Sight Fishing False Albacore

Little tunny seem to move so rapidly most of the time that sight fishing for them would be next to impossible. However, when their behavior lines up with the right conditions it is in fact possible. Slower cruising fish and the right lighting and it is possible to snipe cruising tunny. I've only hit the right conditions once, and it was this season. It was one of the coolest days I've had fishing for scombrids, though the bite window lasted a mere 20 minutes. For that short time, there were dark clouds in front of me and clear skies behind with the sun right at my back, lighting up the water with exceptional contrast. The tunny were running predictable routes and would break sporadically, but the best shot happened when I could see the fish coming in the water, big pods of 20-30 fish, lit up green and blue in the water. 

I was fishing a white and pink Tabory Snake Fly, hoping I could continue to experiment with that the big, erratic fly strategy. I'd see the fish coming, lay the fly out, and strip it quickly as they approached. I got positive reactions each time, but the fish seemed to have a difficult time engulfing that big deer hair headed fly. The first two that grabbed did so abruptly, peeling away from their pods and side swiping the fly. Neither got steel. The third one did though, and it was such a spectacular and visible take- the best tunny take I've ever had. 

Unlike the previous fish I'd had this one actually was exciting. It felt good in some way other than just exhausted relief. Even better, that joy wasn't taken away by the fish breaking off or coming unbuttoned. Instead it very politely came to hand. 

When I got the fish in I could see that it was light up blue, which made for beautiful photography. However it also had severe abrasions from getting stuck in a net, which didn't. The abrasions were interesting because I've often worried about line burns on released tunny. They don't have thick scales or protective slime the way a lot of fish do and this leaves them vulnerable to infections. Very simply, little tunny evolved to be pelagic and fast, and fast pelagic fish don't naturally get abrasions very often. There's no reason for them to have a mechanism for fighting off the side effects of abrasions. This fish made me a little less concerned about it outright killing them. 

Regrettably I didn't manage to make good on any more shots that day but that fish was worth the price of admission. As tunny season wore on, I'd have some more shots in very different circumstances. It kept me entertained despite the overall slow nature of this year's fishing. There have been some big showing but overall it has been very sparse aside from a handful of windows and pockets of concentrated activity. It has been a long season. It's November and they're still here. And I'm still after the damn things.

Until next time, 

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, C, Franky, Geof, Luke, Streamer Swinger, and Noah for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version.