Retail reptiles shed negative image in year of the snake
Pensacola Anglers Catch 721 Lb. Bluefin Tuna, Rivaling The Length Of Florida's Largest
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'What A Giant Bluefin!'Man Hauls In Record Breaking 884 Pound Bluefin Tuna
The bluefin tuna is trophy fish that's historically championed among anglers for its mammoth size and high quality meat that can be sold up to $40 per pound locally.
BEAUMONT, Texas — A Port Arthur man and his friends reeled in their 'white whale' last week, well in this case a massive bluefin tuna that one would be forgiven in mistaking for a whale.
The Bluefin Tuna is trophy fish that is historically championed among anglers for its mammoth size and high quality meat that can be sold up to $40 per pound locally.
David Esslinger was fishing in the Gulf April 10 with a group of friends, when one of these behemoths hit his line like a freight train. Little did he know he was about to be in for the fight of his life.
Luckily for Esslinger had several friends ready to help him bring in the catch of his life.
"Let me take a second to break the day and events down. First off for those who have never landed a fish the size of a car this is a full meal deal. NO man or woman will ever do this without a team," Esslinger wrote on Facebook.
The group hit the water the early hours of Friday morning after loading the boat a plethora of gear.
By 9 a.M. After fishing for a couple of hours signs of tuna schooling began to break through the surface of the otherwise placid waters.
Suddenly right rigger on the boat came down hard with a bite, and the battle had begun.
Esslinger initially thought the fish had spit out the hook, but that's when the first 3/4 spool at 35 pounds of drag started to run.
As realization hit, the group of men wasted no time getting into position preparing for the fight that was about to take place.
"I had to come to 45 pounds of drag on the Tiagra to slow her down, which she responded with a race to the surface. Carson at the helm with Brad, TC, Jeff, and Colby keeping all communication from the cockpit to the helm in rapid working order we got the fish up to the surface in a little over an hour," Esslinger wrote.
After a grueling five hour battle of wills, Esslinger and his team had managed to finally reel the massive fish to the boat.
Colby Denbow was the first one able to lay eyes on the full size of the beast as he loudly exclaimed "Oh my god!"
"Carson holding the boat in position with the giant fish on the side, Colby secured the tail rope. With shaking body and inoperable hands I made my way to the side of the boat and screamed with utter shock, 'what a giant Bluefin!'" wrote Esslinger.
Giant indeed, tipping the scales at 884 pounds, the massive Bluefin is officially a new state record for largest Tuna caught in Texas. Eclipsing Troy Lancaster's 876 pound Bluefin caught back in 2021.
Recent Outer Banks Bluefin Tuna Catches Lead To Push For Law Change
NAGS HEAD, N.C. — For many fishermen, catching a bluefin tuna from the pier or shore would be the catch of a lifetime.
"I don't think I'd ever imagine hooking up with one off a pier," said Fin Brophy, a young Outer Banks local fisherman who was at Avalon Pier Thursday afternoon.
Earlier this month, that's what happened during a rare time period when bluefin tuna were present near Jennette's Pier.
"The first time in recorded history, [they] came within casting distance of the pier. So, we had three anglers that hooked into 150-pound to 300-pound bluefin tuna," said David Harding, the founder of FishingPiers.Info.
A few were caught legally from kayaks near Jennette's Pier during this time. But it's illegal to target the fish from the pier, and a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration law enforcement officer came to Jennette's Pier to make sure fishermen knew that in early April.
"NOAA came out and said, 'Hey, even though you did catch and release, if you guys try to target bluefin tuna again, we're going to give you a $2,000 fine,'" said Harding.
We reached out to NOAA about the laws, and they provided these answers to our questions:
Given the wide geographic range of Atlantic tunas and the fact that they spend the majority of their time well offshore, NOAA Fisheries issues permits that must be associated with a vessel. This system allows us to best quantify, regulate, and monitor these marine resources and make sure the United States does not exceed international quotas. Annually, there are over 30,000 vessels permitted to fish for highly migratory species, including bluefin tuna, both recreationally and commercially.
This permit structure provides an exact number of participants in the highly migratory species fishery. It also allows us to enact rules and regulations that adhere to internationally and domestically mandated permitting, reporting, and monitoring obligations.
Bluefin tuna are rarely present in waters close enough to shore to make them available to shore-based anglers, so there is no federal permit to allow for this activity. If bluefin tuna are caught incidentally during fishing activities from shore, they must be released in a manner that will ensure maximum probability of survival, but without removing the fish from the water.
But the recent news about the NOAA law enforcement officer at Jennette's has sparked a movement called "Operation Inflate: The Bluefin Uprising."
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"You start talking about needing a boat or needing a vessel in order to apply for a permit, we're not talking about conservation anymore. We're not talking about protecting the species; it's just access discrimination," said Harding.
The protest: register inflatables as vessels, which in theory would mean someone could fish for bluefin tuna.
"That's not really the purpose of us to go out and be drifting out five miles out to sea with an inflatable. It's more just to show that shore anglers and pure anglers should have access to this open recreation and bring awareness that this is an absurd protest," said Harding.
The hope is to inspire change on a potential catch of a lifetime that some fishermen on the pier were able to experience.
"As the population continues to increase, we think we are going to see more chances now of the bluefin tuna coming in closer. We love what they're doing for conservation. We want our access to a legal fishery, and we hope that it's not even changing the laws necessarily; it's including the laws so that it's not just for vessels," said Harding.
The protest was previously scheduled next to Jennette's Pier on April 19 but was postponed due to the weather. A new protest date is to be determined right now. Harding also encourages fishermen to attend the virtual NOAA HMS Advisory Panel meeting from May 6-8 to raise awareness about the laws and the want for change.
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