Marlin tournament season has arrived and it’s just in time to coincide with a return to “normalcy.” Visitors have descended on Hawaii like a swarm of bees, COVID-19 guidelines have been relaxed and the ahi are bouncing around offshore, as if all were on schedule.
The Hawaii Marlin Tournament Series managed to pull off the full roster of events in 2020, even with COVID. Although the number of mainland anglers were down, local anglers responded enthusiastically, as did the marlin.
Champion Angler Guy Arrington will be returning this year to defend the crown he won fishing from Allen Stuart’s Wild Hooker. Capt. Shane O’Brien along with crewmen Charlie Bowman and Mark Schubert were steady on the assist and Wild Hooker also earned Champion Boat honors. Competition was fierce last year with the lead volleyed between Arrington and Chad Beaudry on Last Chance a number of times.
The Hawaii Big Game Fishing Club’s Rock n Reel tournament was the first major event of 2021, and it ran the weekend of June 12. The next tourney on the schedule is the Kona Kick Off, leg one of the eight event HMT Series. It fishes June 26 and 27. Anyone can enter. Experience is handy, but not required.
At the Rock n Reel tourney, Capt. Jim Wigzell led his team on Go Get Em to the win with Frank Lujon catching a 616.5 pound blue marlin. Kona Dream won top honors in the ahi department with a nice double, one weighed 121.5 pounds and the other 131. Bwana, Five Star and EZ Pickens split the tag and release purse in a three way tie, with one blue marlin tagged apiece.
Catch and release of live marlin is a major component of the big tournaments in Kona. The HMT Series averages a tag rate of about 95% each season, which usually calculates to more than 150 fish released back into the ocean.
The Big Island Marlin Tournament was the very first in Hawaii to pay cash purse for tag and release, back in the early 1990s. In those days, the very idea of paying cash purse for catching and then freeing a marlin was received with abject skepticism. Howls of laughter even.
It had to be done though, and done in a way that instilled confidence in the system, so tournament organizers attacked it with the technology of the time. In the early years Polaroid supplied instant cameras to photograph the fish before release. Teams were able to watch pictures develop right in the palm of their hand, IF the wind did not blow the photo over the side.
Technology evolved over time and 35mm disposable cameras became the tool of choice. Twenty four frames per roll gave teams multiple chances to capture the required images of each fish before it swam away. The success rate was better, but still less than 100%.
Personal video rigs appeared next, but putting strangers on boats with video cameras proved very unpopular with charter guests. GoPro minimized video cameras and when a Hawaii company called Intova offered a GoPro type camera in a housing that was waterproof and floated, a new partnership was born. Movies allow the documentation of the entire tag and release process, something still images could not do. Video proved to be highly successful and is key to the program success.
Covid caused tournament organizers to find every possible way to reduce staff/client touch points, so last year teams were allowed to use smart phone video to document tag and release. Some folks are leery of dropping their $800 smartphone into the ocean, so many teams prefer the floating Intova.
The naysayers hooting in the bars were right that paying cash to fishermen, legendary prevaricators, would be folly without security measures. Tournament control requires certain images and content to be evidenced in all videos to insure that each and every catch is legit, on many levels. Marine conservation and tag and release are important though, and the days of stacking up small marlin on the dock are long gone. Video security became an integral aspect of the game as it moved into the 21st century.
Over the years, the size of the purses have grown dramatically. A unique rule system integrates tag and release into “most point” categories, so now about three out of every four winning teams have tag and released marlin on their score cards.
Even though hundreds of marlin are tagged and released each summer, one thing technology has not mastered is putting videos in print news The photos seen here are of the very few fish that are brought in to be weighed – the 5%. However, in a good summer that could still be a marlin photo almost every week. This can give a casual observer the feeling that tournaments are contributing to overfishing, but the opposite is actually the truth. Small boats with rods and reels and relatively weak line simply don’t have the capacity to overfish. If every small boat owner entered a contest to catch the very last marlin in the sea, no one would win.
Small boat guys and tournament fishermen want more fish in the sea, with the idea being that with more fish, fishing is better. It’s a simple, straightforward concept.
To that end, tournaments and small boaters raise money for non-profits such as Wild Oceans. Non-profits work diligently with government agencies to insure that the interests of small boat fishermen are heard and taken into consideration when government makes decisions on fishery management issues. US law requires all fishers be considered, but that’s not the case in most “developing” nations. Many of those governments subsidize their large scale fleets, which contribute the most to over fishing.
Ironically, this means that the American non-profits are even more important because the fish saved here roam the oceans. Without American conservation groups, everyone could truly be locked in a race to catch the last fish.
Hawaii Marlin Tournament Series Schedule 2021
Kona Kick Off
June 26 & 27, 2021
Firecracker Open
July 3 & 4, 2021
The Kona Throw Down
July 6, 7, & 8, 2021
Skins Marlin Derby
July 9, 10, & 11, 2021
The Hawaii Lure Makers Challenge
July 16, 17, & 18, 2021
Big Island Marlin Tournament
Aug. 13, 14, & 15, 2021
It’s a Wrap Tournament
September 10, 11 & 12, 2021