Dolphin visit the forage-rich rips that form where the Gulf Stram hits the humps.
Deep-dropping for amberjack, grouper and deepwater snappers was accomplished by a technique that I developed by trial and error. The dropping rig was made up of several sections. The bottom-most part of the deep-dropping rig was a standard size concrete block (I used to get the rejected ones from the plant free to save money). To keep the breakaway portion of the rig from chafing on the way down to the bottom, I tied a piece of 30- or 50-pound-test monofilament around the block; this part we called the “harness.” The breakaway portion of the rig was tied to the harness; it absolutely had to be 20-pound monofilament. This we determined by more than several breakoffs on the way down, using less than 20-pound test, and the unthinkable reeling up of a concrete block from 800 feet of water by hand when a heavier line didn’t break. The breakaway portion was tied to the second hook of a two-hook, freshly caught butterflied bonito or tuna rig.
To get properly positioned for dropping, you would locate the crown of the hump, and then run exactly 240 degrees, the reciprocal course of the Gulf Stream. The distance you ran, depended on the strength of the current, but almost always required running upcurrent to the base of the hump, or beyond, to about 800 feet of water.
Amberjacks, tunas, big sharks and more hang out over the humps.
To effectively fish this rig, due to the fact that the weight was fixed to the second hook, you would drop the bait as fast as possible, while backing down in the direction of the wind, trying to keep the angle as nearly straight up and down as possible. When the bait reached the bottom, we left the rod in the rodholder, locked up the drag, and waited for the rod to bend over. When the rod went down, sometimes double, we’d wait for the weight to break off, relieving pressure on the rod. A bite was telegraphed by a slight pressure, at which time the captain would throttle ahead to help set the hook.
Seamount Stewardship
With the advent of reliable and accurate position-locating systems, fragile ecosystems, such as seamounts and humps, have been received increased fishing pressure in recent years. It is important to remember these areas are prone to overfishing, and must be protected and regulated.
In addition, there is unwritten protocol to fishing these areas, when many boats are fishing the same, relatively small spot. Due to the fact that many anglers fish their baits very far behind the boat, cutoffs are frequent. Fishermen must recognize that in order to effectively fish these deepwater oases, they must be courteous to other boaters.
There many undiscovered seamounts and humps worldwide, and chances are that there may be an excellent, untapped spot within your fishing locale.
Every time I go fishing, after warming up the engines and turning on all the electronics, I refer to my depthfinder often, looking for new bottom. I look for surface rips that might indicate the presence of underwater structure. I look for baitfish and diving birds that might indicate the characteristic upwelling of a hump.
Every day fishermen are discovering new waters to fish, taking pressure off the well-known, regularly fished spots, and opening up entire new areas to the excitement of fishing a previously unknown area, a biologically diverse, unique micro-ecosystem known as a seamount.
Most times the fish would be an amberjack, but other times the angler would be rewarded with a large snowy grouper, a mako shark or even a great white!
Populations of different species of fish usually stratify vertically on seamounts, with each species finding its own comfort zone, according to depth and water temperature. In the case of the Hump, bottom dwellers prefer to stay close to rocky structure on the seamount, while tuna and bonito are normally seen on the fishfinder at about 100 to 200 feet down. Billfish and other pelagics, such as dolphin and wahoo can be found anywhere in the water column.
The time-proven method for catching blackfin tuna on the Hump is to troll a combination of small artificials and skirted ballyhoo 150 yards behind the boat, at 7 to 8 knots. The captain locates the crown of the Hump and then trolls into the current, oftentimes chasing diving birds, and bait sprays, caused by blackfins chasing schools of flyingfish or other baits.
Modern techniques for catching blackfin tuna include anything from trolling large deep-diving artificals, run straight from the rod, or on downriggers, to chumming with live bait.
To effectively chum with live bait, the captain runs upcurrent of the crown of the Hump, and then as the bottom begins to rise, dumps several hundred live baits overboard. The schools of bait will dash beneath the boat, in an attempt to hide, but can be easily washed out by kicking an engine in gear. The tuna rise to the bait, and can be caught by sight-casting live bait on spinning tackle, or even using a fly. Many world-record blackfin have been caught while anglers used live chum.
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