Big fish in the gallery

[FinalPoint]

I was wondering about people's guesses on the weight of that monster wahoo in the gallery. It is being held across four people and is pretty fat. That is an amazing fish. So let's hear some guesses.

[RiskTaker]

Mmmmh:

The fish currently # 3 of 10: my guess is 118 lbs.



I have never caught one that big, so I don't have a clue. But that is my guesstimate.

I will assume that I am exactly correct until somebody proves me wrong.

RiskTaker

[FinalPoint]

I would say 103 lbs., but what do I know?

[RiskTaker]

You know a lot! You just need to put it back into practice and catch another slob.

Yeah my initial guess was in the 80s, but after seeing that they can go as high as 200 lbs I decided to boost the guess up a bit.

That does not seem to be a local fish because it is huge.

RT

[Captain Fred Archer]

Wahoos are one of our specialties down in Cabo. That area is where the current world record came from and there are bigger ones down there. This is the one world record that I'm interested in. We get some over a buck each year, so I'm used to looking at the larger units. I'd call that one about a buck, maybe a little more. It's a fatty and thats what happens once they mature - they bulk up. Nice "hoodawgy!"

[greg1]

I'd say 100+ easy. That girth is amazing.

[Captain Fred Archer]

I am finishing up my wahoo book (350 pages, about two hundred photos and drawings - I haven't counted them yet) and I have a photo of a certified 152# and the current world record of 158# in it, along with others over a hundred. I've looked at the gallery photo again and compared it to the other two and I'm revising my guess up a bunch. It looks very much like the 152, so I'm guessing at least over one thirty. I sure hope that whoever caught it weighed it on a good scale! Unless those guys are all midgets, that puppy is pushing record proportions! The biggest on my boat so far was a 130 and this one looks just like him. What a beauty!

I got a wahoo woody over that thing!

[kai akua]

LOL!

i know what you mean Capt. Fred... man that is alot of sashami, :razz: drool drool.

[Captain Fred Archer]

Ah, Hula Boy, now ya done it! It's four a.m. here, I'm tired from writin' and drawin', I'm fresh outta FangBanger fillets, starvin' and YOU have to mention that lovely, white sashimi?! Arrrgghhh!

Recipes from the book include,

Grilled ono over garlic macadamia, sauteed spinach with steamed rice and buerre blanc. Growl, growl - down stomach, down!

Or, (Oh, mercy!) Seared Ono "Bali" garnished with edible purple and white orchids. Fanceee! You can have the flowers, gimme the meat!

Or how about...Coriander-crusted ono with daikon radish, sun-dried cherry relish, ginger citrus glaze and spicy soy reduction?

I gotta lay down for a while.

You had to mention ono sashimi, didn't you!?

I hope that you're happy!

Full moon in fifteen days. Cabo wahoo start going berserko starting in about twelve days. I can hear them sharpening their teeth. I bet they don't hear me sharpening the hooks on those "Archer Arrows", my new wahoo/ono lures. THE hundred fifty eight came from my front yard, ya know? There are much bigger ones there and enough over a buck to keep the blood pumpin', son!

Did ya ever see a hundred plus come greyhounding and in between jumps swimming (I'm not sure you can call IT that!) from the top of one wave to the next one on its way to your wake from a hundred or more yards away, with his last leap being so impossibly long that you wouldn't dare try to tell anyone who didn't see it happen how long that jump was? The grand finale is at the end of that last jump when he nails your lure dead nuts on and is a hundred yards away in a blink of an eye and your reel ain't clickin', it's screaming its bloody guts out?!

Oh, yeah, wahoo baby! Bad to the bone, but sweet in the meat!

[RiskTaker]

Ono - here we go again - Poetic Justice

With power comes responsibility, with responsibility comes appetite. With power, responsibility and appetite, it is only deserving that such a fine fish gets only the best treatment and dealt the best recipes man can muster when Ono is invited over for La Comida Buena.

If not going Fancee for dinner ... even a simple dish of chunks of Wahoo and Lobster or Shrimp, stir fried together in a Wok or Iron skillet, accompanied by a mixture of fresh vegatables: Bok choy, snow peas, scallions, canned waterchestnuts, slivered carrots, red bell pepper (color contrast) & mushrooms if you like. Seasoned nicely with some olive oil, fresh garlic and fresh ginger, Sal y pimiento, and a touch a toasted sesame oil. Served over a helping of brown/white rice.

For an appetizer try some ONO Tataki dipped in your favorite recipe of Ponzu sauce, locally prepared by your sushi master.

The other white meat: It's not just for dinner anymore.

Capt. Fred - Do you have any special tricks for removing the skin when you fillet Wahoos? I have always just done the best I can with the sharpest knife available but it is not the same as skinning flat-fish. But I sure do like it in fillet form versus (steaked w/ bone-in).

What are you having for breakfast? Some fresh fish Tacos sound mighty nice! Oh-no, there goes the Pirate post again, arrgh irat:

Hey Robby (Kai Akua): great to have you over fishing with us over the holidays. We have just about finished off the rest of that fresh swordfish we landed Christmas Eve Eve (Team FinalPoint). But I think you just got lucky by catching that fish with your Electroloume with the Cyan LEDs.

[Captain Fred Archer]

R.T.,

Life is Spartan when scribbling books. 20/7 or more is the only way that I know and the only way that I can produce them fast enough to get out of California and back to Cabo. I can't write them down there because I am weak and go fishing every day. So I do the research and photography down there and come up here to what I call "The Land Jail" (my business card for here actually says, "Currently doing time in the Southern California State Land Jail" on it).

This book started on 11/21. Nearly finished, it is 347, big format 8.5 x 11, single-spaced pages, 220 photo's and drawings and counting, 33,550 minutes of writing time on the book per se, plus another 20,000 plus minutes on the cover, icon and other illustrations (cover drawing is entitled "Ambush!". Three yellowfin in tuna formation attacking a scattering school of ballyhoo from below, with two BIG wahoos attacking from above, one a about to hit a trolled wahoo lure).

Phew!

First, bleed any and all wahoo that you catch by carefully cutting the throat latch at the bottom of the gills before chucking, then ducking when you put the fish in the box. Then take a scrub brush and wash down hose and scrub and rinse all of the slime off of the fish. Same applies to swords. Then lay the fish on its side and with a sharp knife, make a shallow cut thru the skin into the flesh all the way around the outside edge of the side you are working on. Be sure to cut thru to the flesh, especially below the top fins and back. Peel a section of skin away from the meat at the upper front corner of your cut (the shoulder). Pull some more skin off until you have enough to grasp in your hand, then hold the fish down with your left hand as you strip the skin down and off toward the tail. Done properly you now have a side of meat on bone staring up at you. Cut straight down to the bone every ten inches or so, slide your knife next to the bones and remove perfect, thick, white fillet sections from the fish. Quietly say, "Thank you Capt. Fred!" If it's a big guy keep the rib section, dip it in your favorite batter, then deep fry quickly in peanut oil. Wahoo ribs. Superb! Sashimi from the cheeks. Totamo Oishi!

Slice thin (about 1/8 inch), even slices from a prime chunk. Partially frozen meat and a very sharp knife help you make good cuts. Place on a plate that has a thin layer of extra virgin olive oil on it, crush several garlic cloves and arrange on the plate. Dash with Ponzu (Yum!), sprinkle with salt and a bit of pepper, then put a bit of butter on the tops of the slices and sear lightly with a blow torch for a very light tan color. Eat. Say, "Thank you Capt. Fred and the Wahoo Gods!"

Come ON full moon! Come ta poppa!

WAHOO!

SHAZZZAAMMM![/b][/i]

[RiskTaker]

Thank you Capt. Fred:

Sure, I knew I could. It is starting to sound like a wonderful day in the neighborhood! Time to catch a Wahoo and try out that skinning method.

Wow, I never realized that you could do that with Wahoo. Mention Dolphin and I say that I knew that. The next time I catch one I am very motivated to give it a try.

Haven't caught one lately though: been hanging on the darkside too much and only catching swordfish.

When is publishing date before you get your get out of jail free card?

[kai akua]

id rather be lucky all the time, than good! :lol:

"cyan" its whats for dinner.

i am thinking about buliding some inserts that you can pop in teh electrolum so you can change the color, very easily (i.e. a modular component).

back to the books!

Alohas!

R

[FinalPoint]

Can't say that it was your special light since three lines got hit at the same time, BUT, can't say it wasn't. That was the line that had the most solid hook-up. Obviously it doesn't scare the fish. I think your light looked pretty good. It would be nice to have different inserts for color changes.

[East Coast Archer]

Hey Capt. Fred,

Lately, I've been eating a lot of "white tuna" in sushi restaurants. I do not know of any species of tuna with white flesh. What is this treat?

ECA

[Captain Fred Archer]

Risky Man,

I am in final edit. Nearly four hundred pages, I think about three hundred pictures and drawings. Is probably the biggest big game book ever written and is certainly the biggest in modern times. The ballyhoo section along is about fifty pages with a lot of new tricks and twists. I am hoping it will publish in two or three weeks.

East Coast Archer

Hey, hockey head! Attsa mah boy! I'm pretty sure that white tuna you've been eating is either true albacore of maybe bonito. Both have white meat and both taste great.

Don't know if you heard or not, but your old right winger, coach Tommy's team is going to the States and the Mennen Cup. Tommy? Coaching? "Shoot the puck! Shoot the puck! No, no, that's icing!" That wrist shooter must have learned a lot more about the game than he used to know! It's good to see one of my old players teaching the game to new generations.

Come on out, let's head down south and do some marlin and a few 'hoo! Some MAJOR tooners right now, too. Some are over three hundred, which is a big yellowfin.

Take it easy, PuckHead!

[RiskTaker]

Hey Capt. Fred:

Looks like you're ""getting out of jail" just as soon as the editor's red ink dries or something like that. "Your own version of a Spanish Novela, I suppose." I haven't obtained a good fish book in quite some time with the exception of the Cruiser''s HandBook of Fishing by Scott and Wendy Bannerot: my brother thought that would be an appropriate B-day gift.

Man, that sounds like a major amount of work. You're going to have to go fishin', simply as therapy, to recover from that major push. More playtime with the pups too.

Good luck fishin with Joe when you get back to the happy-lands. I've been out fishin twice partly in the late daylight since the last post to you and haven't got a Wahoo yet. So I haven't got to try the peel and eat trick yet. I just keep catching those junk-fish :^o , broadbills!

I need a nice Wahoo to ensure a balanced seafood diet. But it seems like most of the recent reports of catching the Wahoos here in So.FLA. are from the live baits while sailfishing and perhaps not at the end of the day.

I look forward to seeing that announcement sometime soon. Carry-on Amigo. RT


East Coast Archer: the other white meat that we get here in South Florida that is the most popular for Sashimi is Escolar: incorrectly referred to as white Tuna. It seems to be the economical substitute for Hamachi or "Pacific side yellowtail" but is not to be confused with our Atlantic side Jello-tails as the local Guajiros from Cuba may call them in accented Ingles. (Of coarse, the real white Tuna is Albacore tuna). It's 2 a.m. in the morning east coast time, I am reading this post and reply to Fred's and now craving for a delicious few pieces of Hamachi or some Escolar. (Where have I heard that line before?) So I must either crack a can of fish steaks soaked with mustard sauce or break out a slab of frozen sword-fish and spark up the barbie. Damn, all out of Edamame too as I peak into the freezer! ECA, I think I will just have an apple and revisit this subject matter later tonight or earlier tomorrow, 6 p.m. EST, you know what I mean.

[Captain Fred Archer]

Risky Man,

Yes, a book is a serious undertaking if you want to do a good job on it. Most readers have no idea of the amount of work and sacrifice it takes to put one together. I sure do. This is my third since last spring. I started it on November twenty-second. It contains 137,529 words, 2,373 paragraphs with 260 drawings and photographs. My computer tells me that I have spent 51,892 minutes (866 hours) on it alone.

This does not include photo editing (or taking) and insertion time or the time spent drawing the cover or the other drawings. The cover is a trio of yellowfin coming from below and into a scattering school of ballyhoo, with two humongous wahoo screaming thru the top of the ballies and one just about to gobble down a lure. I don't want to know how long that puppy took me, but it is my best drawing ever and will make a dramatic, one-of-a-kind cover. I call it, "Ambush!"

I just weighed the guts of the book only, no covers and it came in at just over two and a half pounds! It will be printed on the paper that the galley is printed on, twenty eight pound, 106 brite lazer - one of the finest and most expensive of all. It is the exact paper that Kinko's and other printers use to print color copies, just to give you an idea of what it's like. Go see what they charge for a sheet of it.

Why the excellent paper? My books aren't the typical cheap paperback. They aren't even bound like regular books. Instead, they are three hole punched and come in a heavy leatherette binder so that the great paper that I use lays flat when the binder is opened and read, which keeps the binding found on most books from breaking when you are trying to flatten it out so you can study a rigging diagram or whatever. Won't happen on the pro versions of my books that are the only way that I print them anymore. That binder protects them and makes them the kind of lifetime reference books that I intend them to be.

This book is dedicated to big game legend, Captain Black Bart Miller and the foreword was written by Captain Roddy Hays, the man who discovered the great grander blue marlin fishery in Madiera. Roddy is a great big game fisherman who is responsible for more blue granders than anyone in history. Both he and Bart are calling her "a classic". I hope so. I know that big game fishermen, ones with big boats or small ones now have a book to read about what is happening today, instead of the "same old, same old".

Escolar? I've heard of them, but have never caught one. Good eats, eh? And you gotta talk about those Atlantic yellow flags to an old Florida boy who hasn't even seen one in over a decade?! And pez espada (Spanish for Swordfish) or pico largo (Cabo slang, means "big nose" - I love that one!) I just happen to have some steaks in the freezer (ain't talkin' about where they came from yet. Funny, they look like they came from several different size fish from one eighty three to three oh six. Hmm. Oops, exact weights - BAD FREDDY! Shut uppa you face!)

Anyhoo, I got a nice sword steak out, along with some calamari steaks from one of those thirty to eighty pound (and who knows how much bigger) baby Humbolt giant squids that are swarming off our shores right now. I'm gonna skin and pound that puppy and tempura it while I broil that slab 'o swordy. The kids are smilin' big, old Labby smiles right now because they know that I am making enough for my whole pack. It's five thirty here (oops, six nineteen!), so after we finish chowing I'm chuckin' my furry buds in the '72 El Camino wagon (banana yellow) and we're rumblin' down to Hennessey's in Dana Point for coffee and swappin' lies with that manager fisherguy Wojo and that school of fishermen that show up there on Saturday mornings this time of year.

Out of the Land Jail soon? Oh yessssss! I have a spreader bar book that I will be finishing shortly, but I have to head Cabo way for some more pictures and you-know-who is waitin' for me with her three fifties rumblin' and grumblin' and ready to take her out of the harbor with the Alman Brothers singin' "Southbound" so loud, you can't hear yourself think and the Old Man up in the tower saying that silent prayer to the folks and his beloved Shadow Girl and thanking the good Lord for allowing him to play among his children one more time.

I hope that this picture of my thirty six foot, "Finger in the socket, pocket rocket" comes thru here. If not, maybe Mikey will set it up somehow with his site magic wand. I hear my baby moanin' my name and begging me to climb on her and take here and our clients honkin' over the horizon to that far temp break with HIM waiting there for us - you know, a blue marlin with no bill and a wahoo paint job. Oh, yesss, Mister Fang Banger his own seff!

Some revolutionary new fast and high speed wahoo (and everything else) lures being introduced in the book. Stay tuned!

Wow, long post! Fun though. Thanks for gettin' me all fired up Risky Dude. And come on down and ride the rocket with me! All we have right now are striped marlin, the occasional blue and black, sails, huge dorado, giant yellowfin (2 and 3 hundred pounders have been in town), we're the unquestioned home of THE wahoo, the one hundred fifty eight pound world record and there are more than a few bigger ones around and one of my anglers is going to nail his ass some day soon.

You like that hamachi sashimi, do ya? Well, we have the real deal all over the place just outside the harbor. along with Pacific amberjack with sweet white meat like a dorado's, big red, cubera snappers (Colorados) schooling along the beaches, some nice grouper and Lord have mercy, uncountable numbers of the biggest pompano you have ever seen that nobody fishes for! The shrimp are still twitching when you cook or peel 'em to eat 'em raw and the crayfish are crawlin'.

Cabo will leap, not sneak into a fisherman's soul and he will never be the same again once he's tasted Nirvana!

See Ya - Come on, baby...let's go get us some! ZOOM, ZOOM, ZOOM!

[FinalPoint]

You da man Capt.

PS. I can't wait to grab a hold of your book.

[RiskTaker]

Alrighty Capt. Fred:

Keep it fired up, so the momentum keeps your going until it is a DONE deal. Let's hope that this one is a great success. It is certainly a wonderful situation when you can go out fishing, or whatever you love to do. Return back to home/port, low on provisions and realize your past efforts are still paying dividends, so you have the cash to say: Filler up, no problem Mon.

Family life has stifled my PPM machine plans for the moment. Need to continue earning the pay the old fahion way. But Risky Boy will try it again some time soon, to take that chance to move ahead. Got to, to afford those twin-turbo diesels and the vessel they are mounted to.

Took a ride last night on a friends boat that idles at 6 knots or so. Once we cranked those Turbos up to 2800, rated cruising for those beasts of burden, we were movin mighty fine, like an Exocet skimming over the wave tops. I just love that sound and feeling! It is just about as exciting as seeing a power fishing rod bending over hearing the line peeling off so fast to make that reel scream for help. You've got a pretty good idea that could be a big Wahoo takin you up on that presentation.

I would love to try it over on Mexican west coast some day. Nirvana sounds like the proper state of mind for this Scorpio.