Wild milkfish battle
Aloha, what a great afternoon down in old Hilo town. I took my son to the Wailoa ponds for a little afternoon fly fishing. He got a huge puffer on his 5wt, over 10lbs. He did a great job and kept it out of the sticks and I was able to release the beast. I asked him if he wanted to go try for some awa or milkfish. He said sure and we headed into a narrow estuary that the fish had been feeding in lately. I hooked one there the other day, but it popped off when my line got too much seaweed on it. Anyway we headed back to this spot and there were about 10-15 awa feeding on one area. My son had one come by him, but refuse his fly. I cast mine out to where they were feeding. I had some seaweed covering the hook and a big one sucked it up. I set the hook and the fish bolted. Luke, my son helped me by putting his rod down and was there for me to pass the rod to as the fish went around trees and headed out into the center pond. My line was peeling off the reel, so I tightened the drag and hung on. The fish was heading for a bridge, but just then a Hawaiian canoe came paddling up through the bridge. I yelled, "Hey watch my line!" They replied, oh look there is a big fish under the canoe. Their canoe coach, and elderly Hawaiian man was standing on the bridge and said, "your fish when swim dis way" I said thanks and climbed under the bridge and handed the rod again to my son. I waded around another tree and then fought the fish in the center lagoon. The canoe filled with elderly ladies were so excited for me, they just stayed there and watched. Only problem they scared the fish to swim further up the lagoon. Then I got the fish turned, and headed back towards me, but they scared him again and the fish took off towards the bridge again. The coach ran over to watch the milkfish, and scared him to swim in the center section of the bridge. I was screwed. I told Luke to hold my flies, I was going swimming. I went out and did my best river runs thru it imitation, but the tide was too high and I couldn't stand. The canoe then came to my rescue. I was holding on to the bow with my right arm, holding the rod in my right hand and reeling like mad with my left. They encouraged me to climb in the canoe, and I did. But once agian the line had collected a bunch of cabbage on it. I went to flick the seaweed off, and the fish popped off. The ladies were heart broken. They said, "No dinner for you tonight." I told them I would have released it anyway. I said not to worry, I had plenty fresh ahi in the fridge from saturday offshore. I told them I just did it for fun. My son just smiled. Mems.
_________________
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks