The first time I fished a ballyhoo was during a routine trip to North Carolina, chasing giant bluefin. I was standing on the back of a 45-footer in 15-foot seas and 26-degree weather (though it felt like two degrees), lightning striking around the boat, and a big old southern boy yelling, “Get you some, boy!” while we took green water over the bow and stern at the same time. Yep, that was my first time fishing that crazy billed “East Coast” bait known as the ballyhoo. The boys rigged them up with 250-pound fluorocarbon and a large long-shank J-hook and an Islander over the head.
My first question to the captain and mate of the boat was, “So do you guys see ballyhoo in schools out here?” As the skipper scratched his head, in a deep southern drawl, he said, “I never seen one ’round here. How ’bout you?” he asked the mate.
That’s when the light bulb went off in my head. The gears turned, and later that year, fishing in Ft. Lauderdale, I had my buddy Cory take me to grab a few to try for myself. A baitfish is a baitfish right? The next few months would tell the tale.
You have to have confidence in what you pull!
My first few efforts resulted in a lifelike swimming ballyhoo, meaning that I stuck the hook in the right spot and sowed the patient up properly. Although the bait looked like Frankenstein with all of the stitches in it, we still got a bite. I decided to try them out while thresher fishing in the spring. I sowed the bait as if it was going to be hit by a freight train; a thresher’s tail is a formidable weapon.
We missed a couple, and the ballyhoo went back into the freezer until marlin season. Not much of an effort, but that bred-in mentality that most of us suffer from on the Left Coast – that nothing else works but a 7 Strand marlin lure – is hard to overcome. You know, the idea that Pacific Coast fish only bite stuff from here. That hardheaded attitude is what cost me a couple of years of finding out how efficient dead, rigged ballyhoo can be on our local fish.
Marlin season rolled around, and I ran a ballyhoo on my whiskey line, along with a spread of four typical So Cal marlin lures. One of the first shots I had was during the Masters Marlin tournament a few years back. We weren’t fishing in it, but the reports were outrageous on the 14-Mile Bank, and we had to get out there, despite the boat traffic. We ran up from Dana Point and found a pile of boats trying to drown their lures behind the boat. Yeah, the bite was over.
We made a quick swoop up to the 277 and saw a jumper right away. The whiskey line with the ballyhoo went out, and before I could set my first lure in the water, it got a zip. You have to remember we are a crew of a couple of lure-dragging Californians trying to pretend that we are giving ballyhoo a fair shake in our spread. We were running ultra-light drag so the fish would feel the pressure if one took it. When the bait got the zip, I did what any other non-believer would do: I wound the bait in and said to myself, let me get the lures out, and then I’ll mess with this stupid thing. Must have caught on some kelp. I got the bait in the boat and set out the first lure. Just as my hand grabbed the line to set it in the clip of the rigger, I felt a tug. I let go, and, bam! We were on. Yep, he was messing with the ballyhoo, and I didn’t believe it. I unintentionally pulled it right away from him. A year or two would go by before I found out what I was missing.
A season of reckoning
Last year I made it my mission to really – and I mean really – give these things a shot. I called up the guys at Baitmasters of South Florida and told them I needed to get ballyhoo, and they sent me out a nice selection of baits. I was under the impression that big baits were the way to go, but once again, my West Coast mentality was quickly diminished.
The baits arrived, and I started researching rigging them for billfish. I learned both variations, running them naked or skirted, right off the bat. The first trip of the season we rigged them up with the Mold Craft Junior Wide Range and Junior Hookers with the skirts trimmed back short and an Owner Long Shank #5192 in the 11/0 size. We had no time to pre-fish, and we ran up to the 152 area off the East End of Catalina. It was the Church Mouse charity tournament, and the crew was pumped up. We were fishing Drew’s 38 Bertram, Escape.
As we hit the grounds, we set out the Mold Craft Tropic Star daisy chain off of one corner and a Trophy teaser dredge off the other corner on the Scotty downrigger. Most of the boats had started in the shipping lanes outside the 14-Mile Bank, and a couple of others in the know ran up to the Osborn, where a grip of fish had been seen. I had heard of the bite, but we got a late start from the dock, and missing the first slack tide of the day was not going to happen on my watch!
The first hour went by, and the gang was quite restless. We had suaries showering around, and I knew this may not be the mother lode of fish, but there had to be a couple around. We stuck with the plan: no lures, just ballyhoo. Just as we started to lose faith in the area, the radio had a few hookups but nothing outstanding. The slack was al-most over, and just then the short rigger began to sing. Remember, this first couple of trips we were merely testing this technique out. We were using Shimano Tiagra 30W LRS reels backed with 80-pound Western Filament Guide’s Choice Tuffline topped with 80-pound Berkley Hi Test hi-vis line. We rounded out the setup with a BHP Tackle 200-pound wind-on. The fish came in hot and ate the ballyhoo with- out hesitation. I was yelling to the an-gler to let him eat it, and once again I was wrong. That fish crashed all four baits – twice each – and all we ended up with was “San Cocho,” or just getting the head back. The last fish came up jumping and spit the bait, which, we found out again during the Classic, meant that any pressure on the spool causes them to spit the bait. I heard a few comments by the crew, such as, “He spit it out because it wasn’t a mackerel.” This fueled my devotion to proving the guys wrong.
My mistakes were pointed out to me by my buddies on the other coast, and they were twofold. First off, when a marlin grabs the ballyhoo, he already has the bait in his throat within a second or two. Counting more than a couple of seconds is not needed once you pick up the rig. A short count and miss is much better than a long one. If you pull the bait out of the mouth of a marlin, he will surely think it got away and chase it again. That’s the beauty of a natural bait; it tastes like bait. If he gets stung by the hook on too long of a count and spits it out before you come tight, he will leave the spread. One other great thing about Ballyhoo, if the angler is unseasoned they won’t think a live mackerel is bit when it takes line and the bait doesn’t swim deep away from the fish making it an easy target. Secondly, we needed to scale the tackle way back. On our heavy tournament rods, we are now fishing a Wade Cunningham custom Cal- star GF765M with a Tiagra 16 loaded with 65-pound Tuffline spectra and a topshot of 50-pound Hi Test hi-vis line. We then have a wind-on from BHP of either 100- or 130-pound. The bait is then connected to a short five-foot Seaguar fluorocarbon leader of 100- or 130-pound. When not in tournament situations, we are now stepping into a Wade Cunningham custom Calstar GF700L with a Shimano Torsa 30 with 50-pound Tuffline spectra and a topshot of 30-pound Hi Test. The wind-on and leader stay the same.
The day went on, and we didn’t see any more fish. We talked things over and decided to leave early the next day and head up to where the great marlin bite was the day before up around the Osborn bank. Upon arrival we found different conditions, with a major lack of fish but no shortage of sportfishers. We stuck it out and trolled the bank all afternoon going through the first slack tide of the day with only one fish being caught in the area.
Just as we figured we were going to fail in our first attempt at catching lo-cal marlin on ballyhoo, Drew spotted a pod of dolphin tearing up the bait right on top of the bank. We then started heading that way and saw another boat hook up. Within seconds of getting into the zone, we had a big one come up high and dry on the Tropic Star daisy chain. Drew jumped on the rod and popped the ballyhoo rigged with a Mold Craft mini Hooker from the flat line clip. The fish immediately inhaled the bait, Drew gave it just the right count, and we were on! Numero uno on the ballyhoo, and this was a tanker. The crew and I made quick work of the fish and got some great shots. This was Drew’s first marlin aboard the Escape so we brought her on board, supported by three guys, for a quick shot, and then back in the water she went. Definitely not recommended, but this was the first and the only one that will ever be brought aboard, and that fish has a much better chance for survival then one hung at the dock. The fish was definitely lit up when we let her go!
Coming off of this great experience, I was pumped to fish the Catalina Classic aboard my small boat. We downsized the tackle and had a better idea of what we needed to do. For a boat such as mine – less than 30 feet and without a flybridge – we see a lot less fish and depend much more on fish raised behind the boat. Our hook-up ratio on lures was around 20 to 30 percent, and that just doesn’t cut it in So Cal, where you will probably only raise one fish a day.
The tournament saw great fishing, and we caught the only one that came in our spread that day. This fish came in the spread with the exact same situation, except this time on a naked ballyhoo with a circle hook. Tournament rules state that any natural bait needs to have a circle hook. With the circle hook we were able to run down the fish much more quickly without the fear of pulling the hook. We haven’t perfected it yet, but you can run an Islander or Mold Craft head with a circle hook, but the hook comes before the head.
The second day brought even better fishing, and we raised three fish. For the first two I put my newest angler, Scott, on the rod, and it was his first time baiting a marlin with a ballyhoo. Not having a chance to pre-fish with your crew makes for a tough situation. Scott thumbed the spool a bit too hard, and the fish jumped and threw the bait before we could come tight. The first two fish we raised were angler error, and when Bill Sr. jumped back on the rod, the third was on tight. We made quick work once again, and this fish was a qualifier but would not take a place, so we let the fish go. The season continued quite the same. We have found that when a seasoned angler is on the rod, this way of trolling for striped marlin has an almost 90 percent hookup ratio.
I ordered a whole new shipment of ballyhoo in preparation for this upcoming season, and I have really high hopes. This technique, now that we have
perfected it, will change the way we fish striped marlin in So Cal forever. I would rather leave the dock on my boat without live mackerel than without my trusty ballyhoo.
Visit www.baitmasters.com to order ballyhoo, or to avoid shipping costs, visit Anglers Center in Newport Beach, (877) 254-3183. They will be stocking them for the upcoming season.
Ballyhoo come in a variety of sizes
Including Horse, which is used by the giant-bluefin guys, and are around 10 to 11 inches long; Select, which is my favorite striped marlin size measuring out at around 9 to 10 inches; and the list goes on to the smallest size, which is Pee Wee, around
6 to 7 inches long.
I know what you are thinking: “These things don’t live around here. They don’t taste the same.” I have never tasted a ballyhoo or a mackerel, but to a hungry billfish they are both candy.
The next question will be “Can’t we just rig up a sardine or
mackerel the same way?” The answer is no!
Ballyhoo remind me of cattle. Cattle are bred to be eaten. They are bred for fat content and quality of meat. If ballyhoo were a genetically engineered baitfish, they could not have been designed better. First off, the body is tough as nails and lasts a long time behind the boat. Second, fish love flash, and a ballyhoo looks like it has been chromed. A body shape that is long and slender with a slight flatness to it is what makes it swim like a champ. Lastly, the bill and facial structure of a ballyhoo is made to be rigged, hard and bony to hold the hook to the bait, and a bill to wire the line to, which makes the bait swim straight.
