Full moon Bonefishing on Christmas Island

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

If you go in a week to Christmas Island that has the full moon in it the bigger Bonefish will be gathered together spawning.

This usually over at Paris Flats the 3 days following the full moon.

I only experienced it one day out of my 13 trips there early on in the 1980s and 1990s.


Our group of 4 wanted to see what it looked like so the second day we had our guide take us over there.

There were big schools of large Bonefish, many over 10 pounds, swimming around on the surface in about 4 feet of water.

This was how some of the guide got inexperienced angler (dudes) into big Bonefish for photos.


We hook a few big ones but sharks and Giant Trevally chased them down and eat them.

We soon left that mess to go back to walking the beautiful expansive flats for sight casting to Bonefish.

[mems]

https://i.imgur.com/4iqRMQBl.jpg
Aloha Bill, I have seen the spawn at Paris before. There is a silver cloud of bonefish swirling around. You can catch one in the school, but they are not there to feed. I prefer to sight cast to individual fish. The really large bones spend little time up on the flats. We found they hang out in the deep channels. This is a picture of a large 12lb bone caught in a deep channel with a bait fish soft plastic on a spin rod. You could get them on a fly rod with a sinking line and a clouser. I didn't bring a sinking line. I knew there were big bones there creeked up somewhere like they do in the bahamas. Now we know where. Mems.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

I have a 35 m/m slide in old slide show that my friend Dave Egdorf (AK/MT) gave me of his lovely wife Kim in a Bikini with a 13# Bone from Christmas Island on a fly.

Some time ago the guides told me that someone had netted a 22# Bone at Christmas Island.

My friend Fred Gordon said most Bonefish over 15# on Andros Island in the Bahamas are not landed.

I hooked a big Bone in maybe 4 feet of water that spooled me as I waded out up to my neck at Christmas Island.

I love Bonefish.................

[dynaflow]

The spawning Bonefish aggregate occurs best in July/August around the Full Moon as Bill indicated. The fish don't really feed up to the moon as they're full of eggs. They feed best after they spawn...i.e. a few days after the moon, and I have witnessed the passing clouds of more than a thousand Bonefish on Paris 1 Flat a few times but they're generally just out of reach and of course you're often casting straight into the teeth of strong wind and into deeper water.

Better to leave them and find a nice flat somewhere else.

As for the biggest Bonefish caught in the lagoon, it was by Moana Jnr. who caught it off the front of his father's (Moana Kofe) Tinny (aluminium skiff) a few years ago down the Nine Mile flat. Moana told me it was 20lb. and he would know exactly how heavy it was. I've seen plenty of 10 lb. Bonefish that weren't btw.

I'll attach an image of a 13lb. Bonefish from Aitutaki, Cook Islands for reference.

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[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

Thanks dynaflow for the wonderful history and great information.

I would hear people say that "Christmas Island was a great place for many small Bonefish." There are some monsters there.....


I just hope that everyone could get to Christmas Island just once and enjoy the magnificent ecosystem and the lovely people there.