Be warned, the 24th is not all that far away and the emphasis will be on picnicking rather than fishing and you may miss out!

The angling season is well and truly under way and, thankfully, it is looking a whole lot better than last year.

There is classic spring action to be had and with the water and air temperatures rapidly warming up, it would be a shame to miss out on the action before things settle down into the summer pattern.

Trolling is the preferred modus operandi at the moment. With wahoo as the principal quarry, this form of fishing also offers plentiful opportunities for some of the other species that are on the active move.

Really notable among these have been dolphin which are rather more numerous that they usually are, especially so early on in the season. Most boats landing decent catches have included at least one or two in with the haul of wahoo.

Capt. James Robinson’s Wound Up had another great day with 16 wahoo mixed in with dolphin. Good catches have also been posted by Capt. Kevin Winter’s Playmate and Capt. Alan Card’s Challenger.

There is little doubt that most other skippers are also taking advantage of the good supply of fish available as well as the exceptional quality.

Many of the wahoo are 30 pounds and better with enough fish topping the 50-pound mark as to be unremarkable. Considerably larger ones are also being caught on a fairly regular basis and there have been a couple of rumours of single wahoo topping the hundred pound mark.

Although these may be questionable there is plenty of evidence to establish that fish approaching that sort of weigh have indeed been caught.

There are some yellowfin tuna around even though they have not yet arrived in the numbers that are usually associated with tossing in a handful of chum and seeing half a dozen magically appear behind the boat.

From time to time, tuna, presumably yellowfins, can be seen breaching the surface and a limited number have been taken on the troll. Most of these have been middleweights for the yellowfin and the blackfin have been in the 15 to 20-pound range.

There was one notably large tuna caught while trolling that gave its captor a bit of a start.

When it came within sight of the boat, it was immediately noted that the distinctive yellow fins reached almost back to the fish’s tail.

This is characteristic of yellowfin approaching the 200-pound mark; some of the record breakers form the Pacific boasted truly magnificent streamers. Once boated, the fish was weighed and that is when it disappointed, checking in at only 110 pounds.

This was a nice tuna, no question about that, but incredibly deceptive given the development of its fins.

What actual purpose the elongations serve is unclear but the second dorsal and anal fin do provide the fish with a really streamlined appearance and the fact that the upper and lower streamers are generally the same length may have something to to do with the stabilising the fish as it is propelled forward at speed.

Really good examples of such are not often seen here because most of the yellowfins found in the local area tend to be less than 100 pounds.

A few boats have been trying the chumming and there has been some limited success with blackfin and some school-sized yellowfin in the 20 to 40-pound range. Other than the sought-after tunas, the usual small game, mackerel, rainbow runners and oddities like jacks and triggerfish are also pretty consistent at putting in an appearance although the difficulty with any chumming at present is the lack of chum bait.

Several fishermen have spent hours patrolling the inshore waters looking for beds of fry without much in the way of luck.

The key to successful chumming is lots of bait and right now that is just not happening. The simple solution will probably come down to boating a large blue marlin for use as bait. In the meantime, chumming will continue to be a bit of a struggle.

Another alternative would be to use some smaller lures or feathers while trolling, hoping to attract mackerel or some of the very small blackfin tuna that are close to abundant at the moment. These make for good chop-up chum and some good pieces of strip bait can be cut from the fillets.

It is simply matter of time before the billfish encounters start to happen on a regular basis. Given the presence of all the other usual players in the cast of the summer hit parade, there is every reason to suspect that there are both white and blue marlin on the offshore grounds and anyone deciding to put in some directed effort will probably be rewarded.

Still with so much else on offer, the temptation to fill the fish box is pretty hard to resist.

Calling this into question this weekend is the first of the Bermuda Game Fish Association sanctioned tournaments. Planned for Sunday, BFCAT — the annual tournament between the Island’s recognised angling clubs will see the preferred use of light tackle; something which often results in lost rather than caught fish.

With serious bragging rights at stake, the Spanish Point Boat Club weighstation, will see a premium on Tight Lines!!!