I first heard the term 'ram induction feeding' from my friend Ian Devlin to describe how scombrid species eat small baitfish. Basically, they just slam trough tightly packed schools of bait and it gets funneled into their mouths. This feeding strategy can take on a few different looks, and when the fish are on very tiny "snot" bait it is a particularly remarkable thing to watch. The best example of this is chub mackerel, which routinely organize in compact (though large) schools and coordinate attacks on schools of tiny baitfish. We've had quite a lot of that in these parts over the last few years. Less frequently, little tunny feed in the same manor. A large school of them will bunch tightly together and propel themselves through the bait clouds, taking in the minuscule fish as they move. At times, in rough conditions, it can look like a huge pod of tunny is surfing a swell. Its a wild thing, and something I finally got to see and document this year.
Catching fish from these types of feeds can be very difficult at times, and there are two strategies that can be employed: One is sniping smaller pods moving along with large impressionistic lures, something I watched one well known angler do on the day these photos were taken. The same can be done with flies, but it's harder to make a quick shot if you aren't prepared. I'll cover this a bit more in a future post. Another strategy is to cast very tiny bay anchovy patterns into the bigger feeds. There's a level of luck to this since the fish are in such a large cloud of bait and aren't actually singling something out then chasing it down and eating it, but if the school is tightly packed enough and up and feeding when you get your fly in them, the odds certainly aren't bad that the fly ends up in one of their mouths.
It was during the days that this was going on that I got some of my only hookups this season, which isn't typically how it works. I usually like it better when there are roving pods, maybe boiling occasionally but mostly not visible. These are hunting fish, and they are often much easier to catch. Of course the fish I did catch on the day I took these photos was roving, I hadn't cast at breaking fish. But it was clear that the bulk of the fish were very keyed on something specific. It was very cool to see but didn't result in the best fishing. The same can't be said for the situation I was met with in the next tunny post.
Until next time,
This is what is so great about fishing, there is always something new to be learned.
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