[Bertram]

You are watching GT Channel, this is Bertram reporting live from Kilwa

Hi guys,

Had four GT on 1st day 14 to 25 FKG (Formula Kilos) not BKG (Bullshit Kilos), caught all these on popper for a change. This was a warm up day as I wanted to see the spots and check out the conditions.

2sd day had 9 fish from 15 to 35 FKG ( 1 in the morning plus three raises, afternnoon went ballistic), 3 best went 29, 30 and 35. Had at least 20 raises during the day, 12 hook ups, lost three fish on hook pulls (including a good fish right at the boat that was a lot larger than the 35), no breaks. 50-50 poppers and sticks. Had 3 bluefin trevallies, 2 bloody cudas the size of man eating crocodiles that luckily shook the lure out by the boat. Carpenter Gamma stick cathing all the big ones, shame I only brought one and the "crocs" destroyed it.

Guys, the place rocks. Its new moon spring tides today and tomorrow, water temp is 28.5 C, light wind 5 to 15 knots, calm to moderate sea, wind gusting a bit in late afternoon (thermic wind), very hot and humid climate.

Great lodge, good boat fast and stable, great skipper (we got drunk last night) who knows his business. James knows how to position the boat, takes you at the right moment of tide, checks his tide time table, knows his reefs, current and Gt behaviour...nice, you can concentrate on the fishing and doesn t have to worry about these essential things, he takes care of these. A real pro in the leage of Andrew Parsons (Bengerra Lodge) and Damon Olsen (Nomad Sportfishing). I am impressed.

5 more days to go, taking it easy this morning...soare head.

Will post pix when I am back.

Ho yeah, fishing spots are no more than 15 to 20 mins away. We will go to other further locations tomorrow. We get back for lunch as the slack tide is around noon, so it s nice to come back, have a shower, food, siesta and go back again fishing all fresh and ready when the current kicks in. Am getting lazy, hey ? Loving it.
Got to go, need to do a bit of rigging and select a few lures for this afternoon. Incoming tide starts at 3 pm.

Watch this place, stay tuned.

Ciaoooooooooooooooooo

B

Este tema ha sido editado por Bertram: 31 January 2006 - 08:30 AM

[dentex]

Bertram dixit

Ho yeah, fishing spots are no more than 15 to 20 mins away. We will go to other further locations tomorrow. We get back for lunch as the slack tide is around noon, so it s nice to come back, have a shower, food, siesta and go back again fishing all fresh and ready when the current kicks in. Am getting lazy, hey ? Loving it.
Got to go, need to do a bit of rigging and select a few lures for this afternoon. Incoming tide starts at 3 pm.[color=#FF0000][/color]

Yeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaah,I love these place,Nicola are you ready to bring us there ??

Este tema ha sido editado por dentex: 31 January 2006 - 06:41 PM

[Bertram]

Update on Kilwa fishing :

Yesterday afternoon we went to the reef but a local net boat was lying its nets accross the best part. They were catching cudas and other stuff and scared the GTs away.
Somehow at the end of the reef we found GTs and I caught five fish in five drifts, 17 to 29 KG, 3 hook pulls, a few raises, 1 large cuda-croc (I hate these things), 1 lovely red bass and a bluefin trevally...all under 2 hours. In the meantime James young boy, only 10 year old, threw the skippping plug and hooked up a monster. After 10 mins the young but keen chap was finished and was about to get pulled overboard. James took over and soon a really big GT got to the boat, a good 40+. I grabbed the fish by the tail and leader to lift out of the water, the hook came out and the fish slipped out of my hand straight in the water...I felt like a real idiot !
Then the netboat came too close to us so we moved away and came back home after a few cast by the point close to the lodge (another big barra- yuk).
Today, we were keen to go out before the sun comes up. We did and at 5 am were quietly sneaking out of the bay. The current was very strong the water dirty and the wind blowing bad enough to disturb the sea. Fished hard for 2 hours, nothing. We decided to take our revenge jigging and the same happened. Like if the gods of fishing decided to switch the fish off from eating lures and anglers hooks. I managed 3 rosy snappers that we took back for lunch. Ho, its lunch time and I can smell them from here....

Going out later this pm with the incoming tide, wind still strong but conditions are fishable.

Ciaoooooooooo

B

[medregal]

Any news about doggies Bertram?

[Ivan]

I hope the doggies are there and they are big and hungry. BECAUSE WE ARE GOING THERE IN 5 WEEKS!!!!

[Bertram]

Hi guys,

Pictures speak better than words, so here they are there in no particular order.

For the stats, I caught 26 GTs in 5 days and a half, 20 over 20 KG, best one 35, smallest 17.
Lost 2 fish on line breaks (one time the coils got stuck as my line was loose, the other time the line parted in the middle for no reasons other than a breaking problem when my reel got smashed earlier in the boat by a 25 liters water jerrycan ????). Had about 8 hook pulls and raised around 20 more fish in missed strikes, swirls, follows and jump-offs.
About 10 bluefin trevallies, a couple of nice jobfish, some baby yellowfins, a few red bass, a coral trout and heaps of large barracudas.
We went jigging a couple of hours during slack tide and managed to find the doggies. James caught his 1st ever doggy on a jig and found this absolutely fantastic. He is hooked on jigging and will work at finding good jigging spots for the future. You could spend your whole day jigging the yft if you want, when the big ones will move in it could be real fun. His son Kent is a keen angler and will show many of us how to catch fish. A great young boy that should be an example for many young kids.




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This is Karambisi a 264 cat with twin 125. fast stable and perfect for popping.Ideal for 2.

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A view of the lodge.

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The gantry that use to be designed for marlin. Good catch & release policy at the lodge, all GTs are to be returned.

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Full power on an SP78UHL/TwinSpin/TufXP130 combo. Short fights are better for good release.

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My 1st Kilwa GT.

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A fish from the KingFish Reef. I caught plenty on this reef, one day had 8 fish under 2 hours.

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I got this rebass on a jig in the 75 meters drop off at the mouth of the bay.

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Big jobfish love stickbait. This one was a cracker.

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James Taylor knows his business, he is a good angler and a great host.

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The Cliff is an awsome spot for GT. Fight hard as the fish will go for the caves and holes in the lava cliff.

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Had 4 strikes, landed 3, lost one. Fish were very clear in color and active in the surf zone along the rocks.

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Young angler Kent has already caught his share of big fish. He speaks like an old hand angler and is amazingly good at casting.

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When you hook up a Kilwa GT this is what you get. My average was slightly smaller than in full season.

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Dropping jigs on busting yft was a killer. Young Kent shows us the soon to be evening shashimi.

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This coarl trout had a fishing line in the throat coming out of the stomach. Yet it took a large popper.

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Heavy pressure as the fish comes close in right under the boat. This is when I am happy to use a Carpenter and can put pressure on the rod without any fear.

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An average Kilwa GT. The fish are very, very strong due to warm water (from 28.5 to 29.5°C) and current rich oxygen water. Much stronger than in the Coral Sea where the water temp was 23°C.

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Good fish, strong fight, what can I ask more ?

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This is the biggest I caught. 35 real kilos on the formula. Check the exploded body of the Gamma Stick.

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This one came out at 30 kilos with the formula. It fought like hell.

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James first ever doggy on a jig. We celebrated that fish in true fishermen style well into the night.

Ciaoooooooooo

B

Este tema ha sido editado por Bertram: 07 February 2006 - 07:10 PM

[Ivan]

AWESOME
AWESOME
AWESOME

great quality fish and great pictures. You had fun old boy.


And I AM GOING THERE IN 30 DAYS!!!!!

[caranx]

I can see the frencho had a good time, you were "seriously" smiling Good for you mate, I like the idea of unspoiled jigging waters, sounds veeeery interesting.

Ciao

Nicola

[JON]

Bertrand ,

FANTASTIC !

Nice white sandy beach and clear water too !

Jon .

[juanjuan]

Congratulations,
nice fishes and a very nice place, isn´t it Nicola? , good poppin´ unspoiled jiggin´.........
maybe in the future?

[TJ Hook]

Great pictures, looks like you had a good time.
Can I ask a question please, the leaders look heavy in the pictures can I ask how heavy they are. I have been using 80lb Flouro but these look much heavier if you still get bit with heavier leaders I will up mine a bit.
Tightlines,
Tim

[JON]

Great pictures, looks like you had a good time.
Can I ask a question please, the leaders look heavy in the pictures can I ask how heavy they are. I have been using 80lb Flouro but these look much heavier if you still get bit with heavier leaders I will up mine a bit.
Tightlines,
Tim

Tim ,

Bertrand uses #130 PE line exclusively , his leader would be at least #130 but chances are 50% higher which make it #200 leader .

I use fluorocarbon leader only when using stickbait , for surface popper , I use mono leader as most of the time the leader is above the water anyway .

Jon .

[Bertram]

Hi Tim,

Jon is right I use 130lbs braided line and heavy leaders. I now use a twisted 130lbs Jinkai casting leader of 3 meters long (it makes it 260lbs in theory) that is ended by a short 290lbs SeaGuard Fluorocarbon bite leader of 80cm long.
The short leader can be used to wire the fish once at the boat or simply lift it out of the water for small fish and "collateral catches".

I think that the heavy leader doesn't make much difference, I do use a slighlty thinner diameter bite leader for underwater stick that is 240lbs and more supple. The trick with fluorocarbon is to elongate it by hands before tying it. It makes it a lot more supple and straight (it usually is quite coily when out of the spool).

Have also been using a new rigging method designed in partnership with Eric that is completely knotless from spool to bite leader with great success. A must for underwater and floating stick !!!!

Ciao,

B

[TJ Hook]

Jon & Bertram,

Thanks for the info guys, always want to learn from those who walk the walk. (or was that walk the dog!)
I will be upping my leader strengths 2 or 3 fold.

Tightlines,
Tim

[Bertram]

Hello,

Despite the GT popping at Kilwa, the jigging needs serious investigation. There are doggies in the area and it needs to be worked out when, where and how often they feed. We worked a drop off on the outing of the bay and found rosy jobfish (doggies' favourite food) and jigged some of them up. Then we found baby rosies and spotted some serious echoes on the sounder. I had a small rosy come up with deep teeth marks that were not from a shark. On the same drop James got a hook up and we knew it wasn't a snapper or red bass. The fish took a lot of line (James fishes light line only 35lbs) and finally came onboard after a few minutes. Mission accomplised we could then carry on popping....I wasn't gonna spend most of my time investigating jigging as it's not what I am very good at. The jigging fanatics can do that when they will fish the place. Since the current is strong I advise you to take jigs in the 300 to 400 grm to speed up the drop and get better line control.
I tried a Seven Seas jig supposed to be the best of them all for doggies and didn't get a sniff. I switched to a humble Blue Fox Herring 250 grms ( a â?¬5 job) and got bite after bite from all sorts. I gave it to James and he got the dog on it then lost another one on the strike.


I was amazed to hook up bluefin trevallies in as deep as 135 meters. They were shoaling up quite thight in those depth.

The yft did respond very well to jigs, dropping a jig ahead of the tunas was a sure hit or dropping the jig after hook up on a trolled minnow. Again the Herring was doing well same as Shimano's Stinger Butterfly in 270 grms.

At Mafia island, less than 100 nm north of Kilwa the locals bring regularly big doggies in the 20 to 60 KG size caught on handlines. So there is potential.

Prices are very reasonable if you share the boat between 2 or three anglers. James just bought a new boat designed for jigging and popping. It's a cat with full walkaround space. Super stable and fast, a great fishing platform ideal for group anglers.


James' doggy. The fish was gaffed and kept as it was the lodge' first doggy caught on a jig.


The new jigging and popping machine.


From 135 meters deep !

Ciaoooo

B

[Ivan]

Bert,

Is the engine on teh platform boat powereful enough? It seems ideal for teh 3 of us, as long as it moves with speed and agility. If we use the same boat you were fihing on, the 3 of us will be a bit too crammed in and only 2 fishemen can cast at the same time.

One question on jigs: did you try any of the long ones?

[Bertram]

Ivan,

The flat cat has twin 60s and cruises at 20 knots. Which means North Point is 15 minutes from the lodge, King Fish Reef about 25 minutes, South Point 20-25 and the Cliffs 40 minutes. The jigging spot is about 15-20 minutes maxi, it's off from North point so you can alternate between the two.

If it's normal flat seas you can fish 3 from Karambisi the 26' "ski-boat" cat that has twin 125s. 2 at the back one at the front.

I did not try any long jigs, I only brought five jigs !!!!

Ciaooooo,

Bertrand.

[Bertram]

Guys,

I have added some comments for each pix at the top of this thread. Might make it more digestible to read and watch.

Thanks for the kind comments, I did have a ball, really.

Ciaoooooo

B

[medregal]

Have also been using a new rigging method designed in partnership with Eric that is completely knotless from spool to bite leader with great success. A must for underwater and floating stick !!!!

Ciao,

B

Hi Bertram, are you and Eric working for the Institut National de la Recherche? Always discovering new knots, riggings, weigthing formulas...!

Can you please explain us that new knotless rigging method?

Another thing, do you find that the biting rate increases with that short fluro leader? I guess you tie it to the twisted using a solid ring or a swivel, don't you?

Awesome pics, you're the GT Hammer.

[caranx]

Frencho,

there's 3 Doggies WR coming from Latham Island in Tanzania, the place looks good indeed. Maybe this winter....

ciao

Nicola