BlueWater Boats & Sportsfishing – July 2019

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TOURNAMENT

NEWS

As the winter months approached

you would think the fishing should

have slowed down, but this year

seems to be contradictory to the

norm. We have seen continued

success on Queensland’s Sunshine

Coast with both Bryce Bartleson

and Ben Massurit tagging numerous

black marlin on light-tackle. They

are having a monumental season,

with a total of 48 black marlin tagged

between them.

Down in New South Wales, the far south

coast still shines with an abundance of

striped marlin. Kaitlyn Schofield continued

her outstanding season with another nine

stripies tagged in April, plus a 105kg fish

weighed on 8kg line class. Well done

Kaitlyn! Also from southern NSW, Brody

McKay of the Batemans Bay GFC kept his

light-tackle skills sharp, tagging another

three striped marlin on 10kg tackle.

Tasmania has fired up with southern

bluefin tuna, with Lachlin Hicks landing a

monster and potential Australian Junior

record weighing 114kg on 15kg tackle.

That’s an awesome tuna, Lachlin! Of

course, when the southern bluefin tuna

arrive along the southern coastline,

everyone is chasing them from South

Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and into

New South Wales. Martin Oosthuizen

from the Warrnambool Offshore & Light

GFC also got among them, tagging five

off Port MacDonnell in South Australia.

Western Australia slowed a little due

to inclement weather conditions during

April, but Lochlan Turrell from the Perth

GFC tagged a couple of tiger sharks and

the Hornhardt sisters kept their annual

scorestickingover withquite a few fish

Measured& Released.

One of the highlights of the last few

months has come from the Northern

Territory, withnew entrantCooperRudd

achievinga milestonebarramundi,which

he Measured & Released. Cooper’s

remarkablestoryis below.

COOPERRUDD’SBIGBARRA

“I wasexcited to take mynew Shimano

CuradoDCreelfishinglastmonth.I hadto

savemypocketmoneyforovera yearto

buythereel.Wearrivedat ourfishingspot

earlymorningandsawsomeof mydad’s

friendscatcha greatfishstraightaway.

Afterlunch wehad moveduptheriver

with the tide, following the fish on the

Ben Massurit with one of the many black marlin he’s

tagged and released off Queensland’s Sunshine Coast

this year.

Far left: Bryce Bartleson about to

release yet another tagged black

marlin off south-east Queensland.

Left: Bryce fighting a black marlin

on light-tackle.