How about a quick instructional video.  Nothing like watching someone with mad skills prep some bait.

The weather conditions are improving as of today, and so did the fishing. A light SE breeze filled in and stirred up some small Black Marlin. We bait fished this morning and then put the hooks in the water around noon. Ended up getting 4 bites and missing two of those.
 
 
Another Scaley comes to the boat.
 
 
All eyes on the spread.
 
 
The big skipping bait gets lots of attention. Even by the smallest of Black Marlin.
 
 
The swivel and leader pop up quickly around here. It’s all Carl can do to clear the deck and get his gloves on.
 
 

After spending some time recently in the cold waters of the North Atlantic, I thought I would warm things up a bit, like maybe the Coral Sea. This months adventure has me at 15º South Latitude, on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). I was invited to document the Black Marlin quest of angler Stephan Kreupl of Bluewater Fishing. Our ride for this trip would be the charter boat Tradition run by veteran Aussie captain Tim Richardson. After a series of crazy long flights and layovers to get here, we finally meet the boat and head offshore. The deckies on the Tradition are Steve Hall and Carl Copeland. Both multi year GBR veterans.
 
 

300Km North of Cairns is the city of Cooktown, and pictured above is the Fisherman’s Wharf. This is the end of road in NE Australia and the jump off spot for most of the gameboat operations fishing the GBR. Folklore has Cooktown populated by as many Crocodiles as locals. I didn’t see any during my brief time on the ground, but I plan on looking some up on my return pass thru town.
 
 
 

On our way out to deep water we spent some time in the inner reef catching fresh bait. Large swimming plugs are the norm for this. Steve flips a nice one over the covering board. This one is headed for the rigging table.
 
 
 

When the Scads and Scaleys aren’t biting, a welcomed bycatch is this Giant Trevally.
 
 
 

Add some poppers and spin rods to the bait catching chore and it becomes light tackle game fishing!
 

It didn’t take long for me to notice that everything is bigger over here. And the rigged bait is no exception. I can’t wait to see the animal that thinks of this as a snack…
 
 
And then we had a bite.
 
Our first billfish of the trip, and our only bite of the day.
 

 
Carl and Steve make short work of the tag and release of this fish. They called her around 500lbs. This angle and lens combo make this fish look very small.

The Art of Pitch Baiting. No method of big game fishing demands more performance or provides more excitement. And no other group of professionals do it better than the crew of the 80′ Merritt boat “Reel Tight”. This video (above) shows the boys, and girl, in typical smooth perfection as they raise a blue marlin, tease him to the boat, and switch him over to the hook bait. In this case, an artificial lure lovingly referred to as the “Ting um”.

This 30″ clip shows a dwindling ball of Sardines getting eaten by a pack of hungry Atlantic Sailfish. An incredible displays of animal feeding behavior to watch from the sidelines. It goes on and on and on … until that final Sardine is gone. Yum!

The wind is blowing and it’s cold in the Yucatan. Locals tell me that this is the longest cold spell they can remember. The good news is that the annual push of Atlantic Sailfish is going on strong. With the brisk North wind come the sails. And this week they are here in force. And the report is that they have been here and biting very well for several weeks now. It appears to be one of the quieter winter fishing seasons in a while with regard to the transient sportfishing boats. Sad for those who aren’t here, good for those who did make it. I arrived just behind a strong winter front and barely brought enough clothes to pull it off. A brief stay but boy am I seeing some fish. If I count the sails in the spread, tailing, and feeding under the birds, I’m seeing hundreds of sails each day. The conditions are right for fishing the birds, and this also makes for some world class trolling in between bunches. I’ve fished several days aboard the newest Paul Mann boat Qualifier, and also aboard the Keen M. Both boats have put me in the meat each day.I’ve only been trying to get this shot for a few years now … a bait ball of Sardines on the move with dozens of Sailfish and Frigate birds picking away.

Frigate birds battling Sailfish for a fresh Sardine meal.

What they lack in size, the Atlantic Sail makes up for in attitude.

Every so often, one special fish comes along and displays the most magnificent rich colors of blues, green, and gold.

Here is a multi media project I put together from 2009 Summer fishing action in St. Thomas aboard the boat Revenge. I rode along with Mike, Dean, and Ryan a few days and compiled this material into this short movie. It has some great billfish shots and jumping blue marlin action. And it shows a well oiled crew of fantastic fisherman doing their thing. It’s 4 minutes long and has an audio track. The content is a mixture of high res still frames from a Canon MKIII and some short video clips from a Canon MKII5D.