Light Tackle Jigging for GTs in the Philippines

[Castmaster]

I've moved back to the Philippines since Dec 2015.  Needed to feel the burn again and drag screaming run, so I joined a local fishing club.  I joined the Philippine Game Fishing Foundation (PGFF) fishing club and off I went with my friends
to Santa Ana Cagayan for a PGFF sponsored fishing tournament.  It was a 14 hour road trip to the northern most tip of Luzon island.  A place renowned for Blue and Black marlins, sailfish, hoos, and GTs.  My no.1 goal was to hookup a GT. It's been many years since I felt the drag screaming run of a GT when I was stationed in Guam.  The club has a very nice compound complete with airconditioned rooms with hot showers, a pool, full blown kitchen, launch ramp, and its own beach. The club also owned a couple of 23' pangas you can rent for about $100 per day + gas. There are also local banca outriggers you can hire if you choose to do so.
Truly an awesome place for anglers. As per my friends, jigging for GTs was a sure way to catch one. The 1st day was a light tackle competition limited to PE2 (20lb) main line. I was ill prepared, as most of my reels were loaded with 40lb and 80lb spectra.  The only reel I had loaded with PE2 line was my small Van Staal VM150
reel which I used for surffishing in OC. I didn't have any spare spool of PE2 lines either.  So the VM150 will have to do. The only problem was, by the time my jig reached the bottom and coupled with the drift of the boat and the currrent, I was only left with a few yards of spectra on the VM150. Hopefully you won't get bit
till the jig was halfway up and have more line to spare on the spool for the initial runs of the GT. So I briefed the boat captain to be fast and be on the ready to move if I got bit to offset the run of the GT,  The panga we rented had a fish finder, a must if you're jigging.  Unfortunately it wasn't working right.  So we were jigging blind. It's been quite some time since I did the vertical jigging.  It's quite exhausting.  Coupled with the tropical heat, it will dehydrate you fast. I was drinking gatorade like crazy. I did every jigging stroke known to jigging fanatics, (long stroke, short stroke, high pitch, low pitch) to include the Cali yoyo. It was a muscle numbing exercise. It was drift, drop, jig, reset, drift, drop, jig...over and over again till you got hit. I was dropping the 100gm gold colored Charkbait CB Wedge jig that my wifey picked while I was prepping and packing for the trip.  After so many drifts and drops, I was getting frustrated. Still, You gotta jig on.
Finally, on one of the drifts, I got hit hard! I looked at my spool, and I estimate I only had about 15 to 20 yards of line left.  I was screaming at the captain to start the engine as the GT started pulling line fast. Fortunately, the captain was on the ball, and the boat was moving in reverse, and I started recovering line.  I got my first GT on the boat in no time.  Between me and my boat buddy, we landed a total of 7 nice GTs, and some groupers at the end of the day to win the light tackle competition.

Link to the video of one of my GT hookups.

https://youtu.be/VGG3jQohXhI 

Beat up jig after GT hookups!



Light tackle tourney pic.

[Chris]

Pretty cool! GT are a lot of fun! I'm surprised you guys kept them. One of he few places that still does besides Hawaii.

[Castmaster]

Pretty cool! GT are a lot of fun! I'm surprised you guys kept them. One of he few places that still does besides Hawaii.

It was a tournament so we had to turn in our catch for the weigh-in. I really didn't care for the tournament I just wanted to feel the burn.  But since I had a boatmate and it's a team effort I had no choice. One of the biggest GT caught was cooked by the chef and was served for dinner. It was amazingly delicious!  First time I tasted GT

[Latimeria]

Wow!  Those are some incredible catches!

Long ways off from leopard sharks, but that's how to take the next step!