Jigging for Bluefin

[Pitou]

I did attend the tuna seminar given by FirstLight Anglers at my local Boat Club Meeting last Thursday and picked up some good tips.

The guys from 1st Light are on the water with charters 7 days a week from June into November and cover ground from Gloucester's Cape Ann Marina running as far south as Provincetown and north to the Gulf of Maine, Jeffries, Boon Island, Isles of Shoals and Ipswich Bay.

The jigging was of my largest interest. They started using the new Shimano Trevala Butterfly Jigging Rods and a big Stella with a 47" line recovery per turn of the handle. These are phenominal being of such light weight. You could jig all day with them. On the bulk score they sure beat the big St. Croix with the Penn 9500 that I was using (still not a bad set-up for throwing heavy metals). I have a rod on the short list and may match with a Sustain 8000 or put a Penn 8500 that I have in my arsenal for now. We'll see.

They were jigging anywhere from 50 - 240 gram jigs to match the bait. These guys do love the Maria Viva Parade Jigs over the Shimanos. I bought a couple of 56g tinker mack jigs and will swap out the split ring w/a #7 80 lb. ring and 5/0 hook. A larger ring would get hung up on the 5/0 hook.

Larger jigs in June to match the mackeral & bunker runs if you are going to have one size only and going to smaller jigs when the sand eels balled up in summer. They were saying they had no luck with any jig that was not white or silver on the bottom. 6" tan with white belly sluggos with 1 - 1 1/2 oz jig heads to also match the sand eels. This summer the balls of sand eels on Stellwagen were unbelievable. Look for whales and birds. To present your bait at the right depth drop your jig to the bottom and time with your watch. Do a litttle math ..... to keep it simple ... how many seconds for 10 ft increments and present your bait to just below where the marks are on the depth finder and reel to the top and repeat. They were saying and I BELIEVE that this is what I should have been doing when the troll goes cold. And just like bassing when the tide is moving, all the better.

They couldn't stress enough about building a good network for intel, match the bait, fish the tide, find the weed lines, birds and whales. Their forum is pretty good and they share intel often. If the fisherman is successful their shop will follow. These guys are really into the fly as well.
A full day tuna charter is $845.

If the New England Rendezvous lands in Boston, I'll have gear on board.

http://firstlightanglers.com/

[philkri]

I have good success with Bluefin using a 9 oz. Solvkroken Cod jig. I just replace the split ring with a size 11, and a 4X strong Owner or Gamakatsu Treble hook.