Latest Trophy Catch

Angler Marc from the USA spend a couple of days GT Popping with us aboard Bite Me Too hoping to land his first ever GT. After a few smaller to mid-sized fish his Cubera got monstered...

Marc reports:

"That last day turned out to be the most rewarding fishing experience I've had.   

Steady rain.  Heavy at times, but a pleasant temperature.  Relatively calm.  High Tide.  Conditions were perfect.  Third cast of the trip, three rips of the popper and all I see is a giant gray shadow come out of the water totally engulfing the popper.  The fight was on as the fish struck at the end of a very long cast.  Drag screaming.  Sikeli was an amazing captain, immediately maneuvering the boat away from the reef as I did battle.  I 've caught plenty of big fish, but none with the brute strength of a GT.  Unbelievable.  The drag of my Stella 18,000 was locked all the way and the fish was still able to take line with ease."

 

The GT Short Length measured a whopping 132cm (52 inches) and was caught on a Heru El-Toro.

The fish was released unharmed although the popper took a bit of a beating !

 

 

Winter Kadavu Fishing Update

Its Wahoo Central now around Kadavu Island !
The Wahoo are thick and we are catching many Wahoo in sized up to 45kg (100lbs).

Magazine Editor Shane from Fishing SA Magazine with a 40+kg Wahoo

Vicki & Wayne (Mine's bigger than your's - Ooops) Nice one Vicki !

 Ben from Australia with a nice Wahoo caught trolling aboard Bite Me Too

Lance with a 40kg Hoo

The Wahoo are not the only species around. We are seeing some nice Pacific Sailfish mixed in as well as Mahi Mahi schooling a little off the reef.

Some anglers are even tossing a few popper at the reef and catching some great winter GTs

Vicki with a nice winter GT on Popper

The Wahoo will continue to be our main target species for the next two months as well as Sailfish along the outer barrier reef. We expect to still have great winter fishing well into October. With the water temp now hovering just above 24 anglers fishing offshore should also see some Striped Marlin and short billed Spearfish.

July Kadavu Update - Variety !

We are now well out of the normal summer GT Popping season and the Trades have started to push in but so far the weather has been reasonably cooperative - So much so that we are still throwing Poppers and seeing some nice GTs.

 Matt from Australia with a very nice looking GT

 Father Warren no slouch with a Popper rod either !

 Fair few Mahi Mahi around

 The big story for the next few months of course will be the winter Wahoo run. With the water temp now hitting 26C the Wahoo are starting to gather along the Great Astrolabe Barrier Reef. We expect a good season this year with Wahoo being caught as early as May and the first few Pacific Sailfish also showing. The Wahoo packs should grow to average 25-30 fish with an average size of around 60lbs.

IGFA World Record Released

Last week skipper Joeli took angler Kenneth from Singapore out for some GT Popping on the brand new GT boat Bite Me Too.
Using a Dogfight 6500 on a Carpenter Blue Lagoon and GT Mania lure, Kenneth fought a huge GT for over 25 minutes until Joe could finally grab the leader.

The fish measured 57 Inches (short length) smashing the current IGFA All-Tackle Length World Record however, because of the long fight, Kenneth elected to snap one quick photo and get the GT back in the water as soon as possible. Joe swam the fish for 5 minutes before a healthy release....
Nice one guys, commendable !

First Blood

The new boat Bite Me Too went into action with Joe skippering taking out Peter & Sophie from Australia for a bit of trolling, GT Popping and Jigging on a couple of half days.

 

Peter came with the right GT Tackle

 First GT !

 A nice Bluefin Trevally for Sophie

 

A bigger GT for Peter

 A little doggie caught trolling

 Peter jigged up a bigger Dogtooth Tuna

Just to keep the other Resort guests happy.....Dinner !

The Yellowfin Tuna are now starting to move in with several big schools close in to the outer Barrier Reef. Still around the 20-40lb size but the big cow Yellowfin won't be far behind.
We still have openings for bookings in March / April and Matava Resort has some crazy Accommodation Specials available so drop us a line here !

New Offshore Fishing Boat Almost Complete

Work is well under way on our brand new offshore sportfishing boat Bite Me II being built by BlueWater craft in Navua, Viti Levu. She will be a 28ft go-fast go-anywhere fishing machine designed to perfectly service the growing GT Popping and deep water jigging specialists as well as offer anglers the opportunity to go after pelagic gamefish such as marlin, Pacific Sailfish, yellowfin Tuna, Dorado and Wahoo on stand-up tackle. Powered by the very latest Twin 150 Mercury 4-strokes she will cruise at 25 kts and be capable of reaching 35+ knots at WOT.

Sister Ship

Our vessel will be based on the above design however we have added a number of modifications to suit our fishing around Kadavu Island.

The main hull is complete with the large centre console going on now.

With a 400L in-floor fuel tank she will be very stable for casting and jigging and have extensive range.

We have specified grab rails at the perfect height for safety and ease of casting poppers

There will be plenty of rod storage

and of course easy access transom door for hauling in a big Yellowfin or sliding in the big GTs for release !

I will be personally supervising the finishing touches and loading all the required brand new safety equipment in a few weeks and we hope to have her in Marine Survey and in service by the beginning of December. We are now taking bookings for the summer season starting 1st January 2014.

I can’t wait to barrel out to the Kadavu Seamount and drop some jigs !

Summer Kadavu Fishing Update

The GT fishing recently has been pretty modest by our standards. We have been having to work harder than normal with La Nina weather patterns still affecting the ocean current directions along the outer barrier reef.  First off, some pics from Mark from the US who was kind enough to let me post a few pics from his trip.

 Dogtooth Tuna on a Jig

 

Coral Trout on a Stickbait

 Always fun the Red Bass

Mangrove Jack !

Not really any Kadavu Monsters in the mix but a very nice variety of species on both Poppers and Jigs. Offshore South of Kadavu there a lots of schooling skipjack tuna and along the reef, yellowfin to 100lbs but the really big cow yellowfin should move into Kadavu waters in the next few weeks.
They are coming in from the North so currently they are being seen between Kadavu and Beqa Lagoon. This 73kg fish below was caught yesterday aboard NoahRay (Freedive Fiji Charters) fishing off Beqa.

Nice Yellowfin guys !

Other recent news, Stephanie Choate, daughter of Tim Choate ( One of the founders of  The Billfish Foundation ) knocked off the Fiji Womens W-08 kg Narrowbarred Mackerel Record with this fish:

It made wonderful Kokoda for all the guests !

IGFA GT Record up for Grabs

As most anglers will be aware, the IGFA now has a new Record Catagory - The All Tackle Length Record. This is strictly a Release Catagory so all eligible fish must be released in healthy condition.
 As we release all GTs caught here, this record catagory is ideal for us to have a go at the World Record.

Wait ! Measure that !

The current record is 107cm so about 42 Inches, held by Patrick Sebil
We have released plenty of GTs larger than that... This season we will be measuring all the big ones with our brand new IGFA Length Scale !

For those of you aware of the hand made custom Eyre rods we use on Bite Me, you might like to take a quick look at the new Eyre Nano Technology GT Bone Popping rods. I expect them to compare well this season against the top end Ripple Fishers and Hots...

This fish would have taken the IGFA Length World Record !

Fame Anybody ?

We are arranging an opportunity for World renown photographer Jon Schwartz to visit us and photograph GT Poping aboard Tease Me this summer. We need a couple of GT anglers willing to model !
You have probably seen many of Jon's photos gracing the covers of publications such as Marlin Magazine and BlueWater Magazine. You can see some of his work here www.bluewaterjon.com
Jon will be taking action stills of anglers fighting GTs, posing with their catch and releasing, some of which will be filmed from underwater......


We need to fit this in between the 18th and 25th February. Matava Eco-Adventure Resort currently has a 'Special' on for February but it does not include Fishing Packages.
As this would not be a 'normal' fishing trip we are offering to extend this Special Second Person Half Price deal for anbody who wants to GT Pop on Tease Me and be photographed all day long !
Our primary target will be GTs, the bigger the better but if we see an opportunity to pop for yellowfin, wahoo or jig for dogtooth tuna and film that as well, excllent !

This is a great opportunity to get a ridiculously cheap GT Popping trip for two on the Great Astroabe Barrier Reef, Kadavu and be presented with your own professional photos of the trip. Oh, and you might get famous as well.
Drop us an email if you are interested.....

Prime Slot opens up for Anglers

Summer Dolphinfish are numerous

Matava Eco-Adventure Resort was totally fully booked with divers for early January however it has just had a cancellation from the 1st to the 10th January 2012 opening up some accommodation space.
This means that Bite Me Gamefishing Charters now has a slot available for any anglers who might wish to charter Bite Me or Tease Me between the 1-10th January 2012

During our summer season we usually concentrate on offshore heavy tackle gamefishing for blue marlin and yellowfin tuna or we focus on heavy tackle popping for GTs and deepwater jigging for Dogtooth Tuna.

Summer time is usually when we see the larger blue marlin

The summer Yellowfin Tuna run is when we get the big cow yellowfin

Yellowfin boiling on glassy seas....a typical summer sight

Weather conditions are usually hot, humid and calm, ideal for offshore gamefishing, working outer barrier reef slopes with poppers for huge GTs and deepwater jigging.

If anybody is interested, please drop me a line any time at adrian@GameFishingFiji.com