Text and photos by Mary L. Peachin and Northlake Charters
October, 2014, Vol. 19, No. 1
Bursting out of the water, the Bluefin tuna grabbed the baited swimming mackerel trolled from a kite outrigger. After its initial speed explosion, the tuna stopped, did a 180 degree turn towards the boat, passing within inches of the stern. Then, like a freight train, traveling at what seemed like the speed of sound, it swam until it broke the fishing line. It’s true, Bluefin have been recorded swimming a hundred miles per hour.
At first bite, all hell broke loose on North Lake Breeze, Captain Bruce Keus’ 45 foot tuna boat. As Bruce controlled the wheel to position the boat, his brother Ross grabbed the reel peeling line. Biorex (Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans contractor) fishing observer Chris Levesque, who just happen to be along, cleared the second trolling reel.
After a ten plus minute motor from Prince Edward Island’s Souris Harbour into eastern Canada’s Northumberland Straitin Gulf of Saint Lawrence, we trolled in moderately rough water at a depth of forty five to 100 feet. We were fishing around the point from North Lake because the wind and seas were calmer. The kite, complete with a wind sock, kept the live mackerel swimming on the surface while the other bait was at depth, a water bottle serving as a bobbing marker.
As the hours passed, Ross chummed for Bluefin tossing mackerel and herring into the water. Gannets dived for bait fish, black dolphin circled the boat. The tide was stronger than the southwesterly wind. Making three drifts toward the east, we covered six to seven miles. As Bruce said, “the conditions were perfect.” Our half day five hour charter continued bite-less as Captain kept saying “five more minutes.”
And, the bite happen in the final minutes. As the Bluefin almost spooled the reel, Bruce and Ross estimated it to be grander (1000 pounds) size. Pulling 200 pound test line with a gloved hand while cranking the reel with the right hand, it was less than twenty minutes before the tuna broke the line. The few anglers who are successful in reeling such a strong, large tuna to the boat within the regulated hour time limit are required to release the circle hook caught fish.
Atlantic Bluefin, the largest member of the Scombridaes (albacore, bonito, mackerel, and other tuna) are one of the most sizeable bony fishes. Shades of dark blue to black shade their dorsal body with a silvery underneath. Noted for finlets that run down their dorsal and ventral sides to their anal fin, there are twelve to fourteen spines on their first dorsal fin, approximately fifteen on their second, with eleven to fifteen on their anal fin. Living between fifteen to thirty years, they are warm-blooded which makes them well adapted to colder waters. Champion long distant swimmers, they have set records, including trans-Atlantic migrations in less than sixty days.
Highly prized as sashimi, in 2013, a 489 pound Bluefin broke a price record selling for more than a one million dollars. Not all capture that price tag. The first of the years comes with sushi restaurant owner “bragging rights.” In September and October when the herring are spawning, Bluefin tuna begin schooling. Bruce and Ross Keus, along with other tuna boats, spread out in the waters of the Strait. Also chasing the herring are blue and mako sharks, minke and other whales.
Commercial anglers may keep only one Bluefin annually. When they declare the day they are going to keep a fish, their shipping broker is alerted. The rules are strict. The fish must be gaffed in the mouth, bled, and amino acids built from the fishing battle requires an hour of cooling the fish in the water—just to enhance the color of their meat. Properly delivered to the broker, the catch is flown by first class charter to the renowned Tsukiji Market in Tokyo.