Jolla 11-16-2020 Big Fish hookup on the Solo Skiff and........

[Salty]

I can relate to the profanity... Some lost fish hurt more than others. One in particular haunts me. After a long day on the water, our crew of 3 finally hooked up to a massive bluefin on the kite rig. We saw the strike and it was big. This thing fought harder than any other BFT we've had on a the line and we've landed up to 300lbs. We fought it for an hour and we lost it at color about 20' under the boat due to a tiny abrasion on the 300# braid. There was much profanity from all 3 of us... All you can do is replay any mistakes in your head over and over, then get back out and do it again! Plus, when you land that next big fight, that bit of redemption makes it that much better Doesn't make it suck any less in the moment through!

[GregAndrew]

Mark, I am going with a good sized YT that eventually wraps you on something. A bit hard to tell for sure with the rod tip not in view much of the time, but pretty sure that is what I think.

[FISH11]

There were was never any runs and that rod has brought up some good size Yellowtail and 35+ lbs YFT. Had some head shakes but it was always straight down. My line was straight down and about 5' from the bottom while drifting in almost no current at the time. The whole time it was straight down, it was hard to get up, but 3-4 times I started to get it coming and would gain about 10-15 feet and then it would just pull full drag and thumb on reel to get back to just off the bottom. I've always been able to get then moving and up the water column, this was so hard to lift and impossible to keep the line gained. What ever it was the bottom was clean and was not hung up. There were next to no swells so the skiff wasn't even going up and down. It was steady and then it would just pull straight down every bit I could gain after I would gain about 15' maybe more. I did look at the video and realized that after the breakoff, I wound in the braid and the reel was still in low gear. I could tell that there was no way I had reeled in 80' of braid, provably more like 50'. So today I checked the reels and found that a few reel had the braid sun bleached for the UV rays while sitting on the kayaks and now the Solo Skiff. I removed about 120' of braid and replace those sections with new braid. I think that the top section of braid had been weakened and that is why it broke instead of the 40lb fluorocarbon leader. This was stronger than even the approx. 46 lb Yellowtail I lost after getting to the surface 3 times in 100' water about 3 years ago. It would go straight down but I could bring it back up each time after about 20 minutes on the 3rd time it came up a Sea Lion popped up at the back of the Hobie Kayak, it puuled one more time and as it was going down the circle hook popped out cause during the fight and me pulling very hard caused the circle hook to come out. At least that time I got to see it at the surface 3 times. I'm not sure which feels worse, seeing it or not.

[JohnMckroidJr]

Definitely worse to see a good fish and then lose it. If it's unseen, we can justify in our minds that it was not anything special.

[Nobody]

Definitely a BSB

[the dude]

Sorry man, but really looks like your stuck on the bottom. The current can make if feel fishy. We've all done it...just my opinion.

[jorluivil]

I'm willing to bet it was a lizard fish

[h2ofishfo]

Originally Posted by the dude

Sorry man, but really looks like your stuck on the bottom. The current can make if feel fishy. We've all done it...just my opinion.

Just beat the guy when he’s down huh 😂😂

[Direct C51]

Originally Posted by the dude

Sorry man, but really looks like your stuck on the bottom. The current can make if feel fishy. We've all done it...just my opinion.

I hate to say it, but this is what it looks like to me too. I’ve fought some snags for much longer than I want to admit, it happens.