Kitefishing for Bluefin Tuna in Brisbane, Australia by Joe Tuhimata

We caught a bluefin tuna when I finally got a chance to test the new winch out on Sunday.

Had a good 40 knot westerly so off we went. I set the flexiwing one kilometre offshore towing seven hooks.

We left the set to fish for only 10 minutes before winching it back in.

My catch consisted of a painted grinner (not a good eating fish so I threw it back) one 45kg wobbygong shark and one 18kg plus long tail bluefin tuna (pic above).

A couple of fish got off in the surf as my winch ratio is too high, the gear came in too fast, so some modifications are in progress.

We had an audience of 20 or more local people and all were amazed by the kites, the winch, and most importantly the catch.

Rob from Paul's Fishing Kites had a great days kitefishing with Sam Nadan at the top end of Muriwai Beach in late June.

The photo on the right was taken with a cellphone and is a bit blurry, the snapper Rob is holding was mauled by a shark.

They set 20 hooks on a 65kg dropper rig twice and caught a total of 27 fish.

The gear was set 1400 meters offshore and a flexiwing kite was attached as a lifting kite 1000 meters back from the main kites to keep the line supported out of the water.

Despite the fact that they only let the gear fish for 10 minutes per set, sharks bit quite a few traces off.

In fact every hook that wasn't bitten off by sharks had a fish on.

The catch was 18 snapper, (six of which were over 4kg), four kahawai, four sharks and a huge gurnard.

The other 13 hooks set returned as bitten off traces.

Rob met several other kitefishers on the beach and while all had caught snapper none had done as well as he did.

Rob and Sam fished straight out from a deep hole they found six kilometers north of Rimmer Road.

Boat Fishing Report by Paul Major

Was a bit grumpy so I went for a Friday evening fish.

I set the longline for 20 minutes around full tide and got one 30cm snapper on the rod.

On the 25 hook set line was another snapper the same size and four of these sea-run kahawai (photo left).

The photo shows one shaking the water off before coming aboard.

Note in the lower right of the pic is a piece of dowel in the rod holder.

The dowel has a slot cut in it.

This is very handy, I simply put the pre-stoppered hook section into the slot when landing a fish.

The mainline can slip in the slot but the stoppers can not.

This system allows me to lock the knotted section in place while keeping my hands free.

It is then easier to put hooks in the trace rack, wind line off the floor onto the reel or deal with fish.

Due to high winds we didn't venture more than 200 metres from the ramp at Reitahi, which is near the Whangarei Heads.

Photo Above :

It's very rare to catch a john dory on a bait but this one took a 4/0 target hook on a ledger rig.

Photo Left :

Sean got his huge trevally the same way.

Paul Major

Weymouth Boating Club

During April of this year, my five year old son and I took a quick trip up to Hohoura, just north of Kaitaia for a few days.

We had three days of good winds blowing directly off the beach. Strong winds made pulling in a slow task.

I flew my old wind tattered delta kite, using a mixture of squid, pilchard and bonito baits on 20 Jap longline hooks.

Deploying the longline to around 750 metres offshore I left it to fish for 20 minutes.

We were rewarded with this wonderful catch of snapper for our first late afternoon fish.

We had no need to try fishing 90 mile beach and had even further trouble hooking anything smaller than these beauties on any of our other days fishing.

All up we came home with 14 snapper over the three days. Not bad for a lady and a five year old.

Kite Fishing Hawaii Style From Albert Nakaji

Sometime back I recall seeing a question on your website about whether or not a marlin could be caught using a kite rig.

Here's an image of Debbie Ishado's latest catch on a kite rig fished from the shore.

It's not a marlin, but a sailfish.

We couldn't get an accurate weight but it was over 100 lb.

ED : Albert Nakaji has been using Paul's Fishing Kites flexiwing kites for land based game fishing for around a couple of years now and has perfected a very productive style of kite fishing that has made him a local fishing celebrity.

Albert fishes some incredibly difficult terrain, one of his favourite fishing spots is from the top of Ka Lae cliffs.

Alberts article and fishing rig diagram for cliff top fishing

Muriwai Gurnard

Report by Lou Gower

A not so recent report, but recently received and highly relevant for this time of year.

Lou Gower sent in this photo of a catch taken at Muriwai Beach during October 2004.

Lou baited up just 10 hooks with fresh mullet on a kite longline rig, the winds were a strong north easterly.

Lou fished over low tide and ran two sets on the day returning four snapper and two fat gurnard.

Photo Right :

Linda Gower with one of the good sized gurnard taken at Muriwai Beach

Above and below are photos of some good fish caught on your PFK 130lb and 80lb spectra. The pics were taken at the Three Kings Islands. The kingfish was taken on your 80lb Spectra Braid and all the hapuku and bass were landed on your 130lb Spectra Braid Fishing Line. Cheers, James

Muriwai Report by Marius Botha

Hi All, here's some more kite fishing pictures of fish we took on the 65kg Deluxe Dropper rig at Muriwai.

All were taken over the past month or so and all at the most northern point of Muriwai Beach.

We basically fish into the Kaipara Harbour, on either outgoing and incoming tides.

On all three trips we used Target Snapper Hooks and baited up with a mixture of fresh kahawai or trevally.

We also started making our own flasher traces, using size 6/0 hooks, and took some lovely gurnard on a few of them. I was glad to see I made it into your newsletter, then someone told me at work today they saw my picture in the Fishing News, I am stoked! Regards, Marius.

On June 16th I used my torpedo from Karikari Beach.

The tide was about two hours off being full.

I baited up the longline rig using mullet, squid and fresh kahawai.

The torpedo went out about 600 metres.

We got nine nice snapper between 450 grams to 1.8kg for the set. It was good catch.

June 18th, with conditions the same, I again set the torpedo out.

This time we let it go to around 800 metres and left it to fish for one hour.

To our surprise, on the first hook in we had a 10 pounder (4.5kg).

We also got 6 others between 1.4kg and 2.0kgs, great two days fishing.

We caught this fish at Uretiti Beach about two weeks ago and I thought I'd send it in. I didn't know that you had an annual competition so don't have any proof or good photo hints.

The snapper was caught on a delta force kite about 1.6kms offshore and weighed 5.4kgs.

Now I know the competition is on, hopefully we will get out more to get some better photos, and some fish of course!

Cheers, Mike and Norma

On the 28th of June I went fishing at Harrison's cut in the Bay of Plenty.

Baiting up 25 hooks on my longline with trevally I ran one set which went dead straight out, there was a good southwest blowing. I wound up with 3 gurnard and 1 kahawai. Sorry, no pics this time.

I went out again the very next day (the same spot) and again only did one set. I put the line out the full 1000 metres then the wind got stronger. My kite crashed while way out, no problem though, I had the safety float kit on.

Unfortunately, the line got tangled around a set crab pots on the way in. I managed to drag the pot, the line and the kite etc ashore without losing any gear!

This time I caught just one gurnard. The crab pot however was at least 1/4 full with crabs (so there are still plenty left out there)!

Hi there Paul and Peg. On June 28th we went to Muriwai, to the top end, it was a southerly and we were the first people on the beach.

We put the first set out to 1000 metres and got one shark, a small hammer head. The second set to 700-800 metres returned 6 big kahawai. Set number three went to approximately 500 metres and we wound up with another 6 big kahawai.

We were only using ten hooks per set and we kept fishing to the 500 metre mark offshore for the rest off the day. Our total for the day was 27 kahawai and there was only one problem on the day. About mid day another kite fisherman arrived with his long line and he put his kite out with no tack on his kite.

He got tangled with our dropper line and we lost one complete hook section. I quickly made up a new section on the beach and kept on fishing. Apart from that it was all good!

Sorry no pics, we left the camera at home.

p.s. Thank you for a nighthawk kite that flies really well in some very heavy winds.