‘Big blue’ heaviest marlin so far this season

The biggest marlin landed anywhere in the country so far this season was caught off our coast last week. The 281 kilogram fish was caught by Daniel Laffey, pictured here with his crew mates. They were fishing off the boat About Time at “Baistows” north-east of Gisborne. Pictured from left are Ben Whitley, Dan Laffey, Gabe Main and skipper Matt Peters holding Beau. Picture supplied

The biggest marlin caught so far in New Zealand this season was landed last week in Gisborne by Daniel Laffey off the boat About Time.

It was a blue marlin and weighed in at a whopping 281 kilograms  — another indicator that plenty of gamefish are out there heading towards two major fishing contests in the district.

“It was caught on Matt Peters’ boat fishing at Baistows, which is about 18 nautical miles north-east of Gisborne,” Gisborne Tatapouri Sports Fishing club president Roger Faber said.

“It’s the heaviest marlin caught in New Zealand waters so far this season.

“The team on that boat caught a 165-kilogram marlin the day before their big catch last Wednesday,” he said.

They also tagged and released a striped marlin that day.

Matt said it took Daniel just under one-and-a-half hours to get the marlin alongside the boat.

“Daniel is pretty experienced on the rod and he handled it well.

“It’s not his first big fish but he was pretty stoked with it.”

Roger said there have been other reports of a lot of marlin caught and released.

A second big marlin, weighing 220kg, was caught in the same area as Daniel Laffey’s catch on Saturday.

“The big eye tuna are definitely out there, too,” Roger said.

“There was one landed the other day, weighing around 138 kilograms.

“I would say our fishing off here would be the best in New Zealand at the moment.”

Roger said it augured well for the Bay Bonanza fishing contest over the holiday anniversary weekend at the end of the month.

“I understand there has been a real rush on people buying game fishing gear — the fishing is that good out there.”