North Australian FISH FINDER TM forums

G’day all

Mal Miles & I have been discussing some options for Billfish comps, timing etc, the DGFC Billfish comp is run later in the year by the club to try to maximise the chances of calmer weather & sea conditions, the down side is by that time of the year the Billie numbers have generally slowed down.

What we were discussing is the possibility of running a trial outing say in June or July when the Billie numbers generally increase, but the weather can be less then favourable.

The idea would be to try & encourage enough boats to chase Billies on a weekend when the tides are best. What we would be trying to achieve is working off the normal comp times but on an hourly basis to ascertain Billfish raised, hooked & tagged eg 0800-0900, 0900-1000 etc etc.

What we would then be looking at is the outcome/stats on an hourly basis to assess if it would be viable to look at running a Billfish comp during that time of year with the obvious concern of strong trade winds coming into effect in the earlier hours of the day.

This is where the stats would come into play, if high enough amounts of Billies were raised/hooked/tagged in the later part of the day hour by hour break down it still may be a viable option to run a Billie comp at that time of year.

Say if the comp was staged out of Dundee & the weather was cr.p in the morning & moderated by 1100/1200, the run out to productive areas is under an hour & still gives enough time to rack up some fish??

If the comp were ever to actually go ahead at that time of year & the trade winds aren’t favourable/deemed safe at the normal lines in, lines in could be postponed until the weather was deemed safe & depending where the comp was run from the lines out may be extended another hour. At the end of the day if more fish were being raised, hooked & tagged in a shorter time frame later in the day it would still be viable. If like in 2009 the weather gods were good it would be a bonus. As an another option if the lines in for the Billie comp was postponed teams could still fish if they wanted to but no points would be awarded for Billies until the lines in call was made or other species could be targeted in the lee of the headlands to kill some time etc.

The only way to obtain a reasonable assessment if it’s viable is to run a trial & that would need about 20 boats minimum to give a ball park reflection, probably only run it over weekend & work on an average for the third day, as per the normal comp structure.

This is in no way a DGFC comp, no prizes, no winners, no cost etc other then your own outlay etc & not meant to reflect on our existing Billfish comp for 2010, maybe just FFF get together & BBQ after lines out or raft up at Point Jenny?? I haven’t run this by the DGFC committee, as I am just interested to see how many would be interested in putting their hands up & if found favourable, in the future it may aid in reassessing the timing of the DGFC comp for 2011?? let us know if you’re interested in the idea.

Mal & I have discussed some other ideas, lot more involved, mother ships etc, but more thought to go into that before throwing it out there for comment, cheers Balls.

Balls,
a great idea and I am very interested. Can see it as a great FFF get together where we can drink beer and swap notes at the end of each day.

Cheers...

Im in, im planning on clocking up another 200 or so hrs this dry down there so its more than likely ill be down that way wich ever weekend ya choose to go.

Im thinkin i might have a crack too after the excitement we experinced chasing them oversea late last year.....I have to get one for sure

Hi there this sounds like a great idea. I think Ben and I would be up for that but it depends on when as ben works away....cheers

IM KEEN

You can count me in, Bigfoot and Shawy would be in as well, so there's
three boats.
Great idea

G'day all

I hope to be heading down to Dundee on the weekend to chase a Billie, if any one else is down there & is willing to keep track of their details of Billies raised, hooked & tagged each hour, our Club (DGFC) would be really interested in the results, we aren't chasing your weigh points. We are still hoping to get a number of boats together soon & see what the stats are with a few more boats involved. If we run the Billfish comp early next year one of the things we will have to take into account is the possibilty of unfavourable wind/sea conditions in the morning & what sort of results we think can be achieved in a shorter fishing time when the wind drops out. The more info we can get with the different weather conditions/results will eventually determine the decision. If I get down there I will be in the 6m Quintrex navigator & probably staying in around Point Jenny or Blaze, Josh Ker should be floating around in the GS marine with the Green Hornet on the side, cheers Balls.