Let the carking begin, Tuna!

[Hook-up]

Sorry for this late post (just got to a computer, looks like others found the fish too, good job dogs!). On 7/3 I left Depoe Bay at 0500 to hunt tuna with my friend on the Serious Fun. We did some weather calculations and decided things looked rough but do able. The sea got better the further west we went. Dropped lines in 25 miles west of Depoe Bay in 58.5 degree water. 20 minutes later a double (nice fish, about 15-20 lbs). Seas were about 3 foot swell with 1-2 foot wind chop. Sun was shining and it was beautiful. Over next couple of hours we scored 4 more fish and lost 2 others. We could not score in the same area twice. Finally ended up 35 miles out (the middle of the darkest orange on the SST) and started to whack fish. Did best running due north. Water started at 61.4 by afternoon it was 62. Total for the day, 23 albies in the boat, one blue shark on a tuna jig with 4 doubles and 6 lost (major gear tangles when the wind came up from 10-15+ knots in the afternoon). We finally ended up removing the birds from our spread. The last 2 hours we even removed our hand lines to reduce the amount of gear in the water (not a single bite on the handlines all day). Outside and way back lines did the best. Lots of short bites, which caused several misses. Even our hookups were short bites about half the time which caused several lost fish. Started hot bite with small green and white feather jigs, around noon bite changed to yellow (chartruse with red and white) then finished up with purple backed 4" (anchovie) fish traps as the lure of choice. Roared back at 20-25 knots as the angle to the swell was great for cruising. What an awesome day.