It was a beautiful day, this was evident throughout the day by the amount of boats from 19' to 50'! The Hudson was very slow and rough the night before and many of the big boats joined in the chicken fleet. We found Charlie 5 miles short of our destination, the smell of death in the air the tuna were all over sand worms. The tuna seemed very hard to get with their attention on bait all around. This went for everyone but several boats did board some nice tuna.
Eventually we switched to jigging and the butterfly jig was the one that got them. We learned that the hook is way too small for big bluefin and at a point in the fight the hole gets large enough and the tuna will spit the hook.
The last BFT that Capt. Mike had on looked as big as his 260lb big eye from last year if not a little bigger. Mike managed to get the fish to the boat 2x and both times it shot for the bottom just smoking the drag. I ended up having to use the boat to back down on the fish and I mean wide open while Mike tried to get some line back. After a 40 minute battle that hook pulled and it was over. Even though we didn't land the fish it was the coolest thing ever to watch that fight and the power those big BFT's have. Can't wait to start chunking for them!!
